Everyone has been to an arcade before, or at least has heard about it. Flashing lights, loud noises, popcorn, slushes, and who can forget the games. Usually I like to partake in the driving games or the ones that require a great deal of attention to stop a fast flashing light to stop at the smallest designated spot, but from my last trip to Dave and Buster’s I remember one game; the Whac-a-Mole. It’s not normally my game of choice but my son really wanted to play it. Since it was the harder adult version and he is still pretty small I ended up playing it for him with him just holding the mallet. Just like the other games it was flashing lights galore. My son, who thought he was the actual one playing, directed me to where the moles were so I could hit them. I tried my best to score high so he could have more tickets but like I said it was an adult game with a child directing me.

I didn’t notice until the topic was mentioned in class the trick that was used in the Whac-a-Mole game. They used cues to direct the player’s attention; the holes had lights around them and other places as well on the game. Before starting the game it flashed lights but as soon as I started playing the lights increased, especially to where the moles were popping out of. I know now that the reason why my son had directed me to hit in null places was because if the invalid cues in the game. Cues are defined as a stimulus that might indicate where the leading stimulus may appear. Cues can be valid; correctly directing you to the following stimulus, invalid; wrongly directing you to a following stimulus, or neutral which leads to neither a right nor wrong stimulus. My reaction time was slower due to the invalid cues because I believed that the lights indicated an incoming mole, than if we had not focused on the lights. Whac-a-Mole is filled with invalid and natural cues was designed to direct your attention to a lit hole, giving off the impression that a mole would pop out but really the mole would come out of an unlit hole. Thus making you miss the mole and lose points, all because of theses invalid cues. So the next time you go to an arcade, don’t let the lights get you, direct your attention on the actual game.