Attention and memory in mammals and primates

In order to behave effectively in a complicated world, it is important that we can focus our attention selectively on certain stimuli at the expense of others. Here, we review evidence from behavioral and neuroscientific studies of this process of selective attention in vision, hearing, and touch. Our particular focus for this chapter is the enduring debate over the stage of processing at which unattended information is excluded. This chapter describes the origins of this debate and highlights some of the most important empirical and theoretical work to have emerged from studies of this issue in recent years.