The effect of background sounds on mind wandering.

Mind wandering (MW) reflects a situation in which the cognitive system is detached from the main task and involved with inner thoughts. It has been well document that music and other background sounds can have positive effects on number of cognitive functioning. In addition, other body of literature suggests that background sounds might have specifically positive effect on individuals with more attention deficiencies. Hence, the current study examines the effect of background sounds on MW. In two experiments, the effect of background sounds: music (Experiment 1) or an alerting tone (Experiment 2) while performing sustained attention tasks was examined among typical development participants with different severity of attention deficiency. Background sounds were found to reduce MW especially in individuals with more ADHD symptoms. This was further discussed in the context of several theories, and it was suggested that background sound might be used as a tool for MW reduction.

ADHD and Interfering Thoughts in High and Low Conflict Conditions.

BACKGROUND: Individuals with an ADHD diagnosis have increased levels of interfering thoughts, especially in the form of mind wandering. This was mostly investigated in sustained attention tasks; hence it is unclear whether the findings are only due to their difficulties in those types of tasks. Moreover, it is unclear how the amount of control invested in the task will affect those differences between control and ADHD groups. METHOD: ADHD and matched control groups performed the Stroop task under high and low conflict conditions while measuring their interfering thoughts level. RESULTS: Individuals with ADHD have more interfering thoughts compared to a control group even when they are able to change their control level according to the task conflict. CONCLUSION: Interfering thoughts are an independent predictor of ADHD impairments, observed regardless of the degree of control invested in the task.

The Connection Between Mind Wandering, ADHD, and Level of Performance on an Attention Task.

Background: ADHD is related to increased mind wandering (MW). However, it is not clear whether this is restricted by the methods used to measure MW in those studies. Moreover, it is not certain whether MW is an independent characteristic of people with ADHD or only due to their poor performance level in the primary task (the task from which attention wanders). Method: Participants with ADHD were compared to two control groups: high performers and low performers in the primary task who had a similar performance level to the ADHD group. Results: The ADHD group had greater MW than the two control groups, while no difference in MW was found between the two control groups. Conclusion: Increased MW is an independent characteristic of ADHD. This was further discussed within the context of different theories regarding ADHD and MW.