Attention and executive control of complex cognitive and sensorimotor skills

This line of work centers around the manipulation of conscious attention as a means to get at the executive control mechanisms driving novice and experienced performance. Specifically, my colleagues and I have used both dual-task paradigms and the manipulation of attention to specific skill components in an attempt to make salient the types of attentional processes supporting execution across different task types and level of expertise. Our work demonstrates that although novice performance depends on explicit attentional control, high level skills that become proceduralized with extended practice do not require, and may actually be harmed by, explicit control of skill processes and procedures. That is, attention can sometimes be detrimental.

If proceduralized skills can benefit from reduced attention, then any environment that serves to limit the attentional resources available for execution may actually aid performance. For example, because attention takes time to deploy, time constraints may actually help well-practiced execution by preventing too much attention to task control and guidance. Although the notion that well learned skills benefit from limited performance time flies in the face of the well-established speed-accuracy trade-off, this phenomenon has most often been studied in individuals possessing little previous exposure to the tasks they are performing. If the control structures governing performance differ as a function of skill level, then the speed-accuracy trade-off may not always generalize to well-learned skills. And, indeed, we have found support for this idea. Novice and expert golfers performed a series of golf putts under conditions in which they were instructed to putt as quickly as possible and under conditions in which no time constraints existed. Although speed stress harmed novice performance in comparison to performance environments without time constraints, experts’ putting accuracy actually improved under the speeded condition.

It should be noted, however, that not all tasks automate via proceduralization. Rather, some skills appear to rely on the active maintenance and manipulation of information in memory at all levels of learning (e.g., solving some types of complex math problems). This allows us to ask questions about differences in how tasks that operate largely outside the scope of working memory at high levels of practice will be impacted by demanding, high-stakes situations in comparison to tasks that impose significant real-time processing and storage demands at all levels of learning (see Skill Performance under Pressure section below).

Select Relevant Publications:

Jackson, R., & Beilock, S. L. (2008). Attention and performance. In D. Farrow, J. Baker, and C. MacMahon (Eds.), Developing elite sports performers: Lessons from theory and practice. (pp.104-118). Routledge. (pdf)

Beilock, S. L. (2005). Controlled and automatic processing. In R. M. Bartlett, C. Gratton, and C. Rolf (Eds.), Encyclopedia of international sports studies (pp. 209-210). Routledge.

Beilock, S. L., Bertenthal, B. I., McCoy, A. M., & Carr, T. H. (2004). Haste does not always make waste: Expertise, direction of attention, and speed versus accuracy in performing sensorimotor skills. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 11, 373-379. (pdf)

Beilock, S. L., & Carr, T. H. (2004). From novice to expert performance: Attention, memory, and the control of complex sensorimotor skills. In A. M. Williams, N. J. Hodges, M. A. Scott, & M. L. J. Court (Eds.), Skill acquisition in sport: Research, theory and practice (pp. 309-328). Routledge. (pdf)

Beilock, S. L., Carr, T. H., MacMahon, C., & Starkes, J. L. (2002). When paying attention becomes counterproductive: Impact of divided versus skill-focused attention on novice and experienced performance of sensorimotor skills. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 8, 6-16. (pdf)