Vigilance: The Importance of the Elicited Observing Rate

Abstract
Observing may be elicited by regularly repeated events that occasionally become signals. Such events were presented at rates of either 5 per minute or 30 per minute, and signals averaged 15 per hour during an 80-minute vigil. Observers missed about 10 percent of the signals with the low event rate and about 70 percent of the signals with the high event rate. The experiment supports a decisiontheory approach to observing behavior.

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