Importance of frontal motor cortex in divided attention and simultaneous temporal processing

Research on attention in the context of interval timing has a well-established history (Brown, 1985; Hicks et al., 1977; Macar et al., 1994; Thomas and Weaver, 1975; Zakay and Block, 1996). Despite this history, attention is not a well-defined concept. General definitions of attention usually include reference to the speed, efficiency, or depth of processing, with the prediction that attended stimuli are processed more quickly, efficiently, and deeply than unattended stimuli (Sternberg, 1999). Within the field of attention research, one important distinction is between selective attention and divided attention. Selective attention requires a subject to selectively process (focus attention on) one of several possible stimuli, whereas divided attention requires a subject to coordinate the processing of multiple sources of information.