Dissertation Proposal Meeting

Date: Monday, August 22, 2022

Time: 10:30 AM

Location: JS Coon Room 148 or Virtual (https://gatech.zoom.us/j/97335134680?pwd=cVpONFQzZkJISkJIemlibm5KSHJnQT09)

Meeting ID: 973 3513 4680
Passcode: 995305

Advisor: Randall Engle, Ph.D. (Georgia Tech)

Dissertation Committee Members:

Eric Schumacher, Ph.D. (Georgia Tech)

Dobromir Rahnev, Ph.D. (Georgia Tech)

Mark Wheeler, Ph.D. (Georgia Tech)

Michael Beran, Ph.D. (Georgia State University)

Title: What determines how long we can sustain our attention? The influence of cognitive ability, resource depletion, task utility, internal distraction, and arousal on sustained attention.

Abstract:  The ability to sustain attention is critical for many everyday tasks and is often seen as a fundamental factor underlying differences in cognitive ability. Therefore, it is important to understand: what are the factors that influence how long we can voluntarily sustain our attention? I will use a novel sustained attention task to investigate how differences between individuals on various cognitive abilities is related to the ability to sustain attention over the short-term, in the range of seconds, and the long-term, in range of minutes. A failure to sustain attention can be due to one of several factors. For instance, while some models of sustained attention emphasize the depletion of resources as a source of performance decrements over time, other models highlight that diminishing task utility leads to greater disengagement from the task in favor of more rewarding activities. In a second study, therefore, I will investigate how several factors influence sustained attention: depletion of resources, changes in task utility, susceptibility to internal distraction, and changes in arousal. I will do this by manipulating task utility with a monetary reward and obtain measures of behavioral performance, self-report thought probes, eye gaze, pupil size, and heart rate on a novel sustained attention task.