The Effects of High Stress on Attention

Abstract

Attentional narrowing – the involuntary reduction in the range of cues that can be utilized by an individual – represents a major threat in many complex data-rich domains. Still, very little empirical research has been conducted to better understand and overcome the problem, in large part because it is difficult to reliably induce the phenomenon in controlled settings. The present study examined the effectiveness of two factors – high attentional load and ego-threat - for inducing high levels of stress and attentional narrowing in the context of a simplified air traffic control (ATC) task. Five participants were asked to complete two simultaneous noticing tasks - one presented centrally, the other in the periphery of the screen. In the high stress condition, they also had to perform a concurrent paced addition task (high attentional load) and received false feedback on their performance (ego-threat). Performance on the two main ATC tasks and the addition task was measured. Subjective ratings were collected to assess participants’ anxiety levels. High attentional load and ego-threat increased participants’ anxiety level. Overall, performance on the ATC tasks suffered slightly during high stress, suggesting a reduction in the spread of attention. Also, performance on the addition was significantly reduced when performed concurrently with the ATC tasks, as compared to the training phase. The findings from this study represent an important step towards being able to induce and study attentional narrowing systematically and to develop countermeasures to this significant safety threat.