Department of Psychology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada.
Department of Psychology, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada.
Psychol Res. 2023 Nov;87(8):2460-2476. doi: 10.1007/s00426-023-01836-6. Epub 2023 May 27.
Listening to self-selected background music has been shown to be associated with increased task focus and decreased mind wandering during a sustained attention task (Kiss and Linnell, Psychological Research Psychologische Forschung 85:2313-2325, 2021). It is unclear, however, how this relation may depend on the potentially critical factor of task difficulty. To address this knowledge gap, we explored how listening to self-selected music, compared to silence, affects subjectively experienced task engagement (i.e., task focus, mind wandering, and external distraction/bodily sensation states) and task performance during either an easy or a hard vigilance task. We also examined how these effects vary with time-on-task. Our results replicated prior work demonstrating that background music enhanced task focus and decreased mind wandering, compared to silence. There was also lower reaction time variability in the background music condition relative to the silence condition. Notably, these findings held regardless of task difficulty. Interestingly, when examined over time-on-task, the presence of music led to smaller task focus declines and mind wandering increases, compared to silence. Thus, listening to self-selected music appears to confer a protective effect on task engagement, especially over time-on-task.
听自选背景音乐已被证明与在持续注意力任务期间增加任务焦点和减少思维漫游有关（Kiss 和 Linnell，Psychological Research Psychologische Forschung 85:2313-2325, 2021）。然而，目前尚不清楚这种关系可能取决于任务难度这一潜在关键因素。为了解决这一知识空白，我们探讨了与安静相比，听自选音乐如何影响主观体验到的任务参与度（即任务焦点、思维漫游和外部分心/身体感觉状态）以及在简单或困难警戒任务期间的任务绩效。我们还研究了这些效果如何随任务时间而变化。我们的结果复制了先前的工作，表明与安静相比，背景音乐增强了任务焦点并减少了思维漫游。在背景音乐条件下的反应时变异性也低于安静条件。值得注意的是，这些发现与任务难度无关。有趣的是，当随着任务时间的推移进行检查时，与安静相比，音乐的存在导致任务焦点下降和思维漫游增加的幅度较小。因此，听自选音乐似乎对任务参与度具有保护作用，尤其是随着任务时间的推移。
