Attention as a Basic Form of Engagement
-
Attention: First Layer of Engagement
As the focal point of experience, attention is essential to experience delivery. If the user doesn't notice, we can hardly consider an experience to be ‘delivered’. The concept of attention is all the more important because it is a key ingredient in human action and engagement. The relationship between attention and action possibilities is described eloquently by Odmar Neumann, psychologist at the University of Bielefeld in Germany in an essay from 1987:
"Selection is evidently needed for the control of action. Organisms must constantly select what to do and how to do it (...) The problem is how to avoid the behavioral chaos that would result from an attempt to simultaneously perform all possible actions for which sufficient causes exist." (p. 374)
In other words, an action possibility cannot be acted upon if it is not ‘selected’ to be acted upon. That is why all meaningful engagement requires and includes attention. "My experience is what I agree to attend to", wrote William James, one of the founders of modern psychology. From his book "The Principles of Psychology":
"Everyone knows what attention is. It is the taking possession by the mind, in clear and vivid form, of one out of what seem several simultaneously possible objects or trains of thought. Focalization, concentration, of consciousness are of its essence. It implies withdrawal from some things in order to deal effectively with others, and is a condition which has a real opposite in the confused, dazed, scatterbrained state which in French is called distraction, and Zerstreutheit in German ['absent-mindedness' in English]."
In fact, engagement is intrinsically connected to attention because attention is the simplest form of engagement. Remember this the next time you stop looking at a beautiful stranger in the subway the moment they glance back.
You can call ‘attentional engagement’ any form of engagement that consists purely of attention (e.g., visual, auditory, mental). Attentional engagement produces experiences that result from contemplating aspects of Reality and it is what people use to consume experiences offered by media like TV, music, film, books, and performances (e.g., sports, a lecture).
As if it were a scaffold, all other engagement is built on top of attention. You could call engagement that falls in this category ‘higher engagement’. Higher engagement produces experiences that result from acting upon an aspect of Reality (as compared to just paying attention to it). It is the type of engagement people use to experiences things like throwing a ball, holding a conversation, driving a car, or assembling Ikea furniture.
Speaks to