Attention, lapses

Examples of dissociations of consciousness that often divide the waking mind into two compartments include microsleeps, attentional lapses, and fantasy states. At the edges of sleep are hypnagogic hallucinations and sleep paralysis. Within sleep are sleep walking, sleep talking, and lucid dreaming. In all of these conditions, consciousness has some features characteristic of one state mixed with features characteristic of another. 

NE is fundamental in human attention and concentration. It has been demonstrated that idozaxan increase the attention in healthy volunteers (Smith et al., 1992). To contrasy, the administration of a2-adrenergic agonist clonidine results in attention lapses in humans. These clonidine-induced attention difficulties can be reversed by idozaxan (Smith and Nutt 1996). 

Smith A, Nutt D (1996) Noradrenaline and attention lapses. Nature 380 291. 

The fourth part, Driver Temporary Impairments, focuses on the four types of impairments that most researchers associate with the greatest involvement in crashes impairments from alcohol, impairments from (other) drugs, impairments from fatigue, and impairments from distraction and attentional lapses. Unlike the more stable individual differences of personality, gender, age, and visual and information processing abilities, these can change drastically within short intervals (on the order of minutes), and then their effects are often interactive with the person s more stable characteristics. When such interactions have been studied they will be discussed in these chapters. 

This chapter describes accidents caused by those slips and lapses of attention that even well-trained and well-motivated persons make from time to time. For example, they forget to close a valve or close the wrong valve. They know what they should do, want to do it, and are physically and mentally capable of doing it. But they forget to do it. Exhortation, punishment, or further training will have no effect. We must either accept an occasional error or change the work situation so as to remove the opportunities for error or to make errors less likely. 

Let us fix attention on a particular H20 molecule A in the interior of water (if we wish to identify this molecule we can suppose that it contains a nucleus of the oxygen isotope 01S) and let us consider the water molecules which happen to be nearest neighbors of this molecule at the moment. These molecules have been in contact with A for different lengths of time. Since all the molecules in the liquid wander about, there was a time when none of these molecules was in contact with A. Further, if we could now begin to watch these molecules, we should find that, after the lapse of different periods of time, they become separated from A and each is replaced by another molecule. Similar remarks can be made about the molecules which come into contact with any chosen molecule. We can now raise the question—-What is the rate of turnover of this process The rate depends on the degree of local order and disorder, which in turn depends on the strength and character of the forces between adjacent molecules. 

When an accident report says that an accident was due to human error, the writer usually means an error by an operator or other front line worker. But designers and managers also make errors, not slips or lapses of attention as they usually have time to check their work, as well as mistakes or, less often, violations. 

Requires attention A minor lapse within the system has occurred (the human element), which can quickly be put right. 

Figure 1 Individual PVT reaction times (msec) for a representative subject undergoing 88 hr (3.67 days) of total sleep deprivation. Reaction times are from the 10-min visual PVT test bouts at 20 00 on each day of deprivation at 12, 36, 60, and 84 hr of sustained wakefulness. Reaction times after presentation of each stimulus are represented by black bars. Blank spaces between reaction times represent false starts (errors of commission). Reaction times > 500 msec are termed performance lapses, or lapses in attention. After 12 hr of wakefulness, reaction times were comparable across the test bout, with no false starts. At 36 hr of wakefulness, there were occasional lapses in attention (RT > 500 msec), with some false starts near the end of the test bout. After 60 hr awake the frequency of performance lapses was increased a few minutes into the performance bout. At 84 hr of sustained wakefulness, there were significantly more lapses of attention, with RTs > 8000 msec, and a greater incidence of false starts. (From Ref. 44.)...

Kjellberg A. Sleep deprivation and some aspects of performance. II. Lapses and other attentional effects. Waking and Sleeping. Vol. 1, 1977 145-148. 

Furthermore, accidents and injuries are leading health concerns for child and adolescent populations (e.g., Ref. 128). In fact, unintentional injuries are among the leading causes of death for adolescents (129,130). Adolescents who are not able to obtain adequate sleep may struggle with lapses in attention and delayed responses that can affect their ability to safely operate hazardous or tech-... 

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