Abstract :
[en] Background: Mind-wandering (MW) refers to thoughts whose content is unrelated to the task at hand and decoupled from the surrounding environment. While MW is often considered to be disruptive, it has been proposed to serve a variety of functions such as creativity, problem solving, and future planning. These benefits presuppose that the content of MW is encoded in memory and later retrieved when relevant. Yet, factors determining whether MW episodes are remembered or forgotten remain poorly understood.
Methods: Participants completed a 10-min Think-Aloud Protocol while being recorded, followed by an unexpected free-recall test after a one-day delay. After recall, participants rated the phenomenological characteristics of each MW episode based on their recording. This design allowed direct comparisons between recalled and forgotten episodes to determine the content-related and temporal-dynamic predictors of recall.
Results: In separate models, MW episodes were more likely to be recalled when they were longer, involved other people to a greater extent, and more recurrent in daily life, important, goal-related, related to routine activities, structured, deliberate, as well as temporally and functionally future-oriented. Conversely, episodes rated as having no apparent function were more likely to be forgotten. In a multiple logistic regression model, only length, involvement of other people, future temporality, and absence of function uniquely predicted recall likelihood. Finally, recall exhibited primacy and recency effects, as well as a forward-biased temporal-contiguity effect.
Conclusions: Memory for MW is systematically organized by both its phenomenological content and temporal structure, seemingly following the same organizational principles observed for external experiences.
