Monkeying around with the Gorillas in Our Midst: Familiarity with an Inattentional-Blindness Task Does Not Improve the Detection of Unexpected Events

When people know to look for an unexpected event (eg, a gorilla in a basketball game), they tend to notice that event. But does knowledge that an unexpected event might occur improve the detection of other unexpected events in a similar scene? Subjects watched a new video in which, in addition to the gorilla, two other unexpected events occurred: a curtain changed color, and one player left the scene. Subjects who knew about videos like this one consistently spotted the gorilla in the new video, but they were slightly less likely to notice the other events. Foreknowledge that unexpected events might occur does not enhance the ability to detect other such events.