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Selective attention 0:34
A 34-second explainer of Selective attention, narrated over the same demo you can try yourself.
Try the interactive Selective attention demo
What this video covers
Selective attention means your mind focuses on what you’re actively looking for and overlooks everything else - even obvious things right in front of you. When deeply concentrated, you’ll often miss the most noticeable item on screen.
You were hunting for Export, so the banner - the biggest, brightest thing on the screen - barely registered. That's selective attention: focus is a spotlight, and most of what falls outside it goes dark. It's exactly why a genuine warning dressed as a banner reaches almost no one.
