It seems to me that some people find it difficult to retain information that is not naturally salient to them. This isn't the case for all people, however. There exist people that will put in the effort to retain and use information related to material that is inherently uninteresting to them, particularly in a school setting. Is it the case that the latter group has more of a conscious control over what is salient to them at the time? Is this phenomena 'traceable' in the brain?
Why is it that some (yet not all) people may struggle to retain information unrelated to what they are interested in?
cognitive psychology;cognitive neuroscience;motivation