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Working Memory Capacity Offers Resistance to Mind‐Wandering and External Distraction in a Context‐Specific Manner
Author(s) -
Robison Matthew K.,
Unsworth Nash
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
applied cognitive psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.719
H-Index - 100
eISSN - 1099-0720
pISSN - 0888-4080
DOI - 10.1002/acp.3150
Subject(s) - distraction , psychology , mind wandering , working memory , cognitive psychology , context (archaeology) , reading (process) , resistance (ecology) , comprehension , task (project management) , cognition , computer science , linguistics , neuroscience , biology , paleontology , ecology , philosophy , management , economics , programming language
Summary The present study examined the impact of mind‐wandering and distraction in silent and noisy studying environments and how individual differences in working memory capacity offered resistance to these two distinct forms of attention failure. Two groups of participants read a text in different environments and answered reading comprehension questions. While reading, thought probes asked participants to indicate the current focus of their attention. Results showed that the relationship between working memory capacity and reading comprehension was partially driven by resistance to mind‐wandering in the silent condition and by resistance to external distraction in the noise condition. The findings support the distinction between mind‐wandering and external distraction, two separate yet related types of attention failure that impact task performance. Further, executive abilities seem to offer resistance to these two types of attention failure differentially depending on the context. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.