A lexicon of attention: From cognitive science to phenomenology

99LEXICON OF ATTENTION

Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences 2: 99–132, 2003. © 2003 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.

A lexicon of attention: From cognitive science to phenomenology

P. SVEN ARVIDSONDepartment of Philosophy, Seattle University, Seattle, WA 98122, USA(E-mail: [email protected])

Received 21 October 2001; received in revised version 7 August 2002

Abstract. This article tries to create a bridge of understanding between cognitive scientistsand phenomenologists who work on attention. In light of a phenomenology of attention andcurrent psychological and neuropsychological literature on attention, I translate and interpretinto phenomenological terms 20 key cognitive science concepts as examined in the labora-tory and used in leading journals. As a preface to the lexicon, I outline a phenomenology ofattention, especially as a dynamic three-part structure, which I have freely amended from thework of phenomenologist and Gestalt philosopher Aron Gurwitsch (1901–1973). As a con-clusion, I discuss the nature of subjectivity in attention and attention research, and whetherattention might be the same as consciousness.

Key words: attention, consciousness, Gurwitsch, margin, thematic context, theme

Phenomenological philosophers studying attention increasingly express acuteinterest in the findings of cognitive scientists. Meanwhile, more cognitivescientists engaged in attention research are making room for reflective meth-odological critique and first person report, two things that a phenomenol-ogy of science would prescribe, and are occasionally using traditionalphenomenological terminology and the term “phenomenology” itself. Howdoes the cognitive scientist’s terminology translate from the laboratory to aphenomenology of attention? As a preface to an abridged translation lexicon,I will outline a model of the dynamic structure of the field of attention, whichI have freely amended from the work of phenomenologist Aron Gurwitsch(1901–1973), a student of Edmund Husserl. Then, in light of that model, I willtranslate some key cognitive science terms into phenomenological ones. Theresult is a kind of cognitive science-phenomenology lexicon for attentionresearchers, an abridged, basic translation dictionary. I will also pick out twospecial questions for further discussion: where or what is the attending sub-ject in the field of attention, and is the field of attention identically the sameas the field of consciousness.

100 P. SVEN ARVIDSON

Preface: The phenomenological language of attention – theme,thematic context, margin

I will take “attention” to be much larger and more varied in taxonomy than iscurrently allowed in cognitive science and phenomenology. In my opinion,the work of Gurwitsch and Husserl point to and anticipate this larger defini-tion of attention, but I harbor no illusions that they (or their commentators)would find it fully acceptable.1 Eventually, this expansion of the definitionmeans that the functional differentiation between attention and consciousness(as intentionality) melts away. I address this controversial issue later, and soask the reader’s indulgence if this identification seems premature or unwar-ranted. Also, even if this identification between consciousness and attentionis wrong, the description of the attentional field given below is not necessar-ily spurious on that account, and the translation dictionary remains unaffected.

The new approach to the field of attention described here, following andamending Gurwitsch (1964, 1966, 1985), is that the field of attention is adynamic tension of transformations of content involving dimensional organi-zation principles (Gestalt-coherence of the theme, unity by relevance of thethematic context, co-presence of the margin) and transformation principles(serial-shifting, context-shifting, enlargement, elucidation, synthesis, singlingout, restructuration, etc.). I have written about these attentional organizationalprinciples and transformations previously (Arvidson 1996, 1998, 2000) andillustrated some of the transformations (“attention shifts”) in a simple on-linegraphic that is meant to be viewed along with this article.2

Gurwitsch (1966, pp. 267–268) writes that the total field of consciousnesscan be symbolized by a circle (see Figure 1): “The theme with which we aredealing occupies the center of this circle; it stands in the thematic field, which– to abide by the metaphor – forms the area of the circle; and around the the-matic field, at the periphery as it were, the objects of marginal consciousnessare arranged.”

For the purposes of this paper, figure, focus, and theme are taken as roughlyequivalent terms, as are ground, thematic field, and thematic context. I prefer“thematic context” to Gurwitsch’s “thematic field” for a number of reasonsand I will substitute it when referring to this dimension and paraphrasingGurwitsch. I mean nothing more by the new term, but it is more descriptive,aligns better with current cognitive science terminology, and alleviates pos-sible confusion with his other uses of the term “field.”

My visual perception of a coffee mug in a café may involve focally attend-ing to the mug (as the theme), and contextually attending to the café counteron which it sits and the server as she withdraws from the counter (as part of


the thematic context), and marginally attending to the fact that I am standingrather than sitting, that there are ambient conversations and noises of coffeeprocessing machines, etc. Notice I have implied that there is a type of atten-tion appropriate to each of the three realms: one type appropriate to the themeor focus, another type of attention appropriate to the thematic context, andanother to the margin. Like almost all who discuss “attention,” Gurwitschappeared to reserve the term for focal (thematic) attention only.3

Also, attention is not static and neither is this model. Extending the exam-ple to a cross-modal transformation of attention, it’s possible that one of thewords in one of the conversations grabs my attention and becomes focal, forexample, I think I hear my name. As the content of the previous focus, con-text and margin recede or are replaced, new contents are achieved. For exam-ple, there is now an orienting or reorienting response that at least at firstinvolves my name as theme, with a new thematic context (e.g., my friendswho I did not know were present) which itself may transform quickly, andnew marginal content (e.g., the new embodied sense since I have turnedaround, the contents of the previous theme and thematic context which maynow be marginal, etc.).

There are two initial points here: the field of attention consists of three dis-tinctive dimensions, regions, types or levels of attention (theme, thematic

Figure 1. A rendering of Gurwitsch’s descriptions of the field of consciousness.


context, margin); and attention is dynamic – transforming or shifting contentand content relations without violating this three-part structure. An implica-tion is that each dimension of attention has its own organizing principle.

The theme or focus of attention is organized by Gestalt-coherence – a func-tional significance of the constituents of the theme for the whole (Gurwitsch1964, pp. 138, 358). The coffee mug in the example is not reducible to its parts,although it may be later analyzed (another transformation of attention). It isalso not the same as the context in which it appears. Since it is thematicallypresented content organized by Gestalt-coherence, the mug is presented (forthat moment) as central, consolidated and segregated from the background (thethematic context). Any content can be thematic, but a theme does not have tobe fully coherent (Gurwitsch 1964, pp. 103, 336n). Focal attention can shiftto new content before the previous content was fully stable. Or the contentcan be evanescent, as in the tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon. Theme formationcan be and often is interrupted, incomplete, somewhat fragmented, etc., oralternatively, almost instantly complete. On the whole, attention is not like awaltz. It is more like a variable dance with an eclectic-minded DJ – a dance atwhich the musical content and activities transform frequently – styles (waltz,jazz, polka, hip-hop), tempo (allegro, andante), partners (alone, group, triad),gyrations (twist, hop, lean, step), and so on. In each case of theme formation,to the extent that content is thematic or focal, it is central, consolidated, andsegregated from the thematic context. Also, within the theme itself, the con-tent is not necessarily homogenous or horizontalized. A crowd of people canbe presented as thematic, with two or three people emphasized. They are pre-sented as the formative constituents for that theme, and the rest of the crowdas formed constituents (Gurwitsch 1966, pp. 190, 209; cf., Vecera, Behrmann,and Filapek 2001, p. 319). But selectively attending to these three people,singling out these three as theme, replaces the crowd with a new theme (thistriad), that now has new formative and formed constituents (as well as newthematic context relations).

The thematic context is organized by unity by relevance – any thematiccontext content has material relevance for the theme and for other thematiccontext content (Gurwitsch 1964, p. 341). Even though the theme is segre-gated from the thematic context, the theme is materially connected to the the-matic context, as the center of orientation for it. The content of the thematiccontext is presented as Gestalts that are more or less formulated, some vague,some clear, complete, incomplete, etc. Unlike the theme, the content is notcentrally consolidated and segregated in the field of attention.4 We can simul-taneously contextually attend to content that is more relevant to the theme andto other content less relevant. The more relevant content is more intensely


experienced than the less relevant, and the former is nearer the theme whilethe latter is in more remote zones of the thematic context. But even more re-mote zones are still relevant to the theme, if only in pointing reference. Also,the thematic context does not end but presents an “indefinite continuation ofcontext” (Gurwitsch 1964, pp. 379–380). In the example, if I am contextu-ally presented with the withdrawing server as relevant for the thematic coffeemug, I may be presented with her withdrawing hand as more intensely rel-evant (but not thematic) than the rest of her body. That she is wearing a uni-form, or is part of a team of servers, etc., may be even more remote but stillrelevant. But this gradation is only within this one dimension of thematiccontext, and so does not include thematic or marginal content (Arvidson1992b). The general point is that there is usually a presented gradation withinthe thematic context, from that content that is presented as near to the theme,to that presented as remote, and it extends indefinitely through presentedpointing references. These presented contextual references enable the suddenlyappearing delivery truck to fit right in as part of the extended thematic con-text. As Gurwitsch (1964, p. 336) notes, however, sometimes the thematiccontext can be compact or diffuse, penumbral or indistinct. Cognitive scien-tists sometimes obliquely refer to contextual attention, such as when they notecategory effects for selective focal attention (e.g., semantic priming effects),but they almost universally reserve “attention” for the focal dimension.

With respect to the theme and thematic context, the margin is organizedby co-presence, and so is external to the internal relation between the themeand thematic context (Gurwitsch 1985, 1966, pp. 267–286, 1964, pp. 414–420). Marginal content is presented along with what is focal and contextual,but is irrelevant to the theme; so relevance to the theme is the blade that dis-tinguishes the thematic context from the margin. In the example, the counterand the server were directly relevant to the coffee mug at that moment, butthe chatter of surrounding conversations was not, and hence was presentedmarginally. Despite its irrelevance or disconnection with respect to the mate-rial content of the theme and thematic context, the margin is a rich dimensionof attentional activity and organization. For example, Gurwitsch has distin-guished three marginal realms: the stream of consciousness (or phenomenaltime, which I will call the “stream of attention”), embodied existence, and theperceptual world. Briefly, in the example above, it might be that I am margin-ally aware that time is elapsing and that my previous actions are somewhatcontinuous with my current ones, that I am standing and expectant, and thatI am in a building. According to Gurwitsch, a sector of each of the three mar-ginal realms is always co-given with the theme unless that sector is made focalitself. Also, as shown in Figure 1, some marginal items can be externally re-


lated to the theme or thematic context, without being relevant to their con-tent. Gurwitsch (1966, p. 268) writes, “To exemplify this difference, for whichwe use the terms ‘halo’ and ‘horizon’ respectively, consider the case that, whiledealing with a mathematical proposition, we recall our having already thoughtabout this proposition before, having demonstrated it, etc. [halo], and simul-taneously experience a wish arising (e.g., to go outdoors) [horizon]” (cf.Gurwitsch 1985, pp. xliii–xiv).

The preceding paragraphs have mainly discussed the three dimensions ofattention and their distinctive organizational principles. In the context of thecurrent cognitive science research, the following adds a look at the transfor-mations or shiftings of attentional contents between and within these dimen-sions.

The lexicon

The translation of the terms below, from the cognitive scientist’s laboratoryto the structure of the dynamic field of attention presented above, is offeredto help each group of researchers understand the other. It is certainly not meantto be exhaustive. So, for example, although there are many types of distractorsand interference effects used in current experimental paradigms, I include thegeneric phrase “distractors and interference effects” and the more specific“negative priming effect” and “Stroop effect” as particular examples, but donot include other specific effects, leaving the generalization of the discussionfrom the particular examples to these other effects up to the reader. And I havepurposely tried to stay away from particular theories, theorists, and models,since that would clutter the account and take the definitions too far afield. Eachentry begins with a general cognitive science definition of the term or phe-nomenon, followed by a phenomenological interpretation/translation. If asource is cited, it is not because those researchers had a particular theoreticalagenda. It is either because the source provided a clear and explicit, uncontro-versial, generally accepted definition of the term, or the source is an exampleof current use of the term in cognitive science, or the source provides find-ings that support the claim being made. All the cognitive science terms areinterrelated and so, for better or worse, they are arranged alphabetically. A listof all 20 of the entries follows:

–Attentional blink –Joint attention–Automaticity and saliency –Negative priming–Capacity –Orienting


–Control –Precuing–Costs –Priming (or the prime)–Covert attention –Relatedness effect or semantic priming–Distractors and interference effects –Stroop effect–Early and late selection –Target–Facilitation effect –Unattended stimulus effects–Global-local stimuli and shifts –Working memory

Attentional blinkA failure to sustain attention for a second target after paying attention to a firstone. “Attention is not available to identify or even to detect a second targetfor approximately 500 msec after successful report of a first target” (Shapiroand Luck 1999, p. 95).

Phenomenology: Attention is not simply one selected targeted content seri-ally followed by another, which is to say, it is not one well-formed stabletheme followed serially by another. Within and between the dimensions oftheme, thematic context, and margin, attention is a transformation of pre-sented content in dynamic tension with other content. Achievement of atarget as focal, a stable thematic content, is not the standard accomplishmentof attention, since this suggests that attention is not fluid and transformative.The transformation between a well-formed, stable theme at t

1 (a target) and

another well-formed, stable theme at t2 (a serially second target), may have

any number of other not well-formed, unstable, incomplete themes betweenthem t

1+.n (a fractional time and interim fleeting achievement between t

1 and

t2). From the experimenter’s point of view, this is a “blink” or disconnec-

tion in the course of attention. From the subject’s point of view, the firstand second target are possibly continuous with each other in a number ofways, but at the very least they are temporally related as previous theme(target) and subsequent theme (target).5 (For more on temporal context seeBarnes and Jones 2000; Olson and Chun 2001). The cost (see below) whichis interpreted as an attentional blink is the result of a fluctuating, competi-tive tension between the current thematic content and other possible themes(for a compatible view see Chelazzi 1999).

Automaticity and saliencyAutomatic processing is usually considered a pre-attentive process that oc-curs without active attentional control (see control below). For example, themuch researched Stroop effect (see below) is commonly thought to be due toautomaticity. Automatic processes are also called involuntary, passive, inac-


tive, and exogenous, and are said involve to saliency. Saliency refers to thedistinguishability of a stimulus from whatever else is also presented. A stimulushas higher saliency if it is more likely to capture attention (Ohman, Flykyt,and Esteves 2001; Rauschenberger and Yantis 2001; Yantis 1993), for exam-ple, as a distractor (Chastian and Cheal 2001).

Phenomenology: As an adjunct to the entry on control below, this entry con-centrates on automaticity versus the autochthonous stream of attention, andon achievement (Arvidson 1992a; Gurwitsch 1964). The dynamic attentionalfield is like a stream of transformations, and to call it autochthonous is tosay that it is always already organized. The Greek word “autochthon” meanssprung from the land itself, such that a mountain is considered autoch-thonous. Given lifelong experience, the shape of the stream of attention itselfchanges, so that some content is more likely than others to be salient, proc-essed or attended to (Arvidson 1992a; Gurwitsch 1964, p. 103).6 There isno “unattended stimulus” (see unattended stimulus effects below) that is au-tomatically processed but not attended to. So automatic processing is at-tention in any of the three realms – theme, thematic context, or margin – inthe way that attention works within that realm. For example, if the contentis attended to thematically, there is a salient and prompt achievement ofsegregation and consolidation of some content which detaches itself fromthe rest of what is presented. Saliency is interpreted in terms of achieve-ment, and achievement is distinguished from any preparatory phases of trialand active search. Achievement refers to any emergence or segregation ofpresented content from the rest of the attentional field, no matter how ap-parently trivial or insignificant this achievement is. This means not only thatan achieved target, which is attended to thematically as a central, promptlyand spontaneously stable presented content is an achievement, but also otherrelevant content that is attended to as part of the thematic context – othermore or less well-formed Gestalts that are not thematic but are part of thecontext for the theme. Moreover, achievement, now taken in a much widersense, can also refer to co-presented marginal content, e.g., anything fromthe fact that a subject realizes he or she is in a psychology lab, to the factthat another irrelevant stimulus is trying to capture his or her attention (adistractor).

CapacityThe attentional system is constrained by how much information can be proc-essed at a time. So experimental paradigms are designed to measure the lim-its of attentional capacity, especially focal capacity (e.g., McElree 2001).


Increasing or decreasing attentional load or dividing attention across two ormore competing tasks in experimental paradigms is designed to help deline-ate attentional capacity (for a neuropsychological view of divided attentionsee Coull 1998).

Phenomenology: There can only be one center of organization for the fieldof attention at a time – one theme. Since attention is dynamic, thematic con-tent comes and goes, grows and fades, intensifies and weakens, fragmentsand consolidates and so on. The thematic dimension is always more or lessin dynamic tension, between its own constituents (e.g., between formativeand formed ones), between theme and contents of the thematic context, andalso with the margin – for these other two dimensions present Gestalts whichmay be potential themes. Still, the principle of Gestalt-coherence of thetheme not only means that any potential theme is striving for such coher-ence, but also that only one theme can achieve stability and relative com-pleteness at a time. Hence the limited capacity of attention. There are threeother constraints worth mentioning. First, the shape of the field of attentionchanges over time, it grows and develops so that some content can no longerbe attended to in the same way (see Gurwitsch 1964, p. 104). For example,the accomplished chef can no longer view knife sharpening as a contingentactivity for his or her own work. Second, if the attentional load in thematicattention is increased, the acuity of the thematic context and margin (howwell we attend to content in those dimensions) is decreased. In other words,the more intense thematic attention is, the less capacity is available for fine(or nearly any) distinctions outside the focus (see Rees and Lavie 2001).Gurwitsch describes this when he observes that at times the thematic contextcan be dim and penumbral, with little or no differentiation, etc. (Gurwitsch1964, p. 336). Third, it is possible that a given thematic presentation is re-stricted with respect to what transformation it or its constituents can undergo.According to these transformation laws, for instance, it might be the casethat a given constituent of a theme may admit restructuration (such as oc-curs in reversible figures like the Necker cube) but that constituent may notadmit singling out (selective attention) (Gurwitsch 1966, pp. 263–264).

ControlThere are thought to be two types of control or selection. The subjective con-trol of attention in the selection of a target and the capture of attention by anexternal event or stimulus, usually a distractor (see entry below). Various termsare used to state this difference: voluntary vs. involuntary, top-down vs. bot-tom-up, active vs. passive, controlled vs. automatic, endogenous vs. exog-


enous. We’ll use the latter terms here.7 In endogenous control or selection, thetarget is selected because the subject willed it, usually as the result of instruc-tion from the experimenter (see Hopfinger et al. 2001, for the associated neu-rology). In exogenous selection, attention is “caught” from the periphery (e.g.,Chastian and Cheal 2001).

Phenomenology: Selection is singling out – making a constituent of a themeinto a theme itself, or making a co-presented Gestalt from either the the-matic context or margin into a theme. With the new singled out theme comesa new thematic context and a new margin. The contents of attention are trans-formed within the theme, thematic context, margin structure; the previousorganization of relations between content is replaced by the new organiza-tion of relations, now oriented around the new theme (Arvidson 1992a;Gurwitsch 1964). Endogenous control is important and is attention, as neu-ropsychological studies are pointing out (Driver and Frackowiak 2001). Forexample, appropriate brain areas are active even before the target is achievedor presented (Driver and Frith 2000). But in an experimental paradigm whereachievement of the target is a measure of attention, endogenous selectioncan at most prepare the field of attention for the likelihood or inevitabilityof such a transformation of contents. This is sometimes called an “attentionalset” (e.g., Folk, Remington, and Johnston 1992). We don’t make the targetedcontent present itself as thematic – as a centrally consolidated Gestalt seg-regated from the thematic context – we allow it to present itself. The fieldof attention is autochthonous, and endogenous selective attention yields, inthe end, to the saliency of exogenous selection (on saliency see Chastianand Cheal 2001, p. 989). Exogenous selection can be obvious, such as whena ceiling light bulb suddenly pops loudly above my head and intrudes itselffrom margin to theme, or less obvious, such as when I find the word I amlooking for on a page and the open, evanescent thematic content of the“word-as-it-is-expected-to-appear” is replaced by the presentation of theword.8 In each case, the thematic content at t

1 is saliently replaced by the

thematic content at t2. This replacement is accompanied by a reorientation

of the rest of the field of attention (of the shape and contents of the thematiccontext and margin) at t

2 along the lines dictated by that new theme. Since

development and learning change the autochthonous shape of the field ofattention, certain content and constellations of content are more likely tobecome thematic or part of the thematic context over time, establishing akind of facilitation or inhibition of the success of a particular endogenouslyinitiated selective attention (see Arvidson 1992a; Gurwitsch 1964, p. 103;Cf. Ohman, Flykt and Esteves 2001, pp. 466–467 on “learning history”).


CostsCosts are errors or slower response times on the part of the subject. Interfer-ence effects and various attention shifting tasks are often measured in termsof cost effects (e.g., Hubner, Futterer, and Steinhauser 2001). By manipulat-ing the experimental procedures, and so manipulating costs, researchers tryto determine which attentional mechanisms or systems are involved in par-ticular attentional tasks, or in attention generally.

Phenomenology: The assumptions of costs research are that focal attentionis limited in capacity (see above) and that shifts in attention take time and,if endogenous (see control above), also effort. In phenomenological terms,the theme as focus of attention is (more or less) organized by Gestalt-co-herence of its constituents, and is (more or less) given as unitary and con-solidated, segregated from the thematic context but relevant to it. The “moreor less” is parenthetically added since a stable, fully contoured theme is notthe only possibility for the presentation of content attended to thematically,as noted previously. So the formation of a faint theme into a stable theme (a“target”), or from a stable theme to another (e.g., one target to another tar-get within an attentional task paradigm) is limited by the structure of “onetheme at a time” (capacity) and will hence involve costs in time and accu-racy. Accuracy of target achievement is phenomenologically a function ofwhat an experimenter would call distraction or interference – a replacementof the present thematic content with another that is not the target, no matterhow briefly the “wrong” achievement lasts.

Covert attentionIn visual attention research, covert attention involves attending to an area orstimulus while focusing elsewhere, that is, without looking at it, and overtattention involves visually focusing on the location or stimulus (Posner 1980;Posner and Peterson 1990).

Phenomenology: The three dimension structure of attention accounts wellfor the general findings of this classic experimental issue. Depending onthe experiment and results, and the interpretation of these results accordingto the particular hypothesis being investigated, covert attending is either mar-ginal attending, thematic context attending, or thematic attending. Covertattention is marginal attending when the stimulus or location is presentedand reacted to or recalled, yet irrelevant to and possibly interfering with thestability of the target as theme. The relationship between this marginal con-tent and thematic content can be dynamic and tense, as described next in


distractors and interference effects. It is thematic context attending whenthe stimulus or location is incorporated within the current thematic context,as relevant to the theme. It is thematic attending when the stimulus or loca-tion largely replaces the current theme for some length of time, even if noovert attention is evident (Kanwisher and Wojciulik 2000).

Distractors and interference effectsDistractors are unwanted information sources, “designated by experimenteras irrelevant and to-be-ignored.” (Allport 1989, p. 657). Interference effectsare delays in processing caused by distractors, and are the “reaction time dif-ference between neutral and incongruent conditions” (Rafal and Henik 1994,p. 31; see also, Dean, Bub, and Masson 2001).

Phenomenology: The presented distractor introduces a tension between thedistractor and the target as each vies to be thematic, thereby hindering theconsolidation of the target as theme, and hence introducing an interferenceeffect in achievement of the target. In this case, the target and the distractoreach have their own thematic context whose content is mutually irrelevant,and the target and distractor are marginal with respect to each other. In otherwords, to the extent that the distractor is thematic, the target is marginal,and to the extent that the target is thematic, the distractor is marginal. Inthis attentional transformation the distractor and the target quickly alternate,joined in a dynamic tension, although they are materially irrelevant to eachother (see Arvidson 2000). The Stroop effect (below) may be described asan interference effect along these lines. The negative priming effect (below)is a distinctive interference effect with a unique phenomenology.

Early and late selectionAccording to early selection theorists, selective filtering of sensory infor-mation occurs before perceptual recognition or categorization. “Early se-lection . . . depends solely on the coding of physical, sensory attributes andoperates primarily or even exclusively in terms of spatial location – hencethe popular metaphor of a spatial spotlight of attention” (Allport 1989, p. 635;for spotlight, zoom lens, and gradient metaphors, see respectively, Posner1980; Eriksen and St. James 1986; LaBerge and Brown 1986). According tolate selection theorists, a selective filtering bottleneck, if it occurs, occurs onlyafter perceptual recognition or categorization (Allport 1989, p. 635). A cru-cial question in this selection research concerns the fate of unattended stimuli,since when they are processed determines when attention is selective (seeunattended stimulus effects below). Current neuropsychological literature


seems to show that attention operates at an anatomically early stage in theprocess (Kanwisher and Wojciulik 2000).

Phenomenology: If the field of attention at any one time is comprised ofthree dimensions of contents, and each dimension and its contents are dis-tinctly organized as described above, and the presented contents are in dy-namic tension within and between dimensions, then the controversybetween early and late selection dissolves. Perceptual “categorization”is not superadded to thematic content, as early selection theories imply.9

Since a theme is only presented within a thematic context, it is already moreor less categorized. It is true that the theme can be presented as faint, dif-fuse, somewhat fragmented, obscure, etc., and that its thematic context canbe equally incomplete. Nonetheless, what is attended to is always alreadyattended to from a particular perspective, under a certain light, and with acertain orientation. All of these indexical features are derived by the themefrom the thematic context (Gurwitsch 1964, p. 359). So even if only a spa-tial location is given, as in precuing (see below), or exogenous orienting(see orienting below), it is a theme presented within a thematic context, andthereby categorized in at least some nascent sense. Thematic content is nevercompletely unrelated, irrelevant or disconnected from what precedes it orsucceeds it, which is what early selection theories seem to suggest. The “lateselection bottleneck” is the dynamic tension between contents already de-scribed throughout this lexicon (e.g., in distractors and interference effectsabove).

Facilitation effectThe result of a condition that decreases or speeds up reaction time. “Reactiontime difference between congruent and neutral conditions” (Rafal and Henik1994, p. 31; see e.g., Van der Lubbe and Keuss 2001).

Phenomenology: The prime (see below) is a theme that is presented withinthe same thematic context as the subsequently presented thematic target.This transformation of attention from previous theme (at t

1) to a subsequent

theme (at t2) which was previously part of the thematic context at t

1 (or was

at least indicated as relevant by presented pointing references) is one of theleast radical shifts of attention and is called serial-shifting (Gurwitsch 1966,pp. 231–232; cf. Chelazzi 1999). Since the transformation occurs all withinthe same thematic context, the transformation is facilitated (e.g., Barnes andJones 2000; Olson and Chun 2001).


Global-local stimuli and shiftsA global-local stimulus, such as a “Navon” letter (see Navon 1977), is an am-biguous stimulus that involves two mutually exclusive levels of possible pres-entation, for example, a block letter “H” on the global level, and a number ofletter “Es” on the local level (these Es are constituents that make up the glo-bal H). For those researchers interested in attentional control, the phenomenonof global to local and local to global attention shifts can be examined for cluesto control, interference, facilitation, and accompanying neurology. For exam-ple, Rauschenberger and Yantis (2001) found an asymmetry in the two shiftsand discuss the results in terms of interference, survival mechanisms andexogenous/endogenous control. Posner and Peterson (1990) discuss possiblebrain hemispheric differences in the associated attention shifts, and more re-cently, Fileteo, Freidrich, and Stricker (2001, p. 258) conclude that “In sum-mary, intra-stimulus attentional shifts do not appear to share the same cognitiveand neuroanatomical properties as spatial shifts of attention.”

Phenomenology: Over 70 years ago, Gurwitsch named these kinds of localto global shifts of attention “synthesis,” and the global to local shifts “sin-gling out” (Gurwitsch 1966, pp. 240–244). What is noteworthy about hisinterpretation of these transformations is that he deemed these “shifts” ofattention extremely radical. This doesn’t mean they are rare, but it meansthat in achieving these transformations the subject thoroughly reorganizesthe field of attention. This fact is sometimes lost or understated, as whenFileteo et al. (2001, p. 228) imply that it is the same visual object beingpresented in both cases, and when they interpret the transformations as morelike what Gurwitsch would call “restructuration,” a less radical shifting. ButGurwitsch’s recognition of the radical nature of this transformation accordswell with the Fileteo et al. (2001) conclusion reported above in this entry.For example, in synthesis, which is when attention is transformed so thatthe local level presentation (attending to an E or several Es as thematic) isreplaced by the global level presentation (attending to the H as thematic),the Es no longer have the same function in the new presentation. They arenow constituents in the new Gestalt, and function as constituents. That is,the way they were previously attended to is not conserved and maintained,except perhaps in the thematic context or margin of the new thematic pres-entation (the H) or in working memory (see below). Singling out, which iswhen attention is transformed in the converse direction, is also a radicalreplacement of what was previously attended to thematically. And that iswhy Gurwitsch called these transformations “radical,” because the contentof the theme itself undergoes complete change in function and organization.


The global-local stimuli and shifts research is especially promising to phen-omenologists and Gestalt-oriented researchers because there is someconsideration of synthesis, rather than simply singling out (or selectiveattention). These researchers are more likely to talk about “scenes” and largerattentional orientations beyond the attentional focus. For example, re-cently in an examination of how globally defined objects capture atten-tion, Rauschenberger and Yantis (2001, p. 1258) conclude “The findingsreported here suggest that the visual system is sensitive to abrupt changesthat occur at a level more global than the one at which attention is currentlyengaged.” In terms of the expanded definition of this paper, I would para-phrase as follows – ‘the findings suggest that in addition to attending tocontent thematically, we also attend to content in the thematic context andin the margin.’

Joint attentionJoint attention refers to at least two scenarios common to investigations ofinfant attention (Rochat 1999), but is not limited to that population. First, it isthe influence of the adult’s direction of gaze on the infant’s attention. The infantfocuses on the adult gaze, which is a kind of directional cue for then focusingon the object of the adult’s gaze. Second, joint attention refers to triadic inter-actions in which each participant attends to an object while simultaneouslymonitoring the attention of the other.

Phenomenology: The first sense of joint attention is a kind of serial-shift-ing – a thematic context item becomes thematic (Gurwitsch 1966, pp. 231–232). For the infant, the theme at t

1 is the adult’s gaze. The object of the

adult gaze (as the target or theme at t2 for the infant) is eventually presented

as part of the thematic context for the infant at t1. At t

2, this thematic con-

text item becomes thematic (focal). The second sense of joint attention, amore social attention, may involve several different kinds of transforma-tions: serial-shifting, enlargement and elucidation, and context-shifting (seerespectively, Gurwitsch 1966, pp. 231–232, 223–227, 206–207; for a sum-mary and explanation see Arvidson 2000).10 While attending to an objectand the other, attention may simply serially-shift back and forth quicklybetween the two, such that the object and the other repeatedly and rapidlyexchange places in the field of attention, from theme, to thematic context,to theme, etc. For example, the other becomes thematic and the object ispart of the thematic context, and then the object becomes thematic and theother is part of the thematic context, and so on. Another possibility is thatthe object remains theme, while the other remains part of the thematic con-


text. In this case the other is part of the context for the presentation of theobject, and this context can transform without the theme significantly chang-ing. Attentional enlargement – wherein the context is widened and the rel-evance of the context and theme relation expands – could account for the“monitoring” of the other without significant changes in the object as theme.Attentional elucidation – wherein the context becomes more articulated orclear and the relevance of the context for the theme is clarified – could alsodescribe the phenomenon of joint attention. In both cases, the other is at-tended to as part of the thematic context (“monitored”) and the object isthematic. Another attentional transformation, a context shift – wherein thetheme remains the same but the context is replaced by a new one – couldwork to establish the joint attention in the first place. For example, the ob-ject given in the context of something to chew could now be given in thecontext of something we both are looking at. This context-switching couldbe followed by serial-shifting, enlargement or elucidation to maintain whatexperimenters call joint attention in this second sense.

Negative primingActively ignoring a stimulus in the first trial negatively affects the reactiontime of the second trial, when the target of the second trial is related to theactively ignored stimulus of the first trial (Dean, Bub, and Masson 2001). “Astimulus appearing as the target for a current selective response is related to –or is categorically identical to – the distractor stimulus of the preceding trial.The effect, observed in many different variations of this basic paradigm, ap-pears as an increase in the latency of response to the current selective target,compared with a neutral condition in which previous distractors and currenttargets are unrelated. That is to say, it is more difficult to select a stimulus,belonging to a given category, for the control of action, if that same categoryof object was actively ignored on the preceding trial” (Allport 1989, p. 659).

Phenomenology: Rather than treating many such effects in this lexicon, Iwill treat negative priming in more detail, so that it might be taken as a gen-eral guide of how to interpret these other effects. In both the neutral condi-tion and the negative priming condition, the transformation of attentioninvolves the replacement of one theme-thematic context with another. Thedifference in the reaction time of targeted thematic achievement betweenthe two presentations is a function of the relationship between the themeand thematic context. At t

1 of the negative priming condition, the distractor

is irrelevant to the theme, although to the extent that it distracts it vies forthematic attention. At t

2, the content that acted as distractor at t

1 is relevant


to the theme at t2; which is to say that

this previously marginal and previ-

ously distracting content is now indicated as part of the new thematic contextfor the new theme now being achieved, and has a role in the theme-thematiccontext Gestalt-connection of unity by relevance that is being achieved att2. This previously marginal content is now rightfully part of the thematic

context at t2 of the negative priming condition, but also does not immedi-

ately belong and so delays achievement. What happens? The previouslymarginal content that is now relevant to the theme as it is being achieved att2 also seeks to bring with it its own thematic context, since the margin con-

tains potential themes and their potential thematic contexts. And part of theperspective or light under which this rightfully relevant content is attendedto at t

1+.n (a fractional time and interim fleeting achievement between t

1 and

t2) is that it is not rightfully relevant to whatever is thematic. In other words,

at t1+.n

the previously distracting content slows the formation of the unity ofrelevance between the theme and thematic context, and between items inthe thematic context itself. It does this by bringing with it a contextualsignificance of not belonging, even while a Gestalt-connection (unity byrelevance) tries to make it belong. The only way to single-out and thenendogenously “ignore” some content (attending to it marginally) is to atsome point allow it to become attended to thematically, no matter howpoorly formulated or fleeting that thematic transformation is. Thus thephenomenological definition of a distractor above. Now at t

2 of the nega-

tively primed condition, the replacement thematic content is relevant to thispreviously irrelevant marginal content. What has now become contextuallyrelevant at t

2 has been attended to marginally at t

1 (i.e., as irrelevant) and so

allowing it to become relevant will be slower. There is a kind of inertia orresistance to be overcome. In comparison, the neutral condition has littleexogenous dynamic tension to overcome. Analogously, in experiments onmemory and attention, a memory-block effect can be seen as a type of nega-tive priming. For example, a previously studied word acting as a primingstimulus can inhibit achievement of an orthographically similar target(Kinoshita and Towgood 2001).11

OrientingThere are thought to be two types of orienting. The subjective control of at-tention to a location, usually a location where a target is expected to appearand the capture of attention by an external event or stimulus to a location. Asin control above, various terms are used to state this difference: voluntary vs.involuntary, top-down vs. bottom-up, active vs. passive, controlled vs. auto-matic, endogenous vs. exogenous. In endogenous control or selection, the


location is selected because the subject willed it, usually as the result of in-struction from the experimenter. In exogenous selection, attention is “caught”from the periphery and brought to this other location. Precuing (see below) isexogenous orienting. In a sense, the location selects the subject. Orienting ofattention is often discussed in terms of brain mechanisms that are activated inorienting (Kato et al. 2001; Posner and Peterson 1990).

Phenomenology: As explained in control (above), endogenous orientationcan at most prepare the field of attention for the likelihood or inevitabilityof a particular presented theme (target). When that theme is presented at t

2,

it replaces whatever variety of “expecting-something-to-appear-here” the-matic content that was presented at t

1. In experiments, exogenous orienting

is most often the transformation of attention sought in precuing. Margin-ally attended content becomes thematic at t

1 (even if it is only a fleeting cue

to an “empty” location) and then is replaced by the new thematic content att2, along with reorganization of contents or shape of the thematic context

along the lines dictated by the new theme. One way to refer to this attentionalcapture is to say that it is contingent upon endogenous orienting, as Remington,Folk and McLean (2001) propose in their “contingent involuntary orient-ing account.”

PrecuingA cue that precedes the target (Posner 1980). A valid cue summons attention tothe right location, an invalid cue to the wrong location, a neutral cue gives nospatial information (see e.g., Fournier and Shorter 2001; Kawahara and Miyatani2001; for a neurological view, see Hopfinger et al. 2001; Kato et al. 2001).

Phenomenology: A cue is thematically attended to, however fleetingly(Arvidson 1998). The cue has “valid” status until the target is presented.When the target is thematized, the cue is either contextually relevant, andhence presented as part of the thematic context (a valid cue), or irrelevantand hence presented as part of the margin (invalid or neutral cue). Also, priorto target presentation, and this means prior to valid or invalid status, to theextent that it is attended to as a precursor a precue is presented as relevantfor the target-as-it-is-expected-to-appear, when this latter is evanescentlygiven as thematic.

Priming (or the prime)The prime is not what the subject is directed toward by the experimenter, butaffects the target stimulus of attention anyway. Generally speaking, the prime


can be any stimulus or condition that facilitates (facilitation effect) or inter-feres (interference effect) the processing of the target stimulus (for a recentexample in the attention and memory paradigm, see Marks and Dulaney 2001).

Phenomenology: For however briefly it may be presented, the prime is atheme presented within a thematic context; and with respect to the targetthat follows the prime, the prime is a part of what was previously attendedto. The prime can be relevant or irrelevant, which is to say, it can form partof the thematic context for the current theme (target) or be marginal. A rel-evant prime speeds experimenter desired transformation of the field of at-tention so that the target stimulus becomes focal more quickly (facilitationeffect). Irrelevant primes (distractors) slow the desired transformation (in-terference effect).

Relatedness effect or semantic priming effectThe relatedness effect is a facilitation effect in which the prime is of the samecategory as the target. “Greater speed and accuracy of performance in respond-ing to a target word (e.g., DOCTOR) when it follows a semantically-relatedprime (e.g., NURSE) than when it follows an unrelated prime (e.g., GOD)”(Rafal and Henik 1994, p. 36; see, e.g., Smith, Benton, and Spalek 2001).

Phenomenology: In some ways, the relatedness effect (a facilitation effect)is the converse of negative priming. The relatedness effect involves a trans-formation of attention called serial-shifting (Gurwitsch 1966, pp. 231–232;cf. Chelazzi 1999) which involves very little dynamic tension between thecontent of the theme at t

1 and t

2, and so is relatively speedy and simple. In

serial-shifting, the thematic content at t1 has been replaced at t

2 with con-

tent which was previously presented as part of the thematic context of thetheme at t

1 (and attended to at t

1 in the way appropriate to contextual con-

tent), or was at least indicated as relevant by pointing references in the the-matic context at t

1. In other words, in the example, the thematic presentation

of “NURSE” includes the thematic context presentation of “DOCTOR” orat least indicates the lines along which the content “DOCTOR” is easilyrelevant and so may be expected; just as in the café example above, thepresented contextual references enable the suddenly appearing delivery truckto fit right in as part of the extended thematic context.

Stroop effectA visual inhibition effect that occurs when a presented word indicates a dif-ferent color than the type is (Stroop 1935). For example, the word “red” ap-


pears in green font color, and the naming of the green font color is delayed.The most common interpretation of this effect is in terms of automaticity (seeabove) – the reading is automatic while the color naming is endogenouslycontrolled (LaBerge and Samuels 1974). The attentional mechanisms involvedmay be various, which has led to many experiments of the effect and a numberof competing interpretations. Its possible intricacies may make the Stroopparadigm unsuitable for current brain imaging techniques (Coull 1998, p. 349).

Phenomenology: It seems logical that each content, the green font color andthe color-word “red,” is discontinuous with the other, and vies to be attendedto thematically within its own thematic context, which is how interferenceis phenomenologically interpreted above in distractors and interference ef-fects. This way of describing the phenomenon accords with a “continuousflow model” (e.g., Monahan 2001), namely, there are two competing con-tents for thematic attention, the two “streams” of visual color identificationand word processing. For example, the font color green is relevant withinthe context of visual color identification, and the color-word “red” within acontext that researchers might call a “semantic activation system” (e.g.,Smith, Bentin, and Spalek 2001). This means that each is a distractor forthe other, and is attended to, alternatively, as marginal or thematic, in dy-namic tension while achievement of the target is required. In this interpre-tation, each thematic presentation brings with it its own thematic context,and is irrelevant as a whole to the other thematic presentation. By contrast,the possibility of thematic rivalry within one thematic context supposes thatthere is some unity of relevance between these two competing contents, forexample, that they both refer to color (even if they do so cross-modally).12

As an interference effect, however, which is defined above as involving adistractor attended to as irrelevant and hence marginal, the Stroop effectseems to need discontinuity between contexts. Otherwise, the transforma-tion is more akin to a serial-shifting within a context, a theme is replacedwith a related potential theme which was previously part of the thematiccontext, and the effect is priming, or facilitation, not interference. I suspectthat to the extent that the Stroop effect is an interference effect, there is noinclusive thematic context which forms the cohesive playground for thisgame. This means that the potential or alternating themes and their respec-tive contexts are co-presented but irrelevant to each other, so that if one isthematic the other Gestalt is marginal and hence (in this case) distracting.If so, the case here is essentially the same as what occurs just prior to achieve-ment of t

2 of negative priming. There is a dynamic tension between content

that might naturally belong to the thematic context of the green font color


when this font color is attended to thematically (however fleetingly andunstably), and the content that might naturally belong to the thematic con-text of the color-word “red’ when this color-word is attended to themati-cally. One difference between this case and the negative priming conditionwould be that the subject is being asked to report the font color, to trans-form what is attended to marginally into a Gestalt that is now thematic, whilein the negative priming condition the subject merely allows a new Gestaltto be attended to as thematic that has not been presented previously as themeor as part of the thematic context.

TargetThe target is that which the experimenter designates as appropriate focus.

Phenomenology: The target is the content that the experimenter expects tobecome thematic. This achievement typically depends upon a number ofpriming variables such as distraction or interference, which are carefullycontrolled as part of the experimental design. A point often not emphasizedis that the target, as thematic, is always given within a thematic context,which is also attended to in the way appropriate to that dimension.

Unattended stimulus effectsWhen a nontargeted stimulus is “unattended” yet is “automatically” processed,it is thought to affect attention, generally in one of two ways. Either subse-quent targets are more likely to be affected by the “unattended” stimulus,such as in the splitting of auditory attention (a Broadbent filtering effect;see Broadbent 1958), or the co-presented target is affected by the “unat-tended” stimulus (e.g., Eastwood, Smilek, and Merikle 2001; Posner andPeterson 1990, pp. 29, 31; Rauschenberger and Yantis 2001, p. 1259). The fateof “unattended stimuli” is important because it might help decide the contro-versy between late and early selection, that is, how far up the processing path-way stimuli go before being processed (Kanwisher and Wojciulik 2000).

Phenomenology: Instead of the label “unattended” content, content that isnot presented as thematic but nonetheless affects thematic achievementshould be labeled either “attended to contextually” (i.e., thematic context at-tending) or “attended to marginally”. For an example of the latter, Eastwood,Smilek and Merikle (2001) report that the emotional expression of a facecan be perceived outside the focus of attention but nonetheless affect focalattention. The content is attended to in the way that is appropriate to themargin, namely, as co-present but irrelevant to the theme, and possibly as


interfering. Yet as co-presented at t1, the marginally attended content is read-

ily available to have an effect on the theme (target) presented at t2, or if the

experimenter has made this content itself a possible theme (target) amongstothers, it is readily available to more likely become the theme at t

2 (a facili-

tation effect). In the related scenario, where the “unattended” content wasattended to as part of the thematic context, this thematic context content cangive light, perspective and orientation to thematic content, even though itis not presented as centrally consolidated and segregated like the theme. The“unattended” thematic context content can affect the theme without chang-ing the latter’s basic structure or status, and without being presented in thecentrally coherent way that thematic content can be presented. So althoughit is possible that subject reports in this case are misleading or that thememory is fleeting (Flanagan and Dryden 1995, pp. 146–147), the abovedescription of the nature of thematic context attending provides an expla-nation that is simpler and just as credible. The overall point is that insteadof “unattended,” the content is attended to marginally or as part of the the-matic context. One of the main problems in the experiments attempting tomeasure “unattended stimuli” is succinctly stated by Driver and Frackowiak,(2001, p. 1258): “If one asks people to judge an ignored stimulus in itspresence, then they will presumably no longer ignore it! Yet if one askssomewhat later, performance might then reflect forgetting.” This is whymeasurement of neural responses may be more effective for developing thetheory and experimental paradigms surrounding “unattended stimuli.” Butthe neuoropsychological interpretation of “unattended stimuli” from fMRIstudies can also benefit from phenomenological articulation, so that insteadof experiments concluding that “processing is reduced” (Downing, Liu, andKanwisher 2001, p. 1332) they can conclude (in this particular experimen-tal paradigm) that processing occurs in marginal attention; this benefit isespecially pressing since these authors also conclude that “Furthermore,attentional effects were observed in cortical areas measuring processing oftask-irrelevant stimuli” (p. 1336, emphasis added).

Working memoryMany attention experiments explicitly or implicitly discuss working memory,since information besides that which is in focal attention also must be classi-fied. Generally, working memory is the maintenance of information or stimuluscontent in a highly active state outside of focal attention (e.g., Kane et al. 2001;Rockstroh and Schweizer 2001). One interest of current research is the fa-cilitation or interference effects between focal attention and memory (e.g.,Kinoshita and Towgood 2001). The tie between working memory and atten-


tion also propels research that is oriented toward the temporal dimension ofattention, rather than the spatial (e.g., McElree 2001; Olson and Chun 2001).

Phenomenology: Working memory refers to content presented in the the-matic context or margin. The content is available or “highly active” for thetask or target presently being achieved, so it must also be presented in thefield of attention to some extent. Experiments show that what is in workingmemory affects the target or task (e.g., Dean, Bub, and Masson 2001; Marksand Dulaney 2001). To the extent that this content gives light, perspectiveor orientation to what is currently achieved in thematic attention, this con-tent is part of the thematic context, and may facilitate or prime thematicattention. Serial-shifting tasks are a good example of this (Chelazzi 1999).To the extent that this content is presented as irrelevant (e.g., a neutral con-tent) or as interfering (a distractor) it is part of the margin. Negative prim-ing effects are good examples of this latter case.

Where or what is the attending subject in the field of attention?

The claim to be made and investigated in this section is that there is no sub-ject apart from the dynamic tension of the field of attention, that is, apartfrom the activity of distinguishing what is presented. Attention researchersin and out of the laboratory freely refer to “the subject.” But what might thismean in the context of cognitive science as it is practiced and in a new phen-omenological approach to attention as outlined in this paper? In a review ofcurrent brain imaging research, neuropsychologist Chris Firth (2001, p.1370) takes up the question of a homunculus, “Can we identify the brainregion where the critical homunculus lives? Well, perhaps, but for most ofthe experimental paradigms studied to date, it may turn out to be in anotherbrain. That is, it may reside in the brain of the experimenter, who was theultimate source of top-down control in these studies, having provided clearinstructions about what the subject should and should not attend to.” Thepoint is that there is no need for the presence of a subject, as some kind ofsubstantial director, apart from the attending activity itself, even in the spe-cial case of reflection.

Gurwitsch largely shared Jean-Paul Sartre’s non-egological conception ofconsciousness (Gurwitsch 1966). Elsewhere (Arvidson 2000) I have implic-itly suggested a way to try to take the edge off the starkness of the claim, “weare nothing, not a thing” by showing how we may accept something like thisclaim yet still talk about personality and character. Here I wish to bring out


the point that the attending subject is only the dynamic tension in the field ofattention, and nothing more.

In Sartre’s (1956) Being and Nothingness, the “nothingness” refers to hu-man consciousness. Using the terms of consciousness and intentionality, ratherthan attention, he defends the view that human nature is exhausted in the in-terplay between what is attended to and the attending activity. Starting withthe assumption that consciousness is essentially restless, condemned to con-stantly make sense of the world through negation of Being, Sartre shows thatpre-reflective and reflective consciousness are both ordered in accordance withGestalt-phenomenological principles, and that reflective consciousness (ex-cept for Angst) is derivatively based on pre-reflective consciousness.

Negation is both external and internal. External negation refers to the proc-ess of extricating the figure from the background, what Gurwitsch would callGestalt-coherence of theme, such that the theme is centrally consolidated andsegregated from the thematic context (and margin). Internal negation refersto the process of extricating the attending activity from what is thematicallypresented by that activity. In other words, in external negation the thematiccontent is separated from the thematic context content (external negation –the theme is not the thematic context), and in internal negation the theme isseparated from the activity of making the theme be presented (internal nega-tion – the theme is not the activity of distinguishing the theme from the the-matic context).13 Both internal and external negation necessarily work together,most often pre-reflectively. In reflection, one “makes a self” – for example, asegment of the stream of attention is thematized as not the rest of the stream(external negation), and as not the thematizing activity itself (internal nega-tion) – but the essential structure of internal and external negating activity isthe same as in the case of pre-reflection.

The most difficult part of Sartre’s theory to grasp, and to accept, is that thereis no substantial self left over beyond the moment-to-moment negating activ-ity. The pertinent point here is that if one puts together the views of Sartreand Gurwitsch, which have only been sketched here, then the experimentalresults and interpretations of cognitive scientists can be seen as articulationsof the dynamics of the field of attention (or in Sartrean language, external andinternal negation). For example, when cognitive scientists measure reactiontimes to targets in attention research scenarios and manipulate the experimentalsituation to facilitate or inhibit attending to a target, they can be interpretedas uncovering a chronological dimension of the field of attention (or of exter-nal and internal negation). When these scientists work with infants to deter-mine the mean age at which they readily enter into joint attention, they can beinterpreted as uncovering a social-developmental dimension of the field of


attention. The point isn’t only that the work of cognitive scientists and the workof phenomenologists complement one another. The more important conclu-sion is that cognitive scientists working on attention seem to explicitly or im-plicitly share Sartre’s and Gurwitsch’s assumption of the status of subjectivitywith respect to attention: in the structure of the field of attention there is only(1) the attentional activity and (2) that which is attended to in this activity.There is no subject apart from the dynamic tension of the field of attention,that is, apart from the activity of distinguishing what is presented. We are born,we attend, we die.

This account is admittedly sketchy, and most likely controversial, but it ismeant to be a preface to further discussion, by myself or others. Still, enter-taining three possible objections may help focus that discussion. They involveendogenous attention, sense of self, and embodiment.

Endogenous attentionOne might argue that endogenously initiated attention shows that there mustbe a substantial subject that stands apart from the activity of attention. Thelocus of selection or control is on the side of the subject, he or she wills toattend to a location, or to attend to a prime or target. For example, the subjectdecides to attend to the target and hence the target is attended to. It is wrong,the argument might go, to ignore the activity on the side of the subject thatleads to focal attention. Since this activity creates the condition for the mo-ment of attention to the target, and since it is outside (preliminary to) the ac-tual moment of attention, this activity indicates a substantial subject as theinitiator of that activity. In other words, since the subject decides to attend,since there is a “willer,” there must be some thing (a substantial subject) thatdecides or wills.

There are two assumptions in this proposed counterargument that are sus-pect. One is that attention is restricted to focusing on a target. The new approachto the field of attention described here and in my previous work, following andamending Gurwitsch, is that the field of attention is a dynamic tension of trans-formations of content involving dimensional organization principles (Gestalt-coherence of the theme, unity by relevance of the thematic context, co-presenceof the margin) and transformation principles (serial-shifting, synthesis, sin-gling out, enlargement, etc.).14 Thematic transformations beget thematictransformations. So there never really is a complete attentional blink in theattentional field, as was explained above, nor is there ever a “pure” endog-enous initiation of attention. In this enlarged sense of attention, there is al-ways attending activity, or as Sartre might have enigmatically put it, attentionis condemned to be free and restless. So if, as I have argued, “attention” is not


restricted to the target, and also not restricted to well-formed, relatively fullycoherent themes, then the endogenous initiation of attention to a target is it-self a transformation of attention and thus is still attention. Once this widerview of attention is accepted, one is no longer committed to the position thatthe subject is somehow outside of the attentional moment because of the phe-nomenon of endogenous control of attention to a target.

The second assumption of this proposed counterargument is that Descarteswas right in his reasoning about the cogito. That there is thinking, willing,deciding, means that there is a thinker, willer, decider – a substantial, non-extended, “thing” to which mental activity belongs, namely, a subject, as aseparate existence. After all, how could one prepare to attend to a target un-less one existed as a “preparer-thing” prior to the attending. As with the otherassumption, the wider view of attention as a dynamic tension of contents in-volving dimensional organization and general transformation principles miti-gates this claim. The preparation for attention is attention; working to establishthe conditions for focusing on the target is attention to a different “target.”Another way to think about it is to notice that Descartes must have attendedto a thing in the first place, in order to call it into doubt – an insight broughtforward nicely by Edmund Husserl (1960) in his Cartesian Meditations.

Sense of selfAnother possible objection appeals to the common-sense notion that we doindeed have a self, we feel our own subjectivity, we know we exist as a per-son with certain characteristics. This objection is another Cartesian interpre-tation of the phenomenon. I will only respond to this briefly here, since Sartreand others have addressed this issue in-depth. Sartre would affirm our feel-ings of “having a self or ego” and explain it as a type of “bad faith.” This meansthat through negating activity we have made that activity into a substantialthing, when it is actually a process. In other words, we create a narrative withourselves at the center because the realization (Angst) that we are nothing butactivity (read: freedom) is too much to handle. Sartre doesn’t condemn thisactivity of making consciousness into a thing, and acknowledges that it is partof the structure of human consciousness. He claims that this reflective con-sciousness is derived from pre-reflective consciousness, and so reflectiveconsciousness does not point to a primary, founding subjectivity as Descartessupposed. The point for us here is that thematizing some content from thestream of attention (an activity which we call reflection) is still a transforma-tion of attention; and this transformation does not need to point to any specialor privileged subjective “thing” existing outside the transformation, or under-lying it as its source or center.


EmbodimentThe final objection to the position, “the attending subject is only the dynamictension in the field of attention,” is really more of an observation than anobjection. One might note that attention only occurs if something is “over-against” the person attending. In spatial attention, the object attended to is “overthere” and the subject is here. Even if one is attending to a theory, say a particu-lar aspect of Descartes’ theory of mind, there is some sort of distance orperspective that indicates a position on and apart from what is attended to.So the question that proceeds from the observation is this: how does thismodel of the field of attention account for the presence of a bodily positionwith respect to what is attended to if there is no subjectivity in the traditionalsense?

Much interesting and valuable work has been accomplished recently in thearea of embodiment and it would take this paper too far afield to evaluate andconnect up with that body of literature. I have addressed the issue of embodi-ment and attention in some detail elsewhere (Arvidson, 2003) and so here Iwill stick to an outline of how embodiment can be articulated in terms of thefield of attention. According to existential philosophy and psychology, humanbeings already find themselves existing in a world, a kind of “thrownness”and “abandonment” in which consciousness is left to its own devices to makesense of the world. A corollary of this claim is that human beings are neverwithout a perspective on the world. Perspectives or even world-views mayshift, but they never disappear, and never were completely absent. Spatially,the center of this perspective on the world is our body. As others have done,Gurwitsch (1985, p. 62) describes the perceptual world as spatially organizedalong three main axes – front and behind, above and below, right and left.Each axis is determined by the two complementary directions of near andfar. Embodied existence is the center of reference for this spatial organiza-tion. For Sartre, the activity of internal negation “posits” or places that whichis negated as “over there,” and simultaneously places the negating activity itselfas “here.” This distinction is easily the distinction between that which is pre-sented in the field of attention and the embodied attentional activity.

But there is a subtlety that must not be overlooked here. In my pre-reflec-tive experience, I am absorbed by what I am focally attending to (more prop-erly stated, “there is attending to the theme”), and the sense of my body, whichGurwitsch calls embodied existence, is attended to marginally. Embodiedexistence could become thematic, but in that case it is likely that attention isreflective, not pre-reflective. The point is that we are focused most of the timeon the theme that is not our embodied existence, although we attend to thelatter marginally. So can the field of attention be conceived such that the


positional activity of attention is marginal and that which is presented by thisactivity is thematic?

There are at least two main activities always operative simultaneously inthe attentional field. One activity distinguishes what belongs to the theme andthe thematic field. The other activity distinguishes what belongs to the themeand the margin.15 The result is three types of attention appropriate to the threedimensions of the field: theme, thematic context, and margin. Hence attend-ing to something marginally is distinct in kind from attending to somethingthematically or as part of the thematic context, and attending to somethingcontextually as part of the thematic context is different from attending to some-thing thematically or marginally. And so on.

Both of the activities described above, distinguishing what belongs to thetheme and the thematic context, and distinguishing what belongs to the themeand margin, present objective content in the attentional field. This claim is notlikely to be as controversial as the next one. The second activity – distinguish-ing theme and margin – presents also subjective content in the attentional field,namely, the sense of our body. Unless we thematize (and hence reflect on) thestream of attention or our embodied existence, the procession of attending ac-tivity and the sense of our bodies remains marginal. To attend to somethingmarginally does not mean it disappears. It is presented as not materially con-nected or as irrelevant to the theme. So as I run to catch the bus, adapting Sartre’sexample, it is more correct to say that “there-is-a-bus-to-be-caught” than to saythat “I am trying to catch the bus” (Sartre 1990, pp. 48–49). The latter locution,where the subject is the center of the activity, surfaces only in the reflective“storytelling” of “bad faith.” The point here is that we can conceive of the fieldof attention such that the activity of attention, which is usually thought to besubjective and on “this side” while the object is on the “other side,” is includedwithin the attentional field. The subject is not the center except for reflection.In pre-reflective attending, positionality is not acute; subjectivity is “outside”the object of concern, which is to say it is marginal to the theme.

The field of attention is the same as the field of consciousness

I can’t think of any compelling reason to distinguish these two. This reason-ing may smack of an ad ignorantiam fallacy, but I take the expanded defini-tion of the field of attention and how attention works as described in this paperand in my previous work as evidence that the identification is a good one tomake. So it isn’t that “no one has proved otherwise, so the identification ofthe field of attention and the field of consciousness must be true.” Instead a


full description of the field of attention (which this paper can only outline)seems to account for all the phenomena usually described using the term ‘thefield of consciousness.’ In fact, the next logical claim to make here would bethat attention is the same as consciousness, and that attention is a better termsince “consciousness” is more vague. I need to think more about equatingattention with consciousness, but on the face of it, it sounds pretty reasonableto me – controversial, but reasonable.

At least with respect to the identification of the field of attention and thefield of consciousness, there are good reasons to think they are the same. Butone must make attention do more than is usually allowed. One must admit allof the following.16

1. “Category effects” and “unattended stimuli” are actually examples of at-tention that occur outside the target area (the theme) (Arvidson 1998).

2. Attention is transformative. It is not limited to complete achievements of atarget, such that the theme only deserves that name when it is fully given ascentrally consolidated and segregated from the thematic context. That is,one must admit that centrally presented content that is incomplete, faint,unstable, transitory, etc. can count as achievements of “focal attention”(Arvidson 2000).

3. “Inattention” is a function of marginal attention, and the activity of atten-tion can be positional as shown in the previous section.

4. The stream of consciousness, or rather the stream of attention, grows andchanges shape as we develop so that certain endogenous initiations are morelikely to occur and certain exogenous saliencies are more likely to be al-lowed (Arvidson 1992a; Gurwitsch 1964).

Conclusion

This cognitive science to phenomenology lexicon of attention helps expandthe theoretical and applied possibilities for cognitive science of attention andfor phenomenology of attention. The translation lexicon and the articulationof the general nature of the field of attention as a dynamic tension of transfor-mations of content involving dimensional organizational principles and trans-formation principles shows correlations between these two approaches. Thisnew view of attention allows the advancement of challenging claims aboutsubjectivity and consciousness, namely, that the subject is the dynamic ten-sion in the field of attention, and that there is no distinction between the fieldof attention and the field of consciousness.


Notes

1. I must reserve a comparison of Gurwitsch and Husserl on attention for another time.2. See Arvidson (2000), and see a multimedia illustration of seven common attention shifts

at http://drarvidson.home.mindspring.com/transformations. Serial-shifting, singling out,synthesis, enlargement, contraction, elucidation, and restructuration, are simply illus-trated on this single web page.

3. Some refreshing exceptions are Begot (2001) and Sartre (1956).4. Some content may become thematic in an attentional transformation, such as if the counter

replaced the coffee mug as theme.5. Shapiro and Luck (1999) bring up the problem of reliability of phenomenological re-

ports, and suggest fleeting memory as an explanation.6. Gurwitsch (1964, pp. 102–103) writes, “Upon the initial singling out of a datum or group

of data, certain conditions are established upon which future discrimination will depend.Since the new conditions govern every subsequent discrimination, certain data are morelikely to emerge than others, and the emergence of these data, favored by the internalconditions (e.g., learning history), becomes more rapid. Practice in discrimination hasthe effect of stabilizing internal conditions and, therefore, of stabilizing certain organi-zational forms to the detriment of others. . . . Every organization, reorganization, recon-struction, and achievement establishes and reinforces conditions for future processes.”See also, Koffka (1935, p. 535).

7. See Kawahara and Miyatani (2001) for a discussion of possible confusion with theseterms. But also see Frith (2001) for confusion surrounding the terms top-down and bot-tom-up.

8. See Sartre (1956, p. 42) where he analyzes the case of Pierre present(ed) as absent in thecafe. Pierre has not yet arrived but is expected, and this “emptiness” is active in thesearcher’s field of attention. So even when no thing is presented (Husserl’s “empty in-tending”) some thing (as absent) is still presented, and the subject is attending to it asfigure.

9. For a critique of the spotlight metaphor of attention from a phenomenological point ofview see Arvidson (1996, 1998).

10. Also see http://drarvidson.home.mindspring.com/transformations for multimedia illus-trations of these attentional transformations.

11. Kinoshita and Towgood (2001, p. 889, n1) deny that the memory-block effect is a kindof negative priming. But the expanded interpretation of negative priming in this papermakes the identification viable. Also, one might speculate that the halo portion of themargin (Gurwitsch 1966, p. 268) rather than the horizonal portion, is most important innegative priming. See Embree (1985, p. xxx) on the distinction between halo and hori-zon for Gurwitsch.

12. I thank Shaun Gallagher for suggesting that I entertain this possibility. Other than “poten-tial themes” (Gurwitsch 1964, p. 366, 1985, p. 50) or also what I have called serial-shift-ing, the only place I have found that Gurwitsch appears to name something a “secondarytheme” (1985, p. 51) describes it as a privileged part of the thematic context, and so not arival to the “primary” theme. It may be that Gurwitsch has in mind the scenario of possi-ble serial-shifting here (as in 1964, p. 371) but uses this “secondary theme” terminology.Otherwise, a rival possible theme that would cause interference is described by Gurwitschas marginal (1985, p. xliv, 1966, pp. 270–272; but compare 1964, p. 371 with p. 415).


13. In internal negation, the activity of distinguishing theme from thematic context is mar-ginally attended to, so that an attentional distance is established between the theme andthe position of embodied attention on the theme.

14. See Arvidson (2000) and http://drarvidson.home.mindspring.com/transformations.15. Since the thematic context is organized along lines dictated by the theme and is materi-

ally relevant to it, the activity of distinguishing theme and margin is also a kind of de-fault distinction between the thematic context and the margin.

16. Except for the last statement in 3 below, none of these claims have been argued for atlength in this paper.

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A lexicon of attention: From cognitive science to phenomenology

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