Almost as appeared in Cognitive Science Quarterly (2000) 1 (2) Received 04.09.00 ' 1999 HERMES SCIENCE PUBLICATIONS Attention, Habituation and Conditioning: Toward a Computational Model 1 Christian Balkenius Lund University, Sweden 2 Is attention a purely perceptual process or is it in any way related to motor control? The aim of this article is to show that attention puts similar demands on a cognitive system as motor control and present evidence supporting the view that similar mechanisms operate in the two processes. A computational model of attention is presented that uses habituation as well as classical and instrumental conditioning to explain a number of attentional processes. Evi- dence from neurophysiology is reviewed that suggest that attention is con- trolled in a way similar to actions. This view makes it possible to adapt tradi- tional learning theoretical mechanisms to the control of attention. Computer simulations are presented that illustrates the operation of the model. Keywords: attention, learning theory, brain systems. Introduction What is attention for? Is it a purely perceptual mechanism that prevents cognitive overload by keeping irrelevant sensory information away, or is it part of the machin- ery controlling actions? Allport (1990) reviews evidence against theories of attention that assume that sensory information must be selected at an early stage of process- ing. Instead he suggests that the function of selective attention is to specify the pa- rameters for goal-directed actions. In grasping a particular object, it is necessary that the spatial coordinates of that object are selected, and not those of some other object in the scene (Allport, 1987, 1990). Many recent empirical studies support this view of attention (Tipper, Howard, Houghton, 1998, Castiello, 1999). It appears that one important role of attention is to open up sensory channels with information relevant to a particular action. Before an object can be reached or grasped, the focus of atten- tion must first select information from the environment that should guide the action. This implies that attentional fixations must be coordinated with motor actions. 1 This research was supported in part by The Swedish Council for Research in the Humanities and Social Sciences. 2 Address for correspondence: Dr. Christian Balkenius, Lund University Cognitive Science, Kung- shuset, Lundagrd, S-222 22 LUND, Sweden. E-mail: christian.balkenius@lucs.lu.se (Fax: +46-46-222- 97-58). Home page: http://www.lucs.lu.se/People/Christian.Balkenius/