Assessing selective attention abilities in ADHD, highly creative, and normal young children via Stroop interference and negative priming effects

Selective attention is conventionally taken to indicate the selection of one set of sensory inputs over others. The selection of relevant over irrelevant stimuli is fundamental for efficient interaction with the visual world. Such interaction relies on selection mechanisms that allow for the direction of action to behaviourally relevant items. Attention is influenced by both stimulus-driven (bottom-up) and goal-directed (top-down) processes. According to one view of selective attention, along with the enhancement of selected targeted information, there is a screening-out or gating of unwanted, competing non-target stimuli (e.g., Cohen, Dunbar, & McClelland, 1990; Desimone & Duncan, 1995). An alternative view regarding such non-targets holds that they are not simply screened out, but implicitly registered and subjected to active inhibition (see Tipper, 2001, for a review). The current study looks for evidence of active inhibition in groups of children with potential differences relating to attentional processing. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved