Dataset Information

Some See It, Some Don't: Exploring the Relation between Inattentional Blindness and Personality Factors.

ABSTRACT: Human awareness is highly limited, which is vividly demonstrated by the phenomenon that unexpected objects go unnoticed when attention is focused elsewhere (inattentional blindness). Typically, some people fail to notice unexpected objects while others detect them instantaneously. Whether this pattern reflects stable individual differences is unclear to date. In particular, hardly anything is known about the influence of personality on the likelihood of inattentional blindness. To fill this empirical gap, we examined the role of multiple personality factors, namely the Big Five, BIS/BAS, absorption, achievement motivation, and schizotypy, in these failures of awareness. In a large-scale sample (N = 554), susceptibility to inattentional blindness was associated with a low level of openness to experience and marginally with a low level of achievement motivation. However, in a multiple regression analysis, only openness emerged as an independent, negative predictor. This suggests that the general tendency to be open to experience extends to the domain of perception. Our results complement earlier work on the possible link between inattentional blindness and personality by demonstrating, for the first time, that failures to consciously perceive unexpected objects reflect individual differences on a fundamental dimension of personality.

SUBMITTER: Kreitz C

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4443971 | biostudies-literature |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Similar Datasets

Project description:BackgroundHuman factors are increasingly being recognised as vital components of safe surgical care. One such human cognitive factor: inattention blindness (IB), describes the inability to perceive objects despite being visible, typically when one's attention is focused on another task. This may contribute toward operative 'never-events' such as retained foreign objects and wrong-site surgery.MethodsAn 8-week, mindfulness-based intervention (MBI) programme, adapted for surgeons, was delivered virtually. Neurosurgical trainees and recent staff-appointees who completed the MBI were compared against a control group, matched in age, sex and grade. Attention and IB were tested using two operative videos. In each, participants were first instructed to focus on a specific part of the procedure and assessed (attention), then questioned on a separate but easily visible aspect within the operative field (inattention). If a participant were 'inattentionally blind' they would miss significant events occurring outside of their main focus. Median absolute error (MAE) scores were calculated for both attention and inattention. A generalised linear model was fitted for each, to determine the independent effect of mindfulness intervention on MAE.ResultsThirteen neurosurgeons completed the mindfulness training (age, 30 years [range 27-35]; female:male, 5:8), compared to 15 neurosurgeons in the control group (age, 30 years [27-42]; female:male, 6:9). There were no significant demographic differences between groups. MBI participants demonstrated no significant differences on attention tasks as compared to controls (t = -1.50, p = 0.14). For inattention tasks, neurosurgeons who completed the MBI had significantly less errors (t = -2.47, p = 0.02), after adjusting for participant level and video differences versus controls. We found that both groups significantly improved their inattention error rate between videos (t = -11.37, p < 0.0001). In spite of this, MBI participants still significantly outperformed controls in inattention MAE in the second video following post-hoc analysis (MWU = 137.5, p = 0.05).DiscussionNeurosurgeons who underwent an eight-week MBI had significantly reduced inattention blindness errors as compared to controls, suggesting mindfulness as a potential tool to increase vigilance and prevent operative mistakes. Our findings cautiously support further mindfulness evaluation and the implementation of these techniques within the neurosurgical training curriculum.

Dataset Information

Some See It, Some Don't: Exploring the Relation between Inattentional Blindness and Personality Factors.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets