1932

Abstract

Conscious experience is fluid; it rarely remains on one topic for an extended period without deviation. Its dynamic nature is illustrated by the experience of mind wandering, in which attention switches from a current task to unrelated thoughts and feelings. Studies exploring the phenomenology of mind wandering highlight the importance of its content and relation to meta-cognition in determining its functional outcomes. Examination of the information-processing demands of the mind-wandering state suggests that it involves perceptual decoupling to escape the constraints of the moment, its content arises from episodic and affective processes, and its regulation relies on executive control. Mind wandering also involves a complex balance of costs and benefits: Its association with various kinds of error underlines its cost, whereas its relationship to creativity and future planning suggest its potential value. Although essential to the stream of consciousness, various strategies may minimize the downsides of mind wandering while maintaining its productive aspects.

Loading

Article metrics loading...

/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-psych-010814-015331
2015-01-03
2024-03-28
Loading full text...

Full text loading...

/deliver/fulltext/psych/66/1/annurev-psych-010814-015331.html?itemId=/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-psych-010814-015331&mimeType=html&fmt=ahah

Literature Cited

  1. Addis DR, Knapp K, Roberts RP, Schacter DL. 2012. Routes to the past: neural substrates of direct and generative autobiographical memory retrieval. NeuroImage 59:2908–22 [Google Scholar]
  2. Allen M, Smallwood J, Christensen J, Gramm D, Rasmussen B. et al. 2013. The balanced mind: the variability of task-unrelated thoughts predicts error monitoring. Front. Hum. Neurosci. 7:743 [Google Scholar]
  3. Andrews-Hanna JR, Kaiser RH, Turner AE, Reineberg AE, Godinez D. et al. 2013. A penny for your thoughts: dimensions of self-generated thought content and relationships with individual differences in emotional wellbeing. Front. Psychol. 4:900 [Google Scholar]
  4. Andrews-Hanna JR, Smallwood J, Spreng RN. 2014. The default network and self-generated thought: component processes, dynamic control, and clinical relevance. Ann. N. Y. Acad. Sci. 1316:29–52 [Google Scholar]
  5. Antrobus JS, Singer JL, Greenberg S. 1966. Studies in the stream of consciousness: experimental enhancement and suppression of spontaneous cognitive processes. Percept. Motor Skills 23:399–417 [Google Scholar]
  6. Armitage R, Rochlen A, Fitch T, Trivedi M, Rush AJ. 1995. Dream recall and major depression: a preliminary report. Dreaming 5:189–98 [Google Scholar]
  7. Baird B, Smallwood J, Fishman DJ, Mrazek MD, Schooler JW. 2013a. Unnoticed intrusions: dissociations of meta-consciousness in thought suppression. Conscious. Cogn. 22:1003–12 [Google Scholar]
  8. Baird B, Smallwood J, Gorgolewski K, Margulies DS. 2013b. Medial and lateral networks in anterior prefrontal cortex support meta cognitive ability for memory and perception. J. Neurosci. 33:16657–65 [Google Scholar]
  9. Baird B, Smallwood J, Lutz A, Schooler JW. 2014. The decoupled mind: Mind-wandering disrupts cortical phase-locking to perceptual events. J. Cogn. Neurosci. 262596–607
  10. Baird B, Smallwood J, Mrazek MD, Kam JW, Franklin MS, Schooler JW. 2012. Inspired by distraction: Mind wandering facilitates creative incubation. Psychol. Sci. 23:1117–22Provided evidence that mind wandering enhances the creative benefits of an incubation interval. [Google Scholar]
  11. Baird B, Smallwood J, Schooler JW. 2010. I can shake that feeling: Positive mind-wandering prevents the deterioration of mood. Poster presented at Toward a Science of Consciousness conf., Tucson, AZ
  12. Baird B, Smallwood J, Schooler JW. 2011. Back to the future: autobiographical planning and the functionality of mind-wandering. Conscious. Cogn. 20:1604–11 [Google Scholar]
  13. Barron E, Riby LM, Greer J, Smallwood J. 2011. Absorbed in thought: the effect of mind wandering on the processing of relevant and irrelevant events. Psychol. Sci. 22:596–601 [Google Scholar]
  14. Baumeister RF, Masicampo EJ. 2010. Conscious thought is for facilitating social and cultural interactions: how mental simulations serve the animal-culture interface. Psychol. Rev. 117:945–71 [Google Scholar]
  15. Baumeister RF, Masicampo EJ, Vohs KD. 2011. Do conscious thoughts cause behavior?. Annu. Rev. Psychol. 62:331–61 [Google Scholar]
  16. Bernhardt BC, Smallwood J, Tusche A, Ruby FJ, Engen HG. et al. 2014. Medial prefrontal and anterior cingulate cortical thickness predicts shared individual differences in self-generated thought and temporal discounting. NeuroImage 90:290–97Demonstrated that the capacity to regulate the occurrence of mind wandering to a nondemanding task depends on the cortical gray matter in a region of the anterior cingulate, providing the first evidence of a biological substrate accounting for an individual's capacity to control experience. [Google Scholar]
  17. Buckner RL, Vincent JL. 2007. Unrest at rest: default activity and spontaneous network correlations. NeuroImage 37:1091–96 [Google Scholar]
  18. Cai DJ, Mednick SA, Harrison EM, Kanady JC, Mednick SC. 2009. REM, not incubation, improves creativity by priming associative networks. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 106:10130–34 [Google Scholar]
  19. Callard F, Smallwood J, Golchert J, Margulies DS. 2013. The era of the wandering mind? Twenty-first century research on self-generated mental activity. Front. Psychol. 4:891 [Google Scholar]
  20. Callard F, Smallwood J, Margulies DS. 2012. Default positions: how neuroscience's historical legacy has hampered investigation of the resting mind. Front. Psychol. 3:321 [Google Scholar]
  21. Carriere JS, Cheyne JA, Smilek D. 2008. Everyday attention lapses and memory failures: the affective consequences of mindlessness. Conscious. Cogn. 17:835–47 [Google Scholar]
  22. Carriere JS, Seli P, Smilek D. 2013. Wandering in both mind and body: individual differences in mind wandering and inattention predict fidgeting. Can. J. Exp. Psychol. 67:19–31 [Google Scholar]
  23. Casner SM, Schooler JW. 2013. Thoughts in flight automation use and pilots' task-related and task-unrelated thought. Hum. Factors 56:433–42 [Google Scholar]
  24. Cheyne JA, Carriere JS, Smilek D. 2006. Absent-mindedness: lapses of conscious awareness and everyday cognitive failures. Conscious. Cogn. 15:578–92 [Google Scholar]
  25. Cheyne JA, Carriere JS, Solman GJ, Smilek D. 2011. Challenge and error: critical events and attention-related errors. Cognition 121:437–46 [Google Scholar]
  26. Christoff K, Gordon AM, Smallwood J, Smith R, Schooler JW. 2009. Experience sampling during fMRI reveals default network and executive system contributions to mind wandering. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 106:8719–24Provided direct evidence that both the default mode network and the executive system are engaged during periods of mind wandering. [Google Scholar]
  27. Cohen JD, Schooler JW. 1997. Scientific Approaches to Consciousness New York: Psychol. Press
  28. Cowley JA. 2013. Types of off-task thinking and performance decrements during simulated automobile driving. Proc. Hum. Factors Ergon. Soc. Annu. Meet. 571214–18 Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage [Google Scholar]
  29. Delamillieure P, Doucet G, Mazoyer B, Turbelin MR, Delcroix N. et al. 2010. The resting state questionnaire: an introspective questionnaire for evaluation of inner experience during the conscious resting state. Brain Res. Bull. 81:565–73 [Google Scholar]
  30. Deng Y-Q, Li S, Tang Y-Y. 2012. The relationship between wandering mind, depression and mindfulness. Mindfulness 5:124–28 [Google Scholar]
  31. Desimone R, Duncan J. 1995. Neural mechanisms of selective visual attention. Annu. Rev. Neurosci. 18:193–222 [Google Scholar]
  32. Dixon P, Bortolussi M. 2013. Construction, integration, and mind wandering in reading. Can. J. Exp. Psychol. 67:1–10 [Google Scholar]
  33. Donders FC. 1969. On the speed of mental processes. Acta Psychol. (Amst.) 30:412–31 [Google Scholar]
  34. Epel ES, Puterman E, Lin J, Blackburn E, Lazaro A, Mendes WB. 2013. Wandering minds and aging cells. Clin. Psychol. Sci. 1:75–83 [Google Scholar]
  35. Esterman M, Rosenberg MD, Noonan SK. 2014. Intrinsic fluctuations in sustained attention and distractor processing. J. Neurosci. 34:1724–30 [Google Scholar]
  36. Farley J, Risko EF, Kingstone A. 2013. Everyday attention and lecture retention: the effects of time, fidgeting, and mind wandering. Front. Psychol. 4:619 [Google Scholar]
  37. Feng S, D'Mello S, Graesser AC. 2013. Mind wandering while reading easy and difficult texts. Psychon. Bull. Rev. 20:586–92 [Google Scholar]
  38. Forster S. 2013. Distraction and mind-wandering under load. Front. Psychol. 4:283 [Google Scholar]
  39. Forster S, Lavie N. 2009. Harnessing the wandering mind: the role of perceptual load. Cognition 111:345–55 [Google Scholar]
  40. Forster S, Lavie N. 2014. Distracted by your mind? Individual differences in distractibility predict mind wandering. J. Exp. Psychol.: Learn. Mem. Cogn. 40:251–60 [Google Scholar]
  41. Foulsham T, Farley J, Kingstone A. 2013. Mind wandering in sentence reading: decoupling the link between mind and eye. Can. J. Exp. Psychol. 67:51–59 [Google Scholar]
  42. Fox KCR, Christoff K. 2014. Metacognitive facilitation of spontaneous thought processes: when metacognition helps the wandering mind find its way. The Cognitive Neuroscience of Metacognition SM Fleming, CD Frith 293–319 Berlin: Springer-Verlag [Google Scholar]
  43. Fox KCR, Nijeboer S, Solomonova E, Domhoff GW, Christoff K. 2013. Dreaming as mind wandering: evidence from functional neuroimaging and first-person content reports. Front. Hum. Neurosci. 7:412 [Google Scholar]
  44. Franklin MS, Broadway JM, Mrazek MD, Smallwood J, Schooler JW. 2013a. Window to the wandering mind: pupillometry of spontaneous thought while reading. Q. J. Exp. Psychol. (Hove) 66:2289–94 [Google Scholar]
  45. Franklin MS, Mrazek MD, Anderson CL, Smallwood J, Kingstone A, Schooler JW. 2013b. The silver lining of a mind in the clouds: interesting musings are associated with positive mood while mind-wandering. Front. Psychol. 4:583 [Google Scholar]
  46. Franklin MS, Mrazek MD, Broadway JM, Schooler JW. 2013c. Disentangling decoupling: comment on Smallwood 2013. Psychol. Bull. 139:536–41 [Google Scholar]
  47. Franklin MS, Mrazek MD, Anderson CL, Smallwood J, Kingstone A, Schooler JW. 2014. Tracking distraction: the relationship between mind-wandering, meta-awareness, and ADHD symptomatology. J. Atten. Disord. In press
  48. Franklin MS, Smallwood J, Schooler JW. 2011. Catching the mind in flight: using behavioral indices to detect mindless reading in real time. Psychon. Bull. Rev. 18:992–97 [Google Scholar]
  49. Galera C, Orriols L, M'Bailara K, Laborey M, Contrand B. et al. 2012. Mind wandering and driving: responsibility case-control study. BMJ 345:e8105 [Google Scholar]
  50. Giambra LM. 1989. Task-unrelated-thought frequency as a function of age: a laboratory study. Psychol. Aging 4:136–43 [Google Scholar]
  51. Gilbert SJ, Dumontheil I, Simons JS, Frith CD, Burgess PW. 2007. Comment on “Wandering minds: the default network and stimulus-independent thought.”. Science 317:43 [Google Scholar]
  52. Gorgolewski KJ, Lurie D, Urchs S, Kipping JA, Craddock RC. et al. 2014. A correspondence between individual differences in the brain's intrinsic functional architecture and the content and form of self-generated thoughts. PLOS ONE 9:e97176 [Google Scholar]
  53. Greicius MD, Krasnow B, Reiss AL, Menon V. 2003. Functional connectivity in the resting brain: a network analysis of the default mode hypothesis. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 100:253–58 [Google Scholar]
  54. Grodsky A, Giambra LM. 1990. The consistency across vigilance and reading tasks of individual differences in the occurrence of task-unrelated and task-related images and thoughts. Imagination Cogn. Personal. 10:39–52 [Google Scholar]
  55. Gruberger M, Ben-Simon E, Levkovitz Y, Zangen A, Hendler T. 2011. Towards a neuroscience of mind-wandering. Front. Hum. Neurosci. 5:56 [Google Scholar]
  56. Guilford JP, Fruchter B, Kelley HP. 1959. Development and applications of tests of intellectual and special aptitudes. Rev. Educ. Res. 29:26–41 [Google Scholar]
  57. Haggard P. 2008. Human volition: towards a neuroscience of will. Nat. Rev. Neurosci. 9:934–46 [Google Scholar]
  58. He Q, Xue G, Chen C, Lu ZL, Dong Q. 2013. Decoding the neuroanatomical basis of reading ability: a multivoxel morphometric study. J. Neurosci. 33:12835–43 [Google Scholar]
  59. Hu NT, He S, Xu BH. 2012. Different efficiencies of attentional orienting in different wandering minds. Conscious. Cogn. 21:139–48 [Google Scholar]
  60. Iijima Y, Tanno Y. 2012. [The effect of cognitive load on the temporal focus of mind wandering.]. Shinrigaku Kenkyu 83:232–36 [Google Scholar]
  61. Jackson JD, Balota DA. 2012. Mind-wandering in younger and older adults: converging evidence from the sustained attention to response task and reading for comprehension. Psychol. Aging 27:106–19 [Google Scholar]
  62. Janoff-Bulman R. 1992. Shattered Assumptions: Towards a New Psychology of Trauma New York: Free Press
  63. Jha AP, Stanley EA, Kiyonaga A, Wong L, Gelfand L. 2010. Examining the protective effects of mindfulness training on working memory capacity and affective experience. Emotion 10:54–64 [Google Scholar]
  64. Kahneman D, Krueger AB, Schkade DA, Schwarz N, Stone AA. 2004. A survey method for characterizing daily life experience: the day reconstruction method. Science 306:1776–80 [Google Scholar]
  65. Kam JW, Dao E, Farley J, Fitzpatrick K, Smallwood J. et al. 2011. Slow fluctuations in attentional control of sensory cortex. J. Cogn. Neurosci. 23:460–70 [Google Scholar]
  66. Kam JW, Handy TC. 2013. The neurocognitive consequences of the wandering mind: a mechanistic account of sensory-motor decoupling. Front. Psychol. 4:725 [Google Scholar]
  67. Kam JW, Xu J, Handy TC. 2014. I don't feel your pain (as much): the desensitizing effect of mind wandering on the perception of others' discomfort. Cogn. Affect. Behav. Neurosci. 14:286–96 [Google Scholar]
  68. Kane MJ, Brown LH, McVay JC, Silvia PJ, Myin-Germeys I, Kwapil TR. 2007. For whom the mind wanders, and when: an experience-sampling study of working memory and executive control in daily life. Psychol. Sci. 18:614–21 [Google Scholar]
  69. Kane MJ, McVay JC. 2012. What mind wandering reveals about executive-control abilities and failures. Curr. Dir. Psychol. Sci. 21:348–54 [Google Scholar]
  70. Kelley WM, Macrae CN, Wyland CL, Caglar S, Inati S, Heatherton TF. 2002. Finding the self? An event-related fMRI study. J. Cogn. Neurosci. 14:785–94 [Google Scholar]
  71. Killeen PR. 2013. Absent without leave; a neuroenergetic theory of mind wandering. Front. Psychol. 4:373 [Google Scholar]
  72. Killingsworth MA, Gilbert DT. 2010. A wandering mind is an unhappy mind. Science 330:932A large experience sampling study indicating the ubiquitous nature of mind wandering in daily life and its implications for unhappiness. [Google Scholar]
  73. Klinger E. 1966. Fantasy need achievement as a motivational construct. Psychol. Bull. 66:291–308 [Google Scholar]
  74. Klinger E. 1967. Modeling effects on achievement imagery. J. Personal. Soc. Psychol. 7:49–62 [Google Scholar]
  75. Klinger E. 1973. Models, context, and achievement fantasy: parametric studies and theoretical propositions. J. Personal. Assess. 37:25–47 [Google Scholar]
  76. Klinger E. 1984. A consciousness-sampling analysis of test anxiety and performance. J. Personal. Soc. Psychol. 47:1376–90 [Google Scholar]
  77. Klinger E. 2013. Goal commitments and the content of thoughts and dreams: basic principles. Front. Psychol. 4:415 [Google Scholar]
  78. Kvavilashvili L, Mandler G. 2004. Out of one's mind: a study of involuntary semantic memories. Cogn. Psychol. 48:47–94 [Google Scholar]
  79. Levinson DB, Smallwood J, Davidson RJ. 2012. The persistence of thought: evidence for a role of working memory in the maintenance of task-unrelated thinking. Psychol. Sci. 23:375–80 [Google Scholar]
  80. Macdonald JS, Mathan S, Yeung N. 2011. Trial-by-trial variations in subjective attentional state are reflected in ongoing prestimulus EEG alpha oscillations. Front. Psychol. 2:82 [Google Scholar]
  81. Macrae CN, Moran JM, Heatherton TF, Banfield JF, Kelley WM. 2004. Medial prefrontal activity predicts memory for self. Cereb. Cortex 14:647–54 [Google Scholar]
  82. Mar RA, Mason MF, Litvack A. 2012. How daydreaming relates to life satisfaction, loneliness, and social support: the importance of gender and daydream content. Conscious. Cogn. 21:401–7 [Google Scholar]
  83. Marchetti I, Koster EH, Sonuga-Barke EJ, De Raedt R. 2012. The default mode network and recurrent depression: a neurobiological model of cognitive risk factors. Neuropsychol. Rev. 22:229–51 [Google Scholar]
  84. Mason MF, Norton MI, Van Horn JD, Wegner DM, Grafton ST, Macrae CN. 2007. Wandering minds: the default network and stimulus-independent thought. Science 315:393–95Introduced the idea that the default mode network supports the thoughts that occur during mind wandering. [Google Scholar]
  85. McKiernan KA, D'Angelo BR, Kaufman JN, Binder JR. 2006. Interrupting the “stream of consciousness”: an fMRI investigation. NeuroImage 29:1185–91 [Google Scholar]
  86. McKiernan KA, Kaufman JN, Kucera-Thompson J, Binder JR. 2003. A parametric manipulation of factors affecting task-induced deactivation in functional neuroimaging. J. Cogn. Neurosci. 15:394–408 [Google Scholar]
  87. McVay JC, Kane MJ. 2009. Conducting the train of thought: working memory capacity, goal neglect, and mind wandering in an executive-control task. J. Exp. Psychol.: Learn. Mem. Cogn. 35:196–204Provided evidence that working memory can reduce the occurrence of mind wandering in a demanding task. [Google Scholar]
  88. McVay JC, Kane MJ. 2010. Does mind wandering reflect executive function or executive failure? Comment on Smallwood and Schooler 2006 and Watkins 2008. Psychol. Bull. 136:188–97; discussion 198–207 [Google Scholar]
  89. McVay JC, Kane MJ. 2011. Why does working memory capacity predict variation in reading comprehension? On the influence of mind wandering and executive attention. J. Exp. Psychol.: Gen. 141:302–20 [Google Scholar]
  90. McVay JC, Kane MJ, Kwapil TR. 2009. Tracking the train of thought from the laboratory into everyday life: an experience-sampling study of mind wandering across controlled and ecological contexts. Psychon. Bull. Rev. 16:857–63 [Google Scholar]
  91. Mischel W, Gilligan C. 1964. Delay of gratification, motivation for the prohibited gratification, and responses to temptation. J. Abnorm. Psychol. 69:411–17 [Google Scholar]
  92. Mitchell JP, Macrae CN, Banaji MR. 2006. Dissociable medial prefrontal contributions to judgments of similar and dissimilar others. Neuron 50:655–63 [Google Scholar]
  93. Mooneyham BW, Schooler JW. 2013. The costs and benefits of mind-wandering: a review. Can. J. Exp. Psychol. 67:11–18 [Google Scholar]
  94. Morrison AB, Goolsarran M, Rogers SL, Jha AP. 2013. Taming a wandering attention: short-form mindfulness training in student cohorts. Front. Hum. Neurosci. 7:897 [Google Scholar]
  95. Moss J, Schunn CD, Schneider W, McNamara DS. 2013. The nature of mind wandering during reading varies with the cognitive control demands of the reading strategy. Brain Res. 1539:48–60 [Google Scholar]
  96. Mrazek MD, Chin JM, Schmader T, Hartson KA, Smallwood J, Schooler JW. 2011. Threatened to distraction: mind-wandering as a consequence of stereotype threat. J. Exp. Soc. Psychol. 47:1243–48 [Google Scholar]
  97. Mrazek MD, Franklin MS, Phillips DT, Baird B, Schooler JW. 2013a. Mindfulness training improves working memory capacity and GRE performance while reducing mind wandering. Psychol. Sci. 24:776–81 [Google Scholar]
  98. Mrazek MD, Phillips DT, Franklin MS, Broadway JM, Schooler JW. 2013b. Young and restless: validation of the Mind-Wandering Questionnaire (MWQ) reveals disruptive impact of mind-wandering for youth. Front. Psychol. 4:560 [Google Scholar]
  99. Mrazek MD, Smallwood J, Franklin MS, Chin JM, Baird B, Schooler JW. 2012a. The role of mind-wandering in measurements of general aptitude. J. Exp. Psychol.: Gen. 141:788–98Demonstrated that the association between mind wandering and task performance generalizes across measures of intellectual functioning. [Google Scholar]
  100. Mrazek MD, Smallwood J, Schooler JW. 2012b. Mindfulness and mind-wandering: finding convergence through opposing constructs. Emotion 12:442–48 [Google Scholar]
  101. Nemme HE, White KM. 2010. Texting while driving: psychosocial influences on young people's texting intentions and behaviour. Accid. Anal. Prev. 42:1257–65 [Google Scholar]
  102. Oettingen G, Schwörer B. 2013. Mind wandering via mental contrasting as a tool for behavior change. Front. Psychol. 4:562 [Google Scholar]
  103. Ogawa S, Lee T, Kay A, Tank D. 1990. Brain magnetic resonance imaging with contrast dependent on blood oxygenation. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 87:9868–72 [Google Scholar]
  104. Ottaviani C, Couyoumdjian A. 2013. Pros and cons of a wandering mind: a prospective study. Front. Psychol. 4:524 [Google Scholar]
  105. Ottaviani C, Shapiro D, Couyoumdjian A. 2013. Flexibility as the key for somatic health: from mind wandering to perseverative cognition. Biol. Psychol. 94:38–43 [Google Scholar]
  106. Poerio GL, Totterdell P, Miles E. 2013. Mind-wandering and negative mood: Does one thing really lead to another?. Conscious. Cogn. 22:1412–21 [Google Scholar]
  107. Polich J. 1986. Attention, probability, and task demands as determinants of P300 latency from auditory stimuli. Electroencephalogr. Clin. Neurophysiol. 63:251–59 [Google Scholar]
  108. Posner MI, Petersen SE. 1990. The attention system of the human brain. Annu. Rev. Neurosci. 13:25–42 [Google Scholar]
  109. Raichle ME, MacLeod AM, Snyder AZ, Powers WJ, Gusnard DA, Shulman GL. 2001. A default mode of brain function. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 98:676–82 [Google Scholar]
  110. Reichle ED, Reineberg AE, Schooler JW. 2010. Eye movements during mindless reading. Psychol. Sci. 21:1300–10 [Google Scholar]
  111. Revonsuo A. 2000. The reinterpretation of dreams: an evolutionary hypothesis of the function of dreaming. Behav. Brain Sci. 23:877–901 [Google Scholar]
  112. Ruby FJM, Smallwood J, Engen H, Singer T. 2013a. How self-generated thought shapes mood. PLOS ONE 8:e77554Demonstrated that different forms of mind wandering have different implications for mood, illustrating how the content of mind wandering influences its functional outcomes. [Google Scholar]
  113. Ruby FJM, Smallwood J, Sackur J, Singer T. 2013b. Is self-generated thought a means of social problem solving?. Front. Psychol. 4:962 [Google Scholar]
  114. Rummel J, Boywitt CD. 2014. Controlling the stream of thought: Working memory capacity predicts adjustment of mind-wandering to situational demands. Psychon. Bull. Rev. 211309–15
  115. Sayette MA, Dimoff JD, Levine JM, Moreland RL, Votruba-Drzal E. 2012. The effects of alcohol and dosage-set on risk-seeking behavior in groups and individuals. Psychol. Addict. Behav. 26:194–200 [Google Scholar]
  116. Sayette MA, Reichle ED, Schooler JW. 2009. Lost in the sauce: the effects of alcohol on mind-wandering. Psychol. Sci. 20:747–52 [Google Scholar]
  117. Sayette MA, Schooler JW, Reichle ED. 2010. Out for a smoke: the impact of cigarette craving on zoning out during reading. Psychol. Sci. 21:26–30Demonstrated that alcohol simultaneously increases mind wandering while reducing individuals' meta-awareness of it. [Google Scholar]
  118. Schooler JW. 2002a. Re-representing consciousness: dissociations between experience and meta-consciousness. Trends Cogn. Sci. 6:339–44 [Google Scholar]
  119. Schooler JW. 2002b. Verbalization produces a transfer inappropriate processing shift. Appl. Cogn. Psychol. 16:989–97 [Google Scholar]
  120. Schooler JW, Mrazek MD, Franklin MS, Baird B, Mooneyham BW. et al. 2014. The middle way: finding the balance between mindfulness and mind-wandering. The Psychology of Learning and Motivation 60 BH Ross 1–33 Burlington, MA: Academic [Google Scholar]
  121. Schooler JW, Reichle ED, Halpern DV. 2004. Zoning out while reading: evidence for dissociations between experience and metaconsciousness. Thinking and Seeing: Visual Metacognition in Adults and Children DT Levin 203–26 Cambridge, MA: MIT Press [Google Scholar]
  122. Schooler JW, Schreiber CA. 2004. Experience, meta-consciousness, and the paradox of introspection. J. Conscious. Stud. 11:17–39 [Google Scholar]
  123. Schooler JW, Smallwood J, Christoff K, Handy TC, Reichle ED, Sayette MA. 2011. Meta-awareness, perceptual decoupling and the wandering mind. Trends Cogn. Sci. 15:319–26 [Google Scholar]
  124. Schurger A, Sitt JD, Dehaene S. 2012. An accumulator model for spontaneous neural activity prior to self-initiated movement. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 109:E2904–13 [Google Scholar]
  125. Seli P, Carriere JS, Thomson DR, Cheyne JA, Martens KA, Smilek D. 2014. Restless mind, restless body. J. Exp. Psychol.: Learn. Mem. Cogn. 40:660–68 [Google Scholar]
  126. Seli P, Carriere JS, Levene M, Smilek D. 2013. How few and far between? Examining the effects of probe rate on self-reported mind wandering. Front. Psychol. 4:430 [Google Scholar]
  127. Shadlen MN, Kiani R. 2011. Consciousness as a decision to engage. Characterizing Consciousness: From Cognition to the Clinic? S Dehaene, Y Christen 27–46 Berlin: Springer-Verlag [Google Scholar]
  128. Shamosh NA, Gray JR. 2008. Delay discounting and intelligence: a meta-analysis. Intelligence 36:289–305 [Google Scholar]
  129. Smallwood J. 2010. Why the global availability of mind wandering necessitates resource competition: reply to McVay and Kane 2010. Psychol. Bull. 136:202–7 [Google Scholar]
  130. Smallwood J. 2013a. Distinguishing how from why the mind wanders: a process-occurrence framework for self generated thought. Psychol. Bull. 139:519–35 [Google Scholar]
  131. Smallwood J. 2013b. Searching for the elements of thought: reply to Franklin, Mrazek, Broadway, and Schooler 2013. Psychol. Bull. 139:542–47 [Google Scholar]
  132. Smallwood J, Andrews-Hanna J. 2013. Not all minds that wander are lost: the importance of a balanced perspective on the mind-wandering state. Front. Psychol. 4:441 [Google Scholar]
  133. Smallwood J, Beach E, Schooler JW, Handy TC. 2008a. Going AWOL in the brain: Mind wandering reduces cortical analysis of external events. J. Cogn. Neurosci. 20:458–69Provided early support for the decoupling hypothesis by demonstrating that during periods of self-generated thought the cortical response to external events was attenuated. [Google Scholar]
  134. Smallwood J, Brown KS, Baird B, Mrazek MD, Franklin MS, Schooler JW. 2012. Insulation for daydreams: a role for tonic norepinephrine in the facilitation of internally guided thought. PLOS ONE 7:e33706 [Google Scholar]
  135. Smallwood J, Brown K, Baird B, Schooler JW. 2011a. Cooperation between the default mode network and the frontal-parietal network in the production of an internal train of thought. Brain Res. 1428:60–70 [Google Scholar]
  136. Smallwood J, Brown KS, Tipper C, Giesbrecht B, Franklin MS. et al. 2011b. Pupillometric evidence for the decoupling of attention from perceptual input during offline thought. PLOS ONE 6:e18298 [Google Scholar]
  137. Smallwood J, Davies JB, Heim D, Finnigan F, Sudberry M. et al. 2004. Subjective experience and the attentional lapse: task engagement and disengagement during sustained attention. Conscious. Cogn. 13:657–90 [Google Scholar]
  138. Smallwood J, Fitzgerald A, Miles LK, Phillips LH. 2009a. Shifting moods, wandering minds: Negative moods lead the mind to wander. Emotion 9:271–76 [Google Scholar]
  139. Smallwood J, Gorgolewski KJ, Golchert J, Ruby FJ, Engen H. et al. 2013a. The default modes of reading: modulation of posterior cingulate and medial prefrontal cortex connectivity associated with comprehension and task focus while reading. Front. Hum. Neurosci. 7:734 [Google Scholar]
  140. Smallwood J, McSpadden M, Luus B, Schooler J. 2008b. Segmenting the stream of consciousness: the psychological correlates of temporal structures in the time series data of a continuous performance task. Brain Cogn. 66:50–6 [Google Scholar]
  141. Smallwood J, McSpadden M, Schooler JW. 2007a. The lights are on but no one's home: meta-awareness and the decoupling of attention when the mind wanders. Psychon. Bull. Rev. 14:527–33 [Google Scholar]
  142. Smallwood J, McSpadden M, Schooler JW. 2008c. When attention matters: the curious incident of the wandering mind. Mem. Cogn. 36:1144–50 [Google Scholar]
  143. Smallwood J, Nind L, O'Connor RC. 2009b. When is your head at? An exploration of the factors associated with the temporal focus of the wandering mind. Conscious. Cogn. 18:118–25 [Google Scholar]
  144. Smallwood J, O'Connor RC. 2011. Imprisoned by the past: Unhappy moods lead to a retrospective bias to mind wandering. Cogn. Emot. 25:481–90 [Google Scholar]
  145. Smallwood J, O'Connor RC, Heim D. 2005. Rumination, dysphoria, and subjective experience. Imagination Cogn. Personal. 24:355–67 [Google Scholar]
  146. Smallwood J, O'Connor RC, Sudbery MV, Obonsawin M. 2007b. Mind-wandering and dysphoria. Cogn. Emot. 21:816–42 [Google Scholar]
  147. Smallwood J, Obonsawin M, Reid H. 2002. The effects of block duration and task demands on the experience of task unrelated thought. Imagination Cogn. Personal. 22:13–31 [Google Scholar]
  148. Smallwood J, Ruby FJ, Singer T. 2013b. Letting go of the present: Mind-wandering is associated with reduced delay discounting. Conscious. Cogn. 22:1–7 [Google Scholar]
  149. Smallwood J, Schooler JW. 2006. The restless mind. Psychol. Bull. 132:946–58Provides a review of mind wandering that helped bring the topic into the spotlight of mainstream science. [Google Scholar]
  150. Smilek D, Carriere JS, Cheyne JA. 2010. Out of mind, out of sight eye blinking as indicator and embodiment of mind wandering. Psychol. Sci. 21:786–89 [Google Scholar]
  151. Smith SM, Fox PT, Miller KL, Glahn DC, Fox PM. et al. 2009. Correspondence of the brain's functional architecture during activation and rest. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 106:13040–45 [Google Scholar]
  152. Song X, Wang X. 2012. Mind wandering in Chinese daily lives—an experience sampling study. PLOS ONE 7:e44423 [Google Scholar]
  153. Stawarczyk D, Majerus S, Catale C, D'Argembeau A. 2014. Relationships between mind-wandering and attentional control abilities in young adults and adolescents. Acta Psychol. (Amst.) 148:25–36 [Google Scholar]
  154. Stawarczyk D, Majerus S, D'Argembeau A. 2013. Concern-induced negative affect is associated with the occurrence and content of mind-wandering. Conscious. Cogn. 22:442–48 [Google Scholar]
  155. Stawarczyk D, Majerus S, Maj M, Van der Linden M, D'Argembeau A. 2011a. Mind-wandering: phenomenology and function as assessed with a novel experience sampling method. Acta Psychol. (Amst.) 136:370–81 [Google Scholar]
  156. Stawarczyk D, Majerus S, Maquet P, D'Argembeau A. 2011b. Neural correlates of ongoing conscious experience: both task-unrelatedness and stimulus-independence are related to default network activity. PLOS ONE 6:e16997 [Google Scholar]
  157. Szpunar KK, Khan NY, Schacter DL. 2013a. Interpolated memory tests reduce mind wandering and improve learning of online lectures. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 110:6313–17 [Google Scholar]
  158. Szpunar KK, Moulton ST, Schacter DL. 2013b. Mind wandering and education: from the classroom to online learning. Front. Psychol. 4:495 [Google Scholar]
  159. Taylor SE, Kemeny ME, Reed GM, Bower JE, Gruenewald TL. 2000. Psychological resources, positive illusions, and health. Am. Psychol. 55:99–109 [Google Scholar]
  160. Teasdale JD, Dritschel BH, Taylor MJ, Proctor L, Lloyd CA. et al. 1995. Stimulus-independent thought depends on central executive resources. Mem. Cogn. 23:551–59 [Google Scholar]
  161. Treisman AM, Gelade G. 1980. A feature-integration theory of attention. Cogn. Psychol. 12:97–136 [Google Scholar]
  162. Tulving E. 2002. Episodic memory: from mind to brain. Annu. Rev. Psychol. 53:1–25 [Google Scholar]
  163. Tusche A, Smallwood J, Bernhardt BC, Singer T. 2014. Classifying the wandering mind: revealing the affective content of thoughts during task-free rest periods. NeuroImage 97:107–16 [Google Scholar]
  164. Unsworth N, McMillan BD. 2013. Mind wandering and reading comprehension: examining the roles of working memory capacity, interest, motivation, and topic experience. J. Exp. Psychol.: Learn. Mem. Cogn. 39:832–42 [Google Scholar]
  165. Unsworth N, McMillan BD. 2014. Similarities and differences between mind-wandering and external distraction: a latent variable analysis of lapses of attention and their relation to cognitive abilities. Acta Psychol. (Amst.) 150:14–25 [Google Scholar]
  166. Varela F, Thompson E. 2003. Neural synchrony and the unity of mind: a neurophenomenological perspective. The Unity of Consciousness: Binding, Integration, and Dissociation A Cleeremans, pp. 266–87. New York: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
  167. Vincent JL, Snyder AZ, Fox MD, Shannon BJ, Andrews JR. et al. 2006. Coherent spontaneous activity identifies a hippocampal-parietal memory network. J. Neurophysiol. 96:3517–31 [Google Scholar]
  168. Vinski MT, Watter S. 2013. Being a grump only makes things worse: a transactional account of acute stress on mind wandering. Front. Psychol. 4:730 [Google Scholar]
  169. Yanko MR, Spalek TM. 2013. Driving with the wandering mind: the effect that mind-wandering has on driving performance. Hum. Factors 56:260–69 [Google Scholar]
  170. Yarkoni T, Poldrack RA, Nichols TE, Van Essen DC, Wager TD. 2011. Large-scale automated synthesis of human functional neuroimaging data. Nat. Methods 8:665–70 [Google Scholar]
/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-psych-010814-015331
Loading
/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-psych-010814-015331
Loading

Data & Media loading...

  • Article Type: Review Article
This is a required field
Please enter a valid email address
Approval was a Success
Invalid data
An Error Occurred
Approval was partially successful, following selected items could not be processed due to error