INHIBITION AND INTERFERENCE IN SELECTIVE ATTENTION - SOME TESTS OF A NEURAL-NETWORK MODEL

We describe a neural network system that models selective action-that is, how an organism selectively responds to an object when other objec ts evoke competing responses. Performance of the model during simulati ons of various selective action situations reveals a number of interes ting patterns of data. Specifically, the model shows a complex relatio nship between how much a distractor interferes with response to a targ et and how much inhibition is associated with the distracter. Subseque nt experiments with human subjects reveal that the paradoxical behavio ur of the model is also observed in human behaviour. We conclude that the similar performance characteristics of the model and human subject s in a variety of situations suggest that the model has captured some of the essential properties of mammalian selective action mechanisms.