How pervasive is mind wandering, really?
Seli and colleagues take aim at a number that had become common knowledge, the claim that people spend between a third and half of their waking lives mind wandering. Their objection is not that attention holds steady, which they accept it does not, but that the figure depends entirely on how the question is asked. The usual method interrupts people and asks them to judge, yes or no, whether they were on task. That forces a single line through an experience that does not have one, and it assumes everyone draws the line in the same place. When the researchers offered a range of answers instead of a straight choice, the estimates moved enormously, from around sixty per cent of the time down to around ten, using the same people and the same kind of task. Their conclusion is not that mind wandering is rare but that any simple percentage is close to meaningless without stating what counted as off task. This page cites it as a caution against repeating the well-known figure.
Seli and colleagues take aim at a number that had become common knowledge, the claim that people spend between a third and half of their waking lives mind wandering. Their objection is not that attention holds steady, which they accept it does not, but that the figure depends entirely on how the question is asked. The usual method interrupts people and asks them to judge, yes or no, whether they were on task. That forces a single line through an experience that does not have one, and it assumes everyone draws the line in the same place. When the researchers offered a range of answers instead of a straight choice, the estimates moved enormously, from around sixty per cent of the time down to around ten, using the same people and the same kind of task. Their conclusion is not that mind wandering is rare but that any simple percentage is close to meaningless without stating what counted as off task. This page cites it as a caution against repeating the well-known figure.
Written from the abstract, Semantic Scholar.
What our sources record
Reproduced as it was written when this source was checked, figures and all.
66, 74-78. Cited for the methodological argument only; abstract and published summary consulted, full text not read, so no figure from it is carried.
Where we use it
- 2,500 Years, One Good Study, Why We Exist / Endure
Reliability of this reference
The link below was matched against the publisher's record on title, first author and year, and all three agree.
The source
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.concog.2018.10.002
DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2018.10.002