Search

Throughout the 20th century, the psychological literature has considered attention as being primarily directed at the outside world. More recent theories conceive attention as also operating on internal information, and mounting evidence suggests a single, shared attentional focus between external and internal information. Such sharing implies a cognitive architecture where attention needs to be continuously shifted between prioritizing either external or internal information, but the fundamental principles underlying this attentional balancing act are currently unknown. Here, we propose and evaluate one such principle in the shape of the Internal Dominance over External Attention (IDEA) hypothesis: Contrary to the traditional view of attention as being primarily externally oriented, IDEA asserts that attention is inherently biased toward internal information. We provide a theoretical account for why such an internal attention bias may have evolved and examine findings from a wide range of literatures speaking to the balancing of external versus internal attention, including research on working memory, attention switching, visual search, mind wandering, sustained attention, and meditation. We argue that major findings in these disparate research lines can be coherently understood under IDEA. Finally, we consider tentative neurocognitive mechanisms contributing to IDEA and examine the practical implications of more deliberate control over this bias in the context of psychopathology. It is hoped that this novel hypothesis motivates cross-talk between the reviewed research lines and future empirical studies directly examining the mechanisms that steer attention either inward or outward on a moment-by-moment basis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent studies have found that making judgments of learning (JOLs) for verbal materials changes memory itself, a form of reactivity effect on memory. The current study explores the reactivity effect on visual (image) memory and tests the potential role of enhanced learning engagement in this effect. Experiment 1 employed object image pairs as stimuli and observed a positive reactivity effect on memory for visual details. Experiment 2 conceptually replicated this positive reactivity effect using pairs of scene images. Experiment 3 introduced mind wandering (MW) probes to measure participants' attentional state (learning engagement) and observed that making JOLs significantly reduced MW. More importantly, reduced MW mediated the reactivity effect. Lastly, Experiment 4 found that a manipulation that heightened learning motivation decreased the reactivity effect. Overall, the current study provides the first demonstration of the reactivity effect on visual memory, as well as support for the enhanced learning engagement explanation. Practical implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mind wandering (MW), a shift of attention away from external tasks toward internally generated thoughts, has been frequently associated with costs in reading comprehension (RC), although with some contrasting results and many reported potential intervening factors. The aim of the meta-analysis was to evaluate the relationship between MW and RC, considering the role of participants' and text's characteristics, as well as methodological issues in the measurement of the two constructs. From a set of 25 selected full texts (73 correlation coefficients), pooled correlation (r = −0.21) revealed a negative significant relationship. Using trait-based questionnaires to assess MW compared with online probes resulted in an average significant change of 0.30 in the correlation between MW and RC, leading to a null correlation. A significant effect of age was also found, with more negative correlations with increasing age. None of the other moderating variables considered (i.e., language, text type, text length, RC assessment, text difficulty, text interest, and working memory) resulted in a significant effect. From the present meta-analysis, we might suggest that MW and RC are partially overlapping and vary, within a swing effect, in relation to a set of shared factors, such as working memory, interest, and text length. There might also be side-specific factors that drive the movement of primarily one side of the swing, and future research should further consider the role of individual differences in RC. Implications for research and educational settings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mind wandering is ubiquitous in everyday life and has a pervasive and profound impact on task-related performance. A range of psychological processes have been proposed to underlie these performance-related decrements, including failures of executive control, volatile information processing, and shortcomings in selective attention to critical task-relevant stimuli. Despite progress in the development of such theories, existing descriptive analyses have limited capacity to discriminate between the theories. We propose a cognitive-model based analysis that simultaneously explains self-reported mind wandering and task performance. We quantitatively compare six explanations of poor performance in the presence of mind wandering. The competing theories are distinguished by whether there is an impact on executive control and, if so, how executive control acts on information processing, and whether there is an impact on volatility of information processing. Across two experiments using the sustained attention to response task, we find quantitative evidence that mind wandering is associated with two latent factors. Our strongest conclusion is that executive control is impaired: increased mind wandering is associated with reduced ability to inhibit habitual response tendencies. Our nuanced conclusion is that executive control deficits manifest in reduced ability to selectively attend to the information value of rare but task-critical events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much of our day is spent mind-wandering—periods of inattention characterized by a lack of awareness of external stimuli and information. Whether we are paying attention or not, information surrounds us constantly—some true and some false. The proliferation of false information in news and social media highlights the critical need to understand the psychological mechanisms underlying our beliefs about what is true. People often rely on heuristics to judge the truth of information. For example, repeated information is more likely to be judged as true than new information (i.e., the illusory truth effect). However, despite the prevalence of mind wandering in our daily lives, current research on the contributing factors to the illusory truth effect have largely ignored periods of inattention as experimentally informative. Here, we aim to address this gap in our knowledge, investigating whether mind wandering during initial exposure to information has an effect on later belief in the truth of that information. That is, does the illusory truth effect occur even when people report not paying attention to the information at hand. Across three studies we demonstrate that even during periods of mind wandering, the repetition of information increases truth judgments. Further, our results suggest that the severity of mind wandering moderated truth ratings, such that greater levels of mind wandering decreased truth judgements for previously presented information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to influential accounts of mind wandering (MW), working memory capacity (WMC) plays a key role in controlling the amount of off-task thought during the execution of a demanding task. Whereas WMC has primarily been associated with reduced levels of involuntarily occurring MW episodes in prior research, here we demonstrate for the first time that high-WMC individuals exhibit lower levels of voluntary MW. One hundred and eighty participants carried out a demanding reading task and reported their attentional state in response to random thought probes. In addition, participants' WMC was measured with two common complex span tasks (operation span and symmetry span). As a result, WMC was negatively related to both voluntary and involuntary MW, and the two forms of MW partially mediated the positive effect of WMC on reading performance. Furthermore, the negative relation between voluntary WM and reading remained significant after controlling for interest. Thus, in contrast to prior research suggesting that voluntary MW might be more closely related to motivation rather than WMC, the present results demonstrate that high-WMC individuals tend to limit both involuntary and voluntary MW more strictly than low-WMC individuals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Metacognitive monitoring refers to how people evaluate their cognitive performance. An extensive literature examines how accurately individuals engage in monitoring. The question of how often individuals engage in metacognitive monitoring has been largely neglected, although one might expect situational, group, and individual variability in monitoring frequency. We argue that this is a critical omission, given that the frequency of metacognitive monitoring might have important implications for monitoring accuracy and task performance. Within this review, we highlight findings from three literatures, that each provide insight into how often individuals engage in monitoring. To clarify the important links and potential overlaps between these separate bodies of research, we begin by summarizing the metacognitive monitoring literature, including age-related patterns in monitoring accuracy. We then connect these questions regarding spontaneous monitoring, including age-related patterns in spontaneous monitoring, to targeted reviews of the self-regulated learning, think-aloud protocol, and mind-wandering literatures. We discuss situational and dispositional factors believed to influence monitoring accuracy, and propose that the same factors could potentially influence the frequency of spontaneous monitoring. Additionally, we propose that age-related increases in spontaneous monitoring (as suggested by age-related increases in TRI) may contribute to older adults’ intact monitoring abilities. It is our hope that this review will encourage increased attention and research on the topic of spontaneous monitoring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers have recently demonstrated that mind-wandering episodes can vary on numerous dimensions, and it has been suggested that assessing these dimensions will play an important role in our understanding of mind wandering. One dimension that has received considerable attention in recent work is the intentionality of mind wandering. Although it has been claimed that indexing the intentionality of mind wandering will be necessary if researchers are to obtain a coherent understanding of the wandering mind, one concern is that this dimension might be redundant with another, longstanding, dimension: namely, meta-awareness. Thus, the utility of the argument for assessing intentionality rests upon a demonstration that this dimension is distinct from the meta-awareness dimension. To shed light on this issue, across two studies we compared and contrasted these dimensions to determine whether they are redundant or distinct. In both studies, we found support for the view that these dimensions are distinct. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highly motivated students often exhibit better academic performance than less motivated students. However, to date, the specific cognitive mechanisms through which motivation increases academic achievement are not well understood. Here we explored the possibility that mind wandering mediates the relation between motivation and academic performance, and additionally, we examined possible mediation by both intentional and unintentional forms of mind wandering. We found that participants reporting higher motivation to learn in a lecture-based setting tended to engage in less mind wandering, and that this decrease in mind wandering was in turn associated with greater retention of the lecture material. Critically, we also found that the influence of motivation on retention was mediated by both intentional and unintentional types of mind wandering. Not only do the present results advance our theoretical understanding of the mechanisms underlying the relation between motivation and academic achievement, they also provide insights into possible methods of intervention that may be useful in improving student retention in educational settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mind wandering is associated with perceptual decoupling: the disengagement of attention from perception. This decoupling is deleterious to performance in many situations; however, we sought to determine whether it might occur in the service of performance in certain circumstances. In two studies, we examined the role of mind wandering in a test of 'semantic satiation,' a phenomenon in which the repeated presentation of a word reduces semantic priming for a subsequently presented semantic associate. We posited that the attentional and perceptual decoupling associated with mind wandering would reduce the amount of satiation in the semantic representations of repeatedly presented words, thus leading to a reduced semantic-satiation effect. Our results supported this hypothesis: Self-reported mind-wandering episodes (Study 1) and behavioral indices of decoupled attention (Study 2) were both predictive of maintained semantic priming in situations predicted to induce semantic satiation. Additionally, our results suggest that moderate inattention to repetitive stimuli is not sufficient to enable 'dishabituation': the refreshment of cognitive performance that results from diverting attention away from the task at hand. Rather, full decoupling is necessary to reap the benefits of mind wandering and to minimize mind numbing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study assessed the occurrence and factors that influence mind wandering (MW) in the domain of film comprehension. The cascading model of inattention assumes that a stronger mental representation (i.e., a situation model) during comprehension results in less MW. Accordingly, a suppression hypothesis suggests that MW would decrease as a function of having the knowledge of the plot of a film prior to viewing, because the prior-knowledge would help to strengthen the situation model during comprehension. Furthermore, an interest-moderation hypothesis would predict that the suppression effect of prior-knowledge would only emerge when there was interest in viewing the film. In the current experiment, 108 participants either read a short story that depicted the plot (i.e., prior-knowledge condition) or read an unrelated story of equal length (control condition) prior to viewing the short film (32.5 minutes) entitled The Red Balloon. Participants self-reported their interest in viewing the film immediately before the film was presented. MW was tracked using a self-report method targeting instances of MW with metacognitive awareness. Participants in the prior-knowledge condition reported less MW compared with the control condition, thereby supporting the suppression hypothesis. MW also decreased over the duration of the film, but only for those with prior-knowledge of the film. Finally, prior-knowledge effects on MW were only observed when interest was average or high, but not when interest was low. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mind wandering seems to be a prototypical feature of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). However, an important emerging distinction of mind-wandering types hinges on whether a given episode of mind wandering reflects a failure of executive control (spontaneous mind wandering) or the engagement of controlled processes for internal processing (deliberate mind wandering). Here we distinguish between spontaneous and deliberate mind wandering and test the hypothesis that symptoms of ADHD are associated with the former but not the latter. We assessed ADHD symptomatology and everyday levels of deliberate and spontaneous mind wandering in two large non-clinical samples ( Ns = 1,354). In addition, to provide converging evidence, we examined rates of deliberate and spontaneous mind wandering in a clinically diagnosed ADHD sample. Results provide clear evidence that spontaneous, but not deliberate, mind wandering is a central feature of ADHD symptomatology at both the clinical and non-clinical level. We discuss the implications of these results for understanding both ADHD and mind wandering. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mind wandering is a phenomenon in which attention drifts away from the primary task to task-unrelated thoughts. Previous studies have used self-report methods to measure the frequency of mind wandering and its effects on task performance. Many of these studies have investigated mind wandering in simple perceptual and memory tasks, such as recognition memory, sustained attention, and choice reaction time tasks. Manipulations of task difficulty have revealed that mind wandering occurs more frequently in easy than in difficult conditions, but that it has a greater negative impact on performance in the difficult conditions. The goal of this study was to examine the relation between mind wandering and task difficulty in a high-level cognitive task, namely reading comprehension of standardized texts. We hypothesized that reading comprehension may yield a different relation between mind wandering and task difficulty than has been observed previously. Participants read easy or difficult versions of eight passages and then answered comprehension questions after reading each of the passages. Mind wandering was reported using the probe-caught method from several previous studies. In contrast to the previous results, but consistent with our hypothesis, mind wandering occurred more frequently when participants read difficult rather than easy texts. However, mind wandering had a more negative influence on comprehension for the difficult texts, which is consistent with the previous data. The results are interpreted from the perspectives of the executive-resources and control-failure theories of mind wandering, as well as with regard to situation models of text comprehension. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]