1. The process whereby a person concentrates on some features of the environment to the (relative) exclusion of others
   "The magician's trick relied on misdirecting the audience's attention";
   - attending
    
2. The work of providing treatment for or attending to someone or something
   "the old car needs constant attention";
   - care, aid, tending
    
3. The faculty or power of mental concentration
   "keeping track of all the details requires your complete attention"
    
4. A general interest that leads people to want to know more
   "She was the centre of attention"
    
5. A courteous act indicating affection
   "she tried to win his heart with her many attentions"
    
6. (military) a motionless erect stance with arms at the sides and feet together; assumed by military personnel during drill or review
   "the troops stood at attention"
    
7. (AI) a mechanism in neural networks that allows the model to focus on specific parts of the input when processing data
   "The transformer model uses multi-head attention to capture complex relationships in text"

Derived forms: attentions

See also: attentive, inattentive, unattentive [rare]

Type of: attracter [rare], attraction, attractive feature, attractor, basic cognitive process, courtesy, faculty, magnet, mental faculty, module, stance, work

Encyclopedia: Attention, The Kids Are Watching