Freddy is looking for his girlfriend in a large crowd of people. Because he is so focused on finding her, he fails to notice when a man in a clown costume walks right up next to him. This is an example of ______________
A) a feature detection failure
B) sensory overload
C) sensory adaptation
D) inattentional blindness
Answer: D
Rationale: Missing the obvious can be surprisingly easy—especially if you are focused on just one particular aspect of your environment. This phenomenon is called inattentional blindness. This example is very similar to a classic experiment where participants fail to notice a man in a gorilla costume because their attention is focused on another task.
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