Ironic-cognitive-processing theory served as the basis for two investigations. While the theory is complicated and involved [oh, no!], the practical import of its findings are relatively simple.The practical import are simple? I are so relieved!
You already know the results from the title, but they bear repeating:Ss (M = 50; F = 52) watched a videotape of a series of events involving Australian Rules Football players, coaches, and umpires. Study 1 had some Ss listen to an out-of-sync ["His story will break your heart"--the Drunkablog] audio tape of game commentary and background noise as a condition of high cognitive load. A general-instruction condition consisted of receiving the instruction; "Your task is to closely observe what each person is doing in the video. Whatever you do, do not pay attention to what the umpires are doing." In the suppression-of-umpires condition Ss received the instruction; "Your task is to closely observe what each person is doing in the video" [NSW!]. [But read the comments.] "Whatever you do, do not pay any attention to any player who intentionally tries to harm another player." . . .
That's just dumb.It was revealed that Ss were more aware of individuals, in this case umpires, when instructed not to attend to them. . . .The "ironic" effect was that Ss increased their attention more to the objects they were told not to attend to.
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