Inattentional Blindness

Take This Attention Test

How many times does the team in white t-shirts pass the ball?

What is Inattentional Blindness?

Inattentional blindness is when someone fails to perceive something that is in plain sight only because they are not paying attention to it. Did you see the dancing gorilla in the video? Often when people are specifically focusing on something else they miss very obvious things that are in plain sight!

Psychologists test inattentional blindness by asking participants to pay attention to specific sounds or visual cues. They then add something else in (like a loud noise or a moon walking bear) to see if participants saw or heard the other stimulus.

Questions to Consider

Why would people fail to notice things that are right in front of them?

Why do distractions cause you not to notice things?

What would help you notice the moon-walking bear?

What are some examples about how this happens in the real world? (Hint: look up how to do magic and card tricks)

If you choose this topic, you will...

Learn more about the senses, attention, and inattentional blindness

Identify different tasks that test inattentional blindness in science and in the real world

Generate ideas about why inattentional blindness occurs and how it might differ with based on things about an individual (example: how old they are, if they are boys or girls, if they know alot about what you are asking them to do)