Mental Processes and Priorities

A Wandering Mind Reveals Mental Processes and Priorities

ScienceDaily (Mar. 15, 2012) — Odds are, you're not going to make it all the way through this article without thinking about something else. In fact, studies have found that our minds are wandering half the time, drifting off to thoughts unrelated to what we're doing -- did I remember to turn off the light? What should I have for dinner?

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Odds are, you're not going to make it all the way through this article without thinking about something else. In fact, studies have found that our minds are wandering half the time, drifting off to thoughts unrelated to what we're doing -- did I remember to turn off the light? What should I have for dinner? (Credit: © Yuri Arcurs / Fotolia

A new study investigating the mental processes underlying a wandering mind reports a role for working memory, a sort of a mental workspace that allows you to juggle multiple thoughts simultaneously.

Imagine you see your neighbor upon arriving home one day and schedule a lunch date. On your way to add it to your calendar, you stop to turn off the drippy faucet, feed the cat, and add milk to your grocery list. The capacity that allows you to retain the lunch information through those unrelated tasks is working memory.

The new study, published online March 14 in the journalPsychological Science by Daniel Levinson and Richard Davidson at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Jonathan Smallwood at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Science, reports that a person's working memory capacity relates to the tendency of their mind to wander during a routine assignment. Lead author Levinson is a graduate student with Davidson, a professor of psychology and psychiatry, in the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds at the UW-Madison Waisman Center.

Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided byUniversity of Wisconsin-Madison, via Newswise. The original article was written by Jill Sakai.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

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Journal Reference:

1. D. B. Levinson, J. Smallwood, R. J. Davidson. The Persistence of Thought: Evidence for a Role of Working Memory in the Maintenance of Task-Unrelated Thinking. Psychological Science, 2012; DOI:10.1177/0956797611431465