Conducting the Train of Thought: Working Memory Capacity, Goal Neglect, and Mind Wandering in an Executive-Control Task

• Published in: Journal of experimental psychology. Learning, memory, and cognition memory, and cognition, 2009-01, Vol.35 (1), p.196-204
• Main Authors: McVay, Jennifer C, Kane, Michael J
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Attention - physiology; Attention Control; Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity - physiopathology; Biological and medical sciences; Cognition. Intelligence; Cognitive Ability; Cognitive Processes; Discrimination Learning - physiology; Executive Function - physiology; Experimental psychology; Female; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Goals; Human; Humans; Information processing; Learning. Memory; Male; Memory; Memory, Short-Term - physiology; Mind Wandering; Miscellaneous; Models, Statistical; Neuropsychological Tests; Prediction; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Responses; Short Term Memory; Sustained Attention; Task Analysis; Teaching; Thinking - physiology; Young Adult
• ISSN: 0278-7393; 1939-1285
• DOI: 10.1037/a0014104

On the basis of the executive-attention theory of working memory capacity (WMC; e.g., M. J. Kane, A. R. A. Conway, D. Z. Hambrick, & R. W. Engle, 2007 ), the authors tested the relations among WMC, mind wandering, and goal neglect in a sustained attention to response task (SART; a go/no-go task). In 3 SART versions, making conceptual versus perceptual processing demands, subjects periodically indicated their thought content when probed following rare no-go targets. SART processing demands did not affect mind-wandering rates, but mind-wandering rates varied with WMC and predicted goal-neglect errors in the task; furthermore, mind-wandering rates partially mediated the WMC-SART relation, indicating that WMC-related differences in goal neglect were due, in part, to variation in the control of conscious thought.