The effects of self-selected background music and task difficulty on task engagement and performance in a visual vigilance task.

Listening to self-selected background music has been shown to be associated with increased task focus and decreased mind wandering during a sustained attention task (Kiss and Linnell, Psychological Research Psychologische Forschung 85:2313-2325, 2021). It is unclear, however, how this relation may depend on the potentially critical factor of task difficulty. To address this knowledge gap, we explored how listening to self-selected music, compared to silence, affects subjectively experienced task engagement (i.e., task focus, mind wandering, and external distraction/bodily sensation states) and task performance during either an easy or a hard vigilance task. We also examined how these effects vary with time-on-task. Our results replicated prior work demonstrating that background music enhanced task focus and decreased mind wandering, compared to silence. There was also lower reaction time variability in the background music condition relative to the silence condition. Notably, these findings held regardless of task difficulty. Interestingly, when examined over time-on-task, the presence of music led to smaller task focus declines and mind wandering increases, compared to silence. Thus, listening to self-selected music appears to confer a protective effect on task engagement, especially over time-on-task.

A desire for distraction: uncovering the rates of media multitasking during online research studies.

Interpretations of task performance in many cognitive studies rest on the assumption that participants are fully attentive to the tasks they agree to complete. However, with research studies being increasingly conducted online where monitoring participant engagement is difficult, this assumption may be inaccurate. If participants were found to be engaging in off-task behaviours while participating in these studies, the interpretation of study results might be called into question. To investigate this issue, we conducted a secondary data analysis across nearly 3000 participants in various online studies to examine the prevalence of one form of off-task behaviour: media multitasking. Rates of media multitasking were found to be high, averaging 38% and ranging from 9 to 85% across studies. Our findings broadly raise questions about the interpretability of results from online studies and urge researchers to consider the likelihood that participants are simultaneously engaging in off-task behaviours while completing online research tasks.

Does framing an assignment as involving one or multiple components influence subjective experiences of attentional engagement?

Across two studies, we explored whether framing an assignment as involving either multitasking or single-tasking (Srna et al. Psychol Sci 29(12):1942-1955, 2018) leads to differences in both subjective ratings of attentional engagement (i.e., depth of concentration and attentional control) and performance during the assignment. In Experiment 1, we manipulated task framing in the context of an assignment in which participants (Ncollected = 238) simultaneously completed a word-search and an anagram task (Srna et al. Psychol Sci 29(12):1942-1955, 2018). While we replicated prior findings that participants who receive multitasking instructions perform better than those who receive single-tasking instructions, we did not find any influence of task framing on participants' subjective evaluations of their attentional engagement. Exploratory analyses, however, revealed that regardless of group assignment, those who believed they were multitasking reported greater levels of attentional engagement than those who believed they were single-tasking. In Experiment 2 (Ncollected = 238), task framing was varied in the context of the 2-back task (Kirchner J Exp Psychol 55(4): 352, 1958). Unexpectedly, we found that, relative to participants who received single-tasking instructions, those who received multitasking instructions reported exerting less attentional control over their thoughts and showed a greater number of incorrect responses to non-target trials on the 2-back. Taken together, the results do not support a straightforward conclusion regarding the influence of task framing on either subjective reports of attentional engagement or task performance. Nevertheless, they provide insight into our understanding of the role of task framing in contexts ranging from commonly performed real-world tasks to typical laboratory tasks.

The impact of a global pandemic on undergraduate learning experiences: One year later.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: We examined students perceived changes in their attention, motivation, affect, and time perception following the implementation of the pandemic-related restrictions. METHODS: One year after the restrictions were implemented, we surveyed students' (N = 153) perceived changes in their experiences relative to their remembered pre- and early-pandemic ones, as well as their predicted future changes. RESULTS: Consistent with prior work, when students compared their current experiences (March/April 2021) to their remembered pre-pandemic ones, they perceived increases in mind-wandering, technology use, external distraction, and negative affect, as well as decreases in focus, flow, motivation, and time perception. Although somewhat attenuated, students also noted changes in these behaviours when comparing the memory of their early pandemic experiences to their current experiences. Finally, they further anticipated negative changes in their future experiences, possibly due to continued pandemic-related isolation. IMPLICATIONS: Reducing students' sense of isolation might improve their cognitive and affective experiences.

Boredom Proneness and Rule-Breaking: A Persistent Relation One Year into the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Research conducted within the first year of the pandemic demonstrated that boredom prone individuals were more likely to break rules (e.g., social distancing) aimed at preventing the spread of COVID-19. It is of interest whether this relation persisted deeper into the pandemic, given that initial results may have reflected the extraordinary nature of the early stages of the pandemic on one hand, or more stable dispositions on the other. Therefore, in the Summer of 2021, we administered an online survey to investigate whether boredom proneness predicted COVID-19 rule-breaking over one year into the pandemic (and approximately one year after the earlier studies). We found that boredom prone individuals remained more likely to engage in COVID-19 rule-breaking. Our results suggest that a trait disposition towards boredom exerts a persistent, long-term influence on behaviour, one that is detrimental to personal well-being during the pandemic. Adherence to public health measures might be improved by encouraging individuals to find adaptive ways of coping with boredom.

Boredom and Media Multitasking.

Media multitasking entails simultaneously engaging in multiple tasks when at least one of the tasks involves media (e.g., online activities and streaming videos). Across two studies, we investigated one potential trigger of media multitasking, state boredom, and its relation to media multitasking. To this end, we manipulated participants' levels of state boredom using video mood inductions prior to administering an attention-demanding 2-back task during which participants could media multitask by playing a task-irrelevant video. We also examined whether trait boredom proneness was associated media multitasking. We found no direct evidence that state boredom leads to media multitasking. However, trait boredom proneness correlated with greater amounts of media multitasking in Experiment 1, but not in Experiment 2. Surprisingly, in both experiments, post-task ratings of state boredom were equivalent across conditions, alerting us to the short-lived effects of video mood inductions and the boring nature of cognitive tasks.