Post by auntym on Mar 19, 2012 11:17:21 GMT -6
www.livescience.com/19128-wandering-mind-working-memory.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+C2C-InTheNews+%28Feed+-+Coast+to+Coast+-+In+the+News%29
Daydreaming Is Good for the Mind[/color]
Jennifer Welsh, LiveScience Staff Writer
Date: 16 March 2012
Catch yourself daydreaming while washing the dishes again? If this happens often you probably have a pretty capable working memory, new research suggests.
This mind wandering, it seems, actually gives your working memory a workout. Working memory is the mental work space that allows the brain to juggle multiple thoughts simultaneously. The more working memory a person has, the more daydreaming they can do without forgetting the task at hand.
"Our results suggest that the sorts of planning that people do quite often in daily life — when they're on the bus, when they're cycling to work, when they're in the shower — are probably supported by working memory," study researcher Jonathan Smallwood, of the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Science, said in a statement. "Their brains are trying to allocate resources to the most pressing problems."
Wandering brain
Researchers studied groups of people from the University of Wisconsin-Madison community, ranging in age from 18 to 65. The first group was asked to perform simple tasks, like pressing a button every time they took a breath or clicking in response to a letter popping up on a computer screen; these tasks were so easy that their minds were likely to wander, the researchers figured. [6 Fun Ways to Sharpen Your Memory]
The researchers checked in periodically, asking the participants if their minds were on task or wandering. When the task was over, they measured each participant's working memory capacity by having them remember letters while doing math equations. Though all participants performed well on the task, the researchers noticed that the individuals who indicated their minds had wandered more than others also scored higher on the working memory test.
"What this study seems to suggest is that, when circumstances for the task aren't very difficult, people who have additional working memory resources deploy them to think about things other than what they're doing," Smallwood said.
CONTINUE READING: www.livescience.com/19128-wandering-mind-working-memory.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+C2C-InTheNews+%28Feed+-+Coast+to+Coast+-+In+the+News%29
Daydreaming Is Good for the Mind[/color]
Jennifer Welsh, LiveScience Staff Writer
Date: 16 March 2012
Catch yourself daydreaming while washing the dishes again? If this happens often you probably have a pretty capable working memory, new research suggests.
This mind wandering, it seems, actually gives your working memory a workout. Working memory is the mental work space that allows the brain to juggle multiple thoughts simultaneously. The more working memory a person has, the more daydreaming they can do without forgetting the task at hand.
"Our results suggest that the sorts of planning that people do quite often in daily life — when they're on the bus, when they're cycling to work, when they're in the shower — are probably supported by working memory," study researcher Jonathan Smallwood, of the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Science, said in a statement. "Their brains are trying to allocate resources to the most pressing problems."
Wandering brain
Researchers studied groups of people from the University of Wisconsin-Madison community, ranging in age from 18 to 65. The first group was asked to perform simple tasks, like pressing a button every time they took a breath or clicking in response to a letter popping up on a computer screen; these tasks were so easy that their minds were likely to wander, the researchers figured. [6 Fun Ways to Sharpen Your Memory]
The researchers checked in periodically, asking the participants if their minds were on task or wandering. When the task was over, they measured each participant's working memory capacity by having them remember letters while doing math equations. Though all participants performed well on the task, the researchers noticed that the individuals who indicated their minds had wandered more than others also scored higher on the working memory test.
"What this study seems to suggest is that, when circumstances for the task aren't very difficult, people who have additional working memory resources deploy them to think about things other than what they're doing," Smallwood said.
CONTINUE READING: www.livescience.com/19128-wandering-mind-working-memory.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+C2C-InTheNews+%28Feed+-+Coast+to+Coast+-+In+the+News%29