The Relationship Between Mind Wandering And Prospective Memory

Mind wandering is a situation in which executive control shifts away from a primary task and attracted by the internal information. Mind wandering is more likely to occur during goal-oriented activities and resting state intermittently. It can be used as a means to mental time travel to remember the past and imagine the future. Mind wandering has shown prospective bias and episodic representation characteristic, it is associated with autobiographical memory. Mind wandering can have a planning future function. Nevertheless, this viewpoint is not yet supported by empirical evidence. Prospective memory is a form of memory that involves remembering to perform a planned action or intention at the appropriate time. Episodic process is an important component of encoding prospective memory. Based on the characteristics of prospective memory, and many similarities can be seen from mind wandering and prospective memory, the prospective memory performance is the better way to prove mind wandering function of planning for the future.This study adopt natural method and laboratory method to examine the relationship between mind wandering and prospective memory and prove the function of mind wandering. Study1used experience sampling method to collect individuals mind wandering, meanwhile, used schedule of the implementation as the indicator of prospective memory. Study1focused on the discrepancy of two groups in the relationship between future thought and prospective memory. Study2investigated the role of mind wandering on the event-based prospective memory by means of experiment. Prospective memory task was nested in lexical decision task, before that, two different cognitive load filler task was taken in order to analyze the future thinking during mind wandering effecting on prospective memory.This study revealed that:First, no matter natural situation or experimental situation, during mind wandering, participants are inclined to prospect rather than retrospective. Suggesting that mind wandering had prospective bias. Second, in the natural condition, leisure participants’ frequently mind wandering about future contribute to their leisure events completion rates. It indicated that future thought can be improve the prospective performance under appropriate situation. Third, in the laboratory condition, the event-based prospective memory performance would improve while the future thinking during mind wandering refers to the intention of prospective memory. This showed that mind wandering function of planning future relied on its content. This study revealed the relationship between mind wandering and prospective memory, and provided empirical evidence support the function of planning for the future during mind wandering. This would draw great inspiration for prospective memory improvement.