... significant incoming information. Selective attention refers to the ability to focus on one task at a time whilst excluding any eternal stimuli, which may be distracting. Whereas divided attention refers to the ability to divide ones attention between two or more tasks. If one of these tasks becomes an automatic process it becomes easier to divide ones attention between these two tasks. However, sometimes rather than being helpful, interference can occur between the controlled process and the automatic process. Psychologists have frequently found that the powerfully autonomic nature of reading words, as it is such a well-learned automatic activity can interfere with other tasks. This idea has been researched by a number of researchers. Kanheman (1973) devised a model of divided attention, which was based around the idea of mental effort. He proposed that some tasks might be relatively autonomic; so make fewer demands in terms of mental effort, such as a ...

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