"Inattentional blindness". You simply can't see what's not on your list of things to look for. It's why there have been campaigns about seeing bikes and motorcycles for years, to just get the idea that they exist into people's minds.
It's not completely incorrect to say drivers "choose to not see them", just more accurate to say they don't have cyclists on their active-looking-list.
Then again, I'd bet these kinds of drivers have fuck all on their active-looking-list, and are completely self-absorbed, only focusing on the 10 feet of road directly in front of them.
One thing I can credit to riding a motorcycle - my head has been on a permanent swivel since my first class, on the bike or in a car. And I can say many, many, drivers are oblivious to what's going on around them - I can see it in their face in their side mirror that they never look into (or isn't even adjusted correctly). They're looking straight ahead, at nothing.
