Effect of Auditory Distractors on Selective Attention in Young Adults

Abstract

Background: Selective attention plays a crucial role in auditory processing by enabling individuals to filter out distracting information while focusing on and processing relevant input. Working memory, a cognitive system responsible for actively retaining and manipulating information to facilitate cognitive tasks, is closely associated with, but distinct from, short-term memory. Despite their close conceptual similarity, research has not consistently established a direct relationship between working memory and short-term memory. Aim: The study aimed to investigate the effect of auditory distractors on selective attention in young adults. Method: The study comprised 32 young adults aged between 20 and 30 years (Mean age:23.16 ± 1.635), with an equal distribution of 16 males and 16 females. The selective attention scores for right ear/left ear (single correct responses) and both ears (double correct responses) using dichotic digit test were obtained without and with auditory distractor. The auditory distractor employed was a four-talker babble. Subsequently, participants completed auditory working memory assessments, including the backward digit span and operational span tests. Results: The dataset exhibited a non-normal distribution, necessitating the use of the Mann-Whitney U test to compare related samples. The results indicated a significant difference in selective attention scores for single and double correct responses both without and with auditory distractors. Specifically, the difference in scores between conditions without and with auditory distractors was more pronounced for double correct responses compared to single correct responses. Furthermore, Spearman correlation analysis revealed no significant relationship between the difference in scores without and with auditory distractors and measures of backward digit span and operational span tests. Conclusions: This study establishes that auditory distractors, particularly the four-talker babble, substantially degrade selective attention scores. The difficulty in tasks necessitating simultaneous processing from both ears is evident from significant differences between double correct and single ear responses. Moreover, the absence of correlation between selective attention and auditory working memory highlights the independent nature of auditory processing capabilities and cognitive functions. These results emphasize the complicated relationships affected by neural processing variability and individual differences, calling for further exploration in this area.