As someone with an interest in what happens when things go wrong and why it happens, I do pay attention to the safety briefing, if only to confirm that it's the same as last time. I tend to confirm the nearest exits before taking my seat. I usually get to go through the safety card in great detail, explaining all the symbols and drawings to my young son who wants to know what they all mean.
When they do aircraft certification tests, are all the passengers briefed as per a normal briefing? If so, perhaps it would be interesting to brief half of them beforehand and not do an in-cabin briefing to simulate real life a bit better as half the passengers would be ignorant of what to do?