Lapses in Attention Predict Memory Failure

Post by Elisa Guma

What's the science?

Spontaneous lapses or fluctuations in attention are thought to, in part, account for individual differences in memory function. Infinite access to digital media and technologies provides an unlimited source of distraction in our daily lives. This week in Nature, Madore and colleagues investigated whether lapses in attention affected performance on memory and attention tasks in healthy young adults and whether the degree of ‘multimedia multitasking’ was related to differences in attention and performance.     

How did they do it?

In order to assess how memory was affected by attentional lapses, the authors recorded electroencephalography (EEG) and pupillometry (i.e. pupil diameter measurement) as eighty young adults completed a goal-directed episodic encoding and retrieval memory task. Power in the alpha frequency band was recorded from the parietal cortex (using EEG) as tonic pre-stimulus increases in the signal from this brain region have been associated with lapses in attention, as has a decrease in pupil diameter. The memory task consisted of encoding and retrieval portions. In the encoding portion, participants had to classify a series of objects (168) based on a goal cue: size (big vs. small) or pleasantness (pleasant vs. unpleasant) of the object. In the retrieval phase, participants viewed a series of objects (168 studied and 84 new) and were asked to determine whether they had seen them already, and under which category they had been placed (bigger/smaller, pleasant/unpleasant). The authors further quantified trait-level attention using a sustained attention task and questionnaires aimed at assessing their likelihood of engaging in multimedia multitasking (e.g. watching TV while texting).

What did they find?

The authors found that increases in pre-goal alpha power and decreases in pupil diameter just prior to goal-cue presentation in the retrieval portion of the task were correlated with a greater likelihood of memory failure (misses) compared to successes (hits), suggesting that fluctuations in attention may be related to fluctuations in recollection. Using the sustained attention task, the authors found that a greater number of errors and greater response time variability (accepted as markers for attention lapsing) was related to differences in alpha power and pupil distance collected in the previous task, and negatively correlated with task performance. Finally, the authors found that higher scores on the multimedia multitasking questionnaire were associated with higher pre-goal alpha power and greater pupil diameter variability during the memory task, as well as more errors and response time variability during the sustained attention task. Higher multimedia use was also related to traits of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and attentional impulsivity based on the trait-level questionnaire.

What's the impact?

The results presented here suggest that attention is critical for memory formation. Further, interindividual differences in task performance were related both to their engagement with multimedia multitasking and with trait levels of attention and impulsivity. This study also highlights how multimodal approaches can advance our understanding of the role of attention in memory both during task performance and at the trait level. Future work is needed to further investigate a causal relationship between multimedia use, attention, and memory. 

Madore et al. Memory failure predicted by attention lapsing and media multitasking. Nature (2020). Access the original scientific publication here.