Auditory Evoked Potentials and Divided Attention

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Abstract
In a multi‐channel divided attention task, 8 subjects listened to a sequence of tones delivered at one of two stimulation rates and at one of three spatial locations (channels): left ear, right ear, and an apparent position midway between left and right ears. Subjects were instructed to monitor one, two, or all three channels and detect slightly louder target tones in the monitored channel(s). Seven listening conditions were used, three in which subjects monitored one channel and ignored the others, another three in which two channels were simultaneously monitored and the third ignored, and a further condition in which all three channels were monitored. With a high stimulation rate, the N1 component of the vertex evoked potential (latency 70–130 msec) in both attended and unattended channels significantly decreased in amplitude with an increase in the number of monitored channels. At the same time, N1 was significantly larger when a channel was attended than when it was ignored. There were no significant effects under slow stimulation rate conditions. Like N1, target detectability (d') declined with increasing monitoring load only with a fast stimulation rate, but the correspondence between these two measures was not upheld in every condition. The results indicate that with a high “information load” in a multi‐channel task, selective attention increases the vertex response in all attended channels, while divided attention decreases the response in both attended and unattended channels, thus suggesting that the N1 component of the auditory evoked potential reflects the apparent division of attentional capacity among competing auditory inputs.