Basic properties of attention and their conditioning

Sphere of attention

Concentration of consciousness is not all-encompassing. Only those objects, the study of which is determined by some necessity, fall into the sphere of concentration of consciousness. These may be the following circumstances:

• social necessity;
• subjective interest of a person, resulting from his inclinations or field of activity.

The sphere of mental activity is closely interconnected with everyday activities and ensures certain successes in understanding the world, studying, and work. The degree of a person’s learning ability and even his ability to communicate with other people and conflict-free communication depends on it.

This psychological process plays a crucial role both in the process of memorization and in the reproduction of previously recorded images from memory.

Varieties (classification of types of attention)

As a result of the study of psychological processes, several varieties of this physiological phenomenon were identified. Each of them has certain characteristics.

The types of attention in psychology are distinguished as follows:

• involuntary;
• arbitrary;
• post-voluntary.

Involuntary view

Its features include the absence of a person’s conscious choice when choosing an object. This becomes possible in the case of a fairly strong irritant that forces one to take a break from selected daily activities. Examples of objects of involuntary concentration can be:

• unexpected noise;
• a new person in the team;
• bright moving object;
• any phenomenon unusual for the current time and place.

Objects that attract involuntary attention distract from everyday activities, cause a strong emotional response, and can make it difficult to perform current tasks and make decisions. High-intensity stimulation can permanently reduce the ability to concentrate (for example, something that causes severe stress, fear). Managing involuntary concentration is quite difficult, since it can be very closely related to subconscious internal attitudes.

This type of attention prevails, as a rule, in children of preschool and primary school age. This is related to the peculiarities of presenting information in preschool institutions and primary schools - in the form of vivid images that arouse the interest of children. This style of presenting material contributes to faster and easier assimilation of information by preschool children, and also creates the basis for the development of their imagination and creative potential due to strong connections with the emotional sphere.

Free variety

The main characteristic of this mental process is conscious concentration on the object of concentration. The main condition for the formation of voluntary attention is the presence of motivation. That is, a person must understand the importance of concentrating on a specific object. Conscious concentration on a specific task requires volitional effort and tension of mental activity. After all, a person must focus on a certain object or task, even if the essence of this phenomenon is not interesting to him (an example would be the need to prepare for an exam at the end of the semester).

The inherent qualities of voluntary concentration of consciousness are stability and perseverance.

Prolonged concentration of voluntary attention is fraught with the development of a state of fatigue and even severe overwork. This is precisely why recommendations are made to take regular breaks during intense intellectual work, going out into the fresh air or doing simple physical exercises.

Reading books during such breaks is not recommended, because by switching the focus of attention from one stream of information to another, the brain will not have time to rest.

Postarbitrary type

This variety is characterized by high motivation to achieve goals. It differs from voluntary concentration in that internal motivation predominates here. Therefore, post-voluntary attention is characterized by the absence of tension of the person performing the task.

It is this type of attention that gives significant results and is highly productive.

Attention (Dubrovina I.V.)

Any human activity requires highlighting an object and focusing on it.
K.S. Stanislavsky noted: “Attention to an object evokes a natural need to do something with it. Action focuses attention even more on the object. Thus, attention, merging with action and intertwining, creates a strong connection with the object.” Attention

- this is the direction and concentration of our consciousness on a specific object. The object of attention can be anything - objects, phenomena, relationships, properties of objects, actions, thoughts, feelings of other people and your own inner world.

Attention is not an independent mental function. This is a special form of human mental activity; it is included as a necessary component in all types of mental processes. Attention is a characteristic of any mental process: perception, when we listen, examine, sniff, trying to distinguish any visual or sound image, smell; thinking when we solve some problem; memory, when we remember or try to remember something specific; imagination, when we try to clearly imagine something. Therefore, attention

- this is the ability to choose what is important for oneself and focus one’s perception, thinking, remembering, imagination, etc. on it.

P.Ya. Halperin noted that, firstly, attention nowhere acts as an independent process. Both for the person himself and for external observation, it reveals itself as the direction, mood and concentration of any mental activity. And secondly, attention does not have its own separate, specific product. Its result is the improvement of every activity to which it is attached.

Both schoolchildren and students, no matter how talented or capable they are, will always have gaps in knowledge if their attention is not sufficiently developed, if they are often inattentive or absent-minded in class. Attention largely determines the course and results of educational work.

There is a distinction between external and internal attention. External attention

directed at surrounding objects and phenomena,
internal -
at one’s own thoughts, feelings and experiences.

Behind attention there are always the needs, motives, goals, and attitudes of the subject. Focus of attention

defined as readiness for action.
Concentration of attention
presupposes its organization, which ensures depth, completeness and clarity of display in the consciousness of objects with which the subject interacts.

Attention is a necessary condition for the quality performance of any activity. It performs the function of control and is especially necessary in any learning, when a person is faced with new knowledge, objects, and phenomena.

The physiological basis of attention is made up of orienting-exploratory reflexes, which are caused by new stimuli or unexpected changes in the situation. I.P. Pavlov called these reflexes “what is it?” reflexes. He wrote: “Every minute every new stimulus that falls on us causes a corresponding movement on our part in order to become better and more fully aware of this stimulus. We peer into the emerging image, listen to the sounds that arise, intensely inhale the smell that touches us, and, if a new object is near us, we try to touch it and generally strive to embrace or capture any new phenomenon or object... with the appropriate sense organs.”

Thanks to the orienting-exploratory reflex, the impact of a new object on the human nervous system becomes stronger and more diverse. In those parts of the cerebral cortex that are exposed to new stimuli, a fairly strong and stable focus of excitation is created (dominant, according to the definition of A.A. Ukhtomsky, who created the doctrine of the dominant - a focus of excitation with increased stability). The presence of a dominant focus of excitation in the cerebral cortex makes it possible to understand the degree of a person’s concentration on any object or phenomenon, when extraneous stimuli are unable to cause distraction and go unnoticed.

K. D. Ushinsky noted the enormous role of attention in mental activity: “... attention is precisely the door through which everything that enters the human soul from the outside world passes.”

Attention develops gradually and at a certain level of development it becomes a property of the individual, its permanent feature, which is called attentiveness.

An attentive person is an observant person, he perceives his surroundings quite fully and accurately, and his studies and work are more successful than those of a person who does not have this personality trait.

A person’s attentiveness is manifested not only in understanding the world and carrying out activities, but also in relationships with other people. Sensitivity, responsiveness, understanding of the moods and experiences of another person, the ability to grasp the slightest nuances of his feelings and desires and the ability to take all this into account in his behavior and communication with him distinguish a person who is attentive to people and indicates a fairly high development of personality.

Attention to a person is an external manifestation of internal culture, or intelligence, which is based on respect for another person. “It seems to me,” recalled People’s Artist of the USSR S. Giatsintova, “the artist of the Art Theater Vasily Ivanovich Kachalov is the standard of such qualities. He walked along the street - and you’ll admire him. Both modestly and festively... He certainly remembered all the names and patronymics of the people he met. He organically respected people and was always interested in them. With him, every woman felt attractive, a gentle creature, worthy of care. The men felt smart and very much needed by Kachalov at the moment. Vasily Ivanovich seemed to “absorb into himself other people’s lives, faces, characters, and he was among people like a holiday, like human beauty and nobility.”

Attention has its external expression - the peculiarity of the posture, the turn of the head, the expression and movement of the eyes.

Attention can be involuntary (unintentional) and voluntary (intentional). The term “arbitrary” is formed not from the word “arbitrariness”, but from the word “volition”, meaning will, desire.

Involuntary attention

does not depend either on our desire, or on our will or intentions. It happens, arises as if by itself, without any effort on our part.

What can attract involuntary attention? There are a lot of such objects and phenomena; they can be divided into groups:

— bright light phenomena (lightning, colorful advertising, lights suddenly turned on or off);

- unexpected taste sensations (bitterness, acidity, unfamiliar taste);

- something new (a new dress from a friend, a new car passing by, a changed color and expression on the face of the person you just talked to, etc.);

- objects and phenomena that evoke emotional surprise, admiration, delight in a person (paintings by artists, music, various manifestations of nature: sunset or sunrise, picturesque banks of a river, a gentle calm or a menacing storm at sea, etc.), with many aspects of reality seem to fall out of his field of attention.

Remember the fable by I.A. Krylov “Curious”:

Dear friend, great! Where have you been?" - “In the Kunstkamera, my friend! I walked there for three hours; ...It’s truly a chamber of miracles there! Nature is gifted with inventions! What animals, what birds I have never seen! What butterflies, bugs, boogers, flies, cockroaches! Some are like emerald, others are like coral! How tiny the cows are! There are, really, less than a pinhead!” - “Have you seen an elephant? What a look! I, tea, did you think that you met a mountain?” - “Is he really there?” - "There". - “Well, brother, it’s my fault: I didn’t even notice the Elephant.”

A person’s attention can be attracted by everything that is interesting and important to him.

We watch, for example, an interesting film or some TV show that is interesting to us, and our attention is directed to the screen without any effort. An ordinary person will not pay attention to any traces in the forest. But the attention of the hunter, the tracker will be literally absorbed by these traces. And the mushroom picker’s attention will be directed to something else:

A mushroom hides behind a stump, a bird lands on a stump. Our shadow is a landmark for us, so as not to go astray.

B. Pasternak.

"Pick mushrooms"

A book on dog breeding will arouse the involuntary attention of a dog handler (a person who professionally studies dogs). This book will be uninteresting and will not attract the attention of a person who does not care about dogs.

Most often, what is interesting for a person is what is connected with his main, favorite activities, with the thing that is important to him.

In addition to the strength and surprise of stimuli, involuntary attention can also be caused by the contrast of stimuli.

It is known that the transition from silence to noise, from quiet speech to loud one attracts attention. For example:

“Cold rain poured incessantly for several days. A wet wind rustled in the garden... One night I woke up from a strange sensation. It seemed to me that I had gone deaf in my sleep. I lay with my eyes closed, listened for a long time and finally realized that I was not deaf, but that there was simply an extraordinary silence outside the walls of the house. Such silence is called “dead”. The rain died, the wind died, the noisy, restless garden died. You could only hear the cat snoring in its sleep” (K. Paustovsky. “Farewell to Summer”). Teachers often use these transitions as a means of capturing students' attention. If the teacher suddenly lowers the strength of his voice or becomes silent for a minute, he will involuntarily attract the attention of the students.

Involuntary attention can also be caused by the internal state of the body.

A person experiencing a feeling of hunger cannot help but pay attention to the smell of food, the clinking of spoons and forks, and the appearance of a plate of food.

When it comes to involuntary attention, we can say that it is not we who pay attention to certain objects, but they themselves capture our attention. But sometimes, and quite often, you have to make an effort - to tear yourself away from an interesting book or other interesting activity and start doing something else, deliberately switching your attention to another object. Here we are already dealing with voluntary (intentional) attention,

when a person sets himself a specific goal and makes efforts to achieve it. In other words, a person has certain intentions and he makes efforts (himself, of his own free will) to realize this intention. Conscious purpose, intention is always expressed in words.

The ability to voluntarily direct and maintain attention developed in a person in the process of work, since without this it is impossible to carry out long-term and systematic work activities.

Educational activities place high demands on the level of development of voluntary attention. The development and strengthening of voluntary attention is facilitated by:

- a person’s awareness of the significance of the task: the more important the task, the stronger the desire to complete it, the more attention is attracted;

- interest in the final result of the activity forces you to remind yourself that you need to be attentive;

- asking questions as the activity progresses, the answers to which require attention;

- a verbal report of what has already been done and what still needs to be done;

— a certain organization of activity. Voluntary attention sometimes turns into so-called post-voluntary attention.

One of the conditions for such a transition is interest in a certain activity. While the activity is not very interesting, it requires a strong-willed effort from a person to concentrate on it. For example, in order to solve a mathematical problem (write an essay), you yourself must constantly keep your attention on it. However, sometimes solving a problem becomes such an interesting task for a person that the tension weakens, and sometimes disappears completely - all attention itself is focused on this activity and is no longer distracted by the conversations of other people, the sounds of music, etc. Then we can say that attention is from the voluntary has again become involuntary or post-voluntary (post-voluntary).

There are five properties of attention: concentration, stability, volume, distribution and switching. All of the listed properties of attention can manifest themselves in all types of attention - involuntary, voluntary and post-voluntary.

Concentration

- this is maintaining attention on one object or one activity while distracting from everything else.
Focus of attention is usually associated with deep, effective interest in an activity, some event or fact. The degree or strength of concentration is the concentration or intensity of attention. Concentration
is the absorption of attention on one object or one activity.
An indicator of intensity
is the inability to distract attention from the subject of activity by extraneous stimuli. For example, a child puts together a new construction set. He is completely absorbed in his work, is not distracted for a minute, does not notice how time passes, does not respond to phone calls, you can call him, call him to dinner - he does not answer, and sometimes he does not even hear. In this case, we can talk about great concentration and intensity of attention.

Sustainability

- this is a long-term retention of attention on an object or some activity. Sustained attention is one that can remain continuously focused on one subject or the same work for a long time. I.P. Pavlov said about his work: “This is, first of all, stubborn concentration of thought, the ability to persistently think about the chosen subject, go to bed with it and get up with it.”

The opposite of stable attention is unstable, wavering,

which every now and then is weakened or diverted to the side.

The attention span of different people varies. Some can concentrate on the subject of their activity for a very long time, without distraction, while others have this ability to a much lesser extent. But the stability of attention can fluctuate in the same person. This depends on awareness of the purpose of the activity and its significance, on the attitude towards the work being performed.

You can trace fluctuations in attention when perceiving dual images, for example, large and small squares. If you look at such a drawing for several minutes, you will notice that the smaller square is either pushed forward - it is in front of the larger one, or it “falls through” - the large square moves to the foreground.

Attention cannot stay long on a stationary object (for example, a point on a sheet) if we cannot examine it from different angles. The richer an object is in its various properties, the easier it is to focus attention on it for a long time. For example, reading a meaningful book, watching a play, talking with an interesting person, the content of a picturesque landscape.

Volume

- this is the number of objects that are covered by attention simultaneously, at the same time. The attention span usually ranges from 4 to 6 objects in adults, and from 2 to 5 objects in schoolchildren (depending on age).

A person with a greater attention span can notice more objects, phenomena, and events. The scope of attention largely depends on knowledge of objects and their connections with each other.

To determine the amount of attention, they use a special device called a tachistocope.

(from the Greek words “tachistos” - the fastest and “skopeo” - I look). This device makes it possible to show a person several objects - letters, geometric shapes, signs - for 0.1 s. How many objects a person remembers is his attention span.

Attention span is important to consider in many areas of life. For example, the creator of an advertisement wants any passerby, taking a fleeting glance at the billboard, to understand and remember its content. To do this, the advertisement must contain no more than five words. If there are more of them, then it is useful to clearly highlight a few of the most important words, but their number should not exceed four to six.

A person standing at a machine control panel in a large modern production facility must take in several devices at one glance. The breadth of attention span is also professionally important for a teacher.

Distribution of attention

is the ability to perform two or more different activities while maintaining your attention on them. Can attention be divided simultaneously between two or more different activities? Maybe life constantly requires this. For example, a student at a lecture simultaneously distributes attention between what he is writing down and what he is hearing at the moment. The teacher's attention is distributed to the whole class, to individual children, to the content of the lesson, etc. The ability to distribute attention varies among people. They say that Napoleon could do seven things at once.

To successfully perform two jobs at the same time, at least one of them must be known so well that it is performed automatically, by itself, and the person only consciously controls and regulates it from time to time. In this case, the main attention can be paid to the second job, which is less familiar to the person.

The ability to distribute your attention develops gradually with age. Thus, younger schoolchildren do not distribute attention well, they do not yet know how to do this, they do not have experience, automatic skills, so they should not be asked to do two things at the same time or, when doing one thing, to distract the child’s attention to another. But it is necessary to promote the development of this skill.

Switching

- this is a conscious and meaningful movement of attention from one object or action to another, this is a restructuring of attention, its transition from one object to another in connection with a change in the task of the activity. An essential aspect of attention is its switching, i.e. the ability to quickly move from one activity to another. Conscious switching of attention should not be confused with distractibility of attention.

The success of the switch depends on the characteristics of the previous and new activities and on the personal qualities of the person. If the previous job is interesting, but the next one is not, then switching is difficult, and vice versa.

Switching attention is always accompanied by some tension, which is expressed in volitional effort. This makes it clear why it can be difficult for a student to start a new job, especially if he doesn’t really like it, and the previous activity, on the contrary, was more interesting. For example, switching attention to the lesson from the activities that the children were doing during recess. Frequently changing types of work during educational activities can cause great difficulties for schoolchildren.

If, while distracted, a person changes the object of attention involuntarily, then by switching attention, he consciously sets a goal to do something new.

Attention switches faster and easier from an object that is less important to the individual to a more significant one.

The individual characteristics of a person are clearly manifested in the switching of attention - some people can quickly move to a new activity, while others slowly and with difficulty. Different activities require different forms of attention. For example, the work of a proofreader requires high concentration of attention, the work of an educator or teacher requires the ability to distribute attention.

Attention and distraction.

Attention is usually opposed to absent-mindedness. In our language, absent-mindedness is often understood as a synonym for inattention. Remember the poem by S.Ya. Marshak: “Abstracted from Basseynaya Street”: “Instead of a hat, he put on a frying pan as he walked, and instead of felt boots, he pulled gloves onto his heels.”

However, absent-mindedness and inattention do not always coincide with each other.

Absent-mindedness

may be the result of instability, weakness of attention. A person cannot concentrate on anything for a long time; his attention constantly jumps from one thing to another. For example, such attention is typical for children; it is also observed in adults, especially in a state of fatigue, during illness.

But absent-mindedness can also have a completely different reason. A person is so strongly focused on one object, activity, that he is unable to notice anything else, and therefore is absent-minded. For example, many scientists do not pay any attention to everyday problems, the objects around them, etc. This absent-mindedness is an expression of maximum concentration and concentration on the main subject of one’s thoughts. Such people have a strong attention, but narrow and inactive. K.K. Platonov in his book “Entertaining Psychology” cites such an episode. Newton decided to boil an egg. Taking his watch, he noticed the start of cooking. And after some time, he suddenly discovered that he was holding an egg in his hands, and was boiling it for... hours. But when the scientist was once asked how he managed to discover the law of gravity, he replied: “Thanks to the fact that I constantly thought about this question.”

One of the reasons for inattention is insufficient mental activity. Personal orientation plays a huge role in the development of attention.

Dubrovina I.V. and others. Psychology: Textbook for students. avg. ped. textbook institutions / I. V. Dubrovina, E. E. Danilova, A. M. Prikhozhan; Ed. I. V. Dubrovina. — 2nd ed., stereotype. - M.: Publishing House, 2003. - 464 p. pp. 143-153.

Properties of attention

Each of the qualities pursues its own goals. This makes it possible to perform a wide variety of tasks. The characteristics of attention are very closely related to the components of personality:

• Concentration is intentional focus on the task at hand or a given object. A person can effectively focus on a specific object for 30–40 minutes.
• Volume. This refers to the number of tasks or objects that a person can hold in the sphere of sustained concentration.
• Stability is the ability to concentrate on one object or task for a long period of time without switching to other stimuli. If a person tends to be distracted by numerous external stimuli, this is a sign of lability (one of the disorders) of attention.
• Switchability. This is a conscious, voluntary redirection of the focus of attention. As a rule, this property is due to external circumstances. If a shift in attention occurs under the influence of minor changes in the situation and occurs unintentionally, we are talking about a disorder called distractibility. Often, the switchability of attention depends on concentration: with a high degree of concentration, it is quite difficult to switch it from one object to another. Switchability is a necessary parameter, since it is this that provides the opportunity for rest when moving from one type of activity to another.
• Distribution. This property characterizes the ability to concentrate on several objects or tasks at once, of approximately equal importance. The need to distribute attention, as a rule, entails the rapid onset of a state of fatigue.

The role of context and state

All of the above experiments showed that contextual memory is involved. This means that information is remembered better if the context in which the information was received is repeated (this could be the environment, room, circle of people, etc.).

The second significant factor influencing students' concentration is their personal state during the learning and testing process. It is believed that memory depends on physical and mental state. If a person is healthy and feels good during training, but gets sick before the exam (as well as vice versa), then his result will not be the highest. Conditions can be very different: depression, severe anxiety, hangover, sadness, nervous excitement, etc. These are all distractions that affect learning.

Methods for developing attention

The ability to concentrate is not an immutable, unchanging value. It can be strengthened, developed, trained with the help of exercises developed specifically for this purpose.

Today, there are various techniques for improving the ability of this physiological mechanism:

• development of concentration;
• development of visual concentration;
• development of auditory attention.

Concentration training

Having chosen an arbitrary object for observation at your discretion, it is recommended to concentrate your attention on it for a certain period of time, the duration of which should be gradually increased in the future. The easier the chosen object is to perceive, the easier it will be to cope with the task - this is important for starting training when you are not yet in the habit of concentrating on the object.

An example would be concentrating on a particular book, thinking about who it was written and what it was about, about the characters and plot, about what paper it was made of, what trees were involved in the production process, what color, shape, etc. thickness, format. This exercise is effective for developing focus and increasing the duration of concentration on one object.

By developing the acquired concentration skill, you can train to keep 2, and later more, objects in your sphere of attention. In this case, the ability to retain in memory all the noticed qualities of all objects will be an indicator of training.

A modification of this exercise would be to hold several objects in memory, switching attention from one to another and remembering the key properties of each of them.

Visual attention

This exercise expands your ability to concentrate on a subject. In addition, it develops the ability to notice features that are not obvious at first glance - observation. For example, looking at a certain object for 3-5 minutes, it is recommended to note all its properties and qualities:

• color;
• shape;
• size;
• height;
• material.

For convenience, you can briefly record the characteristics of the object being studied.

The exercise is to identify new details and smallest details while studying the object in more detail. With proper practice, with each new exercise, the list of noticed features of the object will become longer and longer.

There is a theory that this method of developing mindfulness with a systematic approach works at any age, at any period of life and in any occupation. The main condition for success, as with any training, is systematic repetition of the exercises.

Auditory Focus

To train this type of mindfulness, it is recommended to concentrate on sounds. For example, when listening to human speech, concentration on the sounding voice is implied:

• speech rate analysis;
• degree of emotionality;
• the degree of usefulness of the information presented for a particular individual.

With developed auditory concentration, analysis of voice timbre and speech rate does not interfere with the perception of the meaning of what is said.

Controlling the concentration of consciousness

Many people face the need for such a skill. This skill helps you fully concentrate on your work, ignoring all external stimuli and noticing only that external information that is really important.

To achieve mastery in controlling the concentration of consciousness, the ability to consciously direct its flow to a particular object, exercises for the development of visual and auditory attention and its concentration will help.

Functions of attention

Comparative characteristics of the functions and their meaning can be presented in the form of a table:

The insufficiency of one or another function is fraught with the formation of instability and absent-mindedness (a person creates the impression of being absent-minded, inattentive, and poorly absorbing the material). This lack of functionality has a negative impact at work: the time it takes to complete each individual task is extended, resulting in increased fatigue, insufficient accuracy and reduced productivity.

conclusions

So, the universal truth has not changed in the course of research - in general, distraction has a negative impact on the learning process. Therefore, to improve attention and concentration, it is better to find a quiet place, put your smartphone or other tempting devices away and concentrate entirely on your studies. Scientists have proven once again that context and state greatly influence the completion of tasks and their effectiveness.

The recommendations, therefore, are as follows: if you know that your friends are likely to distract you during the test, then it is really better to study and prepare for it among friends. Try to create conditions similar to those in which you will find yourself during testing and you will cope well with it. A similar emotional state during preparation and passing the test can also help. But be sure to remember that this is just context, and the only thing that really matters is knowledge. You should study diligently, try not only and not so much to memorize information, but strive to understand it. This will help keep it in your memory for years, not just until the end of the session.