Individuals with an ADHD diagnosis have increased levels of interfering thoughts, especially in the form of mind wandering. This was mostly investigated in sustained attention tasks; hence it is unclear whether the findings are only due to their difficulties in those types of tasks. Moreover, it is unclear how the amount of control invested in the task will affect those differences between control and ADHD groups.
Method:
ADHD and matched control groups performed the Stroop task under high and low conflict conditions while measuring their interfering thoughts level.
Results:
Individuals with ADHD have more interfering thoughts compared to a control group even when they are able to change their control level according to the task conflict.
Conclusion:
Interfering thoughts are an independent predictor of ADHD impairments, observed regardless of the degree of control invested in the task.
AkermanA.NaftalovichH.Akiva-KabiriL.KalanthroffE. (2020). Inhibiting the emergence of involuntary musical imagery: Implications for improving our understanding of intrusive thoughts. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 44(4), 885–891.
2.
Alali-MorlevyK.GoldfarbL. (2020). The connection between mind wandering, ADHD, and level of performance on an attention task. Journal of Attention Disorders. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1177/1087054720946371
3.
American Psychiatric Association. (2013). DSM-5. American Psychiatric Association.
ArigaA.LlerasA. (2011). Brief and rare mental “breaks” keep you focused: Deactivation and reactivation of task goals preempt vigilance decrements. Cognition, 118(3), 439–443.
6.
BairdB.SmallwoodJ.MrazekM. D.KamJ. W.FranklinM. S.SchoolerJ. W. (2012). Inspired by distraction: Mind wandering facilitates creative incubation. Psychological Science, 23(10), 1117–1122.
7.
BairdB.SmallwoodJ.SchoolerJ. W. (2011). Back to the future: Autobiographical planning and the functionality of mind-wandering. Consciousness and Cognition, 20, 1604–1611.
8.
BarghJ. A.ChenM.BurrowsL. (1996). Automaticity of social behavior: Direct effects of trait construct and stereotype-activation on action. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71(2), 230–244.
9.
BarkleyR. A.MurphyK.KwasnikD. (1996). Psychological adjustment and adaptive impairments in young adults with ADHD. Journal of Attention Disorders, 1(1), 41–54.
10.
BarronE.RibyL. M.GreerJ.SmallwoodJ. (2011). Absorbed in thought: The effect of mind wandering on the processing of relevant and irrelevant events. Psychological Science, 22(5), 596–601.
11.
BastianM.SackurJ. (2013). Mind wandering at the fingertips: Automatic parsing of subjective states based on response time variability. Frontiers in Psychology, 4, 573.
12.
BotvinickM. M. (2007). Conflict monitoring and decision making: Reconciling two perspectives on anterior cingulate function. Cognitive Affective & Behavioral Neuroscience, 7, 356–366.
13.
BraverT. S. (2012). The variable nature of cognitive control: A dual mechanisms framework. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 16, 106–113.
14.
CarterC. S.MacdonaldA. M.BotvinickM.RossL. L.StengerV. A.NollD.CohenJ. D. (2000). Parsing executive processes: Strategic vs. Evaluative functions of the anterior cingulate cortex. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA, 97, 1944–1948.
15.
CastellsX.Blanco-SilventeL.CunillR. (2018). Amphetamines for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in adults. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, 8, CD007813.
16.
ChoiH.NamC. S.FengJ. (2015, September). A wandering mind cannot resolve conflicts in displayed information. In Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society annual meeting (Vol. 59, No. 1, pp. 1397–1401). SAGE Publications.
17.
ConnersC. K.StaffM. H. S.ConnellyV.CampbellS.MacLeanM.BarnesJ. (2000). Conners’ continuous performance test II (CPT II v. 5). Multi-Health System Inc, 29, 175–196.
18.
CunninghamS.ScerboM. W.FreemanF. G. (2000). The electrocortical correlates of daydreaming during vigilance tasks. Journal of Mental Imagery, 24(1-2), 61–72.
19.
DijksterhuisA.van KnippenbergA. (1998). The relation between perception and behavior or how to win a game of Trivial Pursuit. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74, 865–877.
20.
DriverJ. (2001). A selective review of selective attention research from the past century. British Journal of Psychology, 92(Part 1), 53–78.
21.
EllamilM.DobsonC.BeemanM.ChristoffK. (2012). Evaluative and generative modes of thought during the creative process. NeuroImage, 59, 1783–1794.
22.
EpsteinJ. N.LorenR. E. (2013). Changes in the definition of ADHD in DSM-5: Subtle but important. Neuropsychiatry, 3(5), 455.
23.
FacoettiA.PaganoniP.TurattoM.MarzolaV.MascettiG. G. (2000). Visual-spatial attention in developmental dyslexia. Cortex, 36(1), 109–123.
24.
ForsterS.LavieN. (2014). Distracted by your mind? Individual differences in distractibility predict mind wandering. Journal of Experimental Psychology Learning Memory and Cognition, 40(1), 251.
25.
FranklinM. S.MrazekM. D.AndersonC. L.JohnstonC.SmallwoodJ.KingstoneA.SchoolerJ. W. (2017). Tracking distraction: The relationship between mind-wandering, meta-awareness, and ADHD symptomatology. Journal of Attention Disorders, 21(6), 475–486.
26.
GodwinC. A.HunterM. A.BezdekM. A.LiebermanG.Elkin-FrankstonS.RomeroV. L.WitkiewitzK.ClarkV. P.SchumacherE. H. (2017). Functional connectivity within and between intrinsic brain networks correlates with trait mind wandering. Neuropsychologia, 103, 140–153.
27.
GoldfarbL.AisenbergD.HenikA. (2011). Think the thought, walk the walk – Social priming reduces the Stroop effect. Cognition, 118(2), 193–200.
28.
GoldfarbL.HenikA. (2007). Evidence for task conflict in the Stroop effect. Journal of Experimental Psychology Human Perception & Performance, 33, 1170–1176.
29.
GonçalvesÓ. F.RêgoG.CondeT.LeiteJ.CarvalhoS.LapentaO. M.BoggioP. S. (2018). Mind wandering and task-focused attention: ERP correlates. Scientific Reports, 8(1), 7608–7614.
30.
Gonzalez-CarpioG.SerranoJ. P.NietoM. (2017). Creativity in children with attention déficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Psychology, 8(3), 319.
31.
HeltonW. S.WarmJ. S. (2008). Signal salience and the mindlessness theory of vigilance. Acta Psychologica, 129(1), 18–25.
32.
JacksonJ. D.BalotaD. A. (2012). Mind-wandering in younger and older adults: Converging evidence from the Sustained Attention to Response Task and reading for comprehension. Psychology and Aging, 27, 106.
33.
JASP Team. (2018). JASP (Version 0.8.6) [Computer software].
34.
JonkmanL. M.MarkusC. R.FranklinM. S.van DalfsenJ. H. (2017). Mind wandering during attention performance: Effects of ADHD-inattention symptomatology, negative mood, ruminative response style and working memory capacity. PLoS One, 12(7), e0181213.
35.
KalanthroffE.AvnitA.AslanC.HenikA. (2014). Inhibiting doubt and uncertainty: Integrating behavioral and cognitive models in obsessive-compulsive disorder. Clinical Neuropsychiatry, 11(6), 160-163.
36.
KalanthroffE.LinkovskiO.HenikA.WheatonM. G.AnholtG. E. (2016). Inhibiting uncertainty: Priming inhibition promotes reduction of uncertainty. Neuropsychologia, 92, 142–146.
37.
KamJ. W.DaoE.StanciulescuM.TildesleyH.HandyT. C. (2013). Mind wandering and the adaptive control of attentional resources. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 25(6), 952–960.
38.
KamJ. W.HandyT. C. (2014). Differential recruitment of executive resources during mind wandering. Consciousness and Cognition, 26, 51–63.
39.
KesslerR. C.AdlerL.AmesM.DemlerO.FaraoneS.HiripiE.HowesM. J.JinR.SecnikK.SpencerT.UstunT. B.WaltersE. E. (2005a). The World Health Organization adult ADHD Self-Report Scale (ASRS): A short screening scale for use in the general population. Psychological Medicine, 35, 245–256.
40.
KillingsworthM. A.GilbertD. T. (2010). A wandering mind is an unhappy mind. Science, 330(6006), 932.
41.
KooijJ. J. S.BijlengaD.SalernoL.JaeschkeR.BitterI.BalázsJ.ThomeJ.DomG.KasperS.Nunes FilipeC.StesS.MohrP.LeppämäkiS.CasasM.BobesJ.MccarthyJ. M.RicharteV.Kjems PhilipsenA.PehlivanidisA.. . ., AshersonP. (2019). Updated European Consensus Statement on diagnosis and treatment of adult ADHD. European Psychiatry, 56(1), 14–34.
42.
KucyiA.SalomonsT. V.DavisK. D. (2013). Mind wandering away from pain dynamically engages antinociceptive and default mode brain networks. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 110(46), 18692–18697.
43.
LamC. M.BealeI. L. (1991). Relations among sustained attention, reading performance, and teachers’ ratings of behavior problems. Remedial and Special Education, 12(2), 40–47.
44.
LavieN. (2005). Distracted and confused?: Selective attention under load. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 9(2), 75–82.
45.
LearkR. A.GreenbergL. M.KindschiC. L.DupuyT. R.HughesS. J. (2007). Test of variables of attention continuous performance test. The TOVA Company.
46.
LevinsonD. B.SmallwoodJ.DavidsonR. J. (2012). The persistence of thought: Evidence for a role of working memory in the maintenance of task-unrelated thinking. Psychological Science, 23(4), 375–380.
47.
LoganG. D. (1980). Attention and automaticity in Stroop and priming tasks: Theory and data. Cognitive Psychology, 12, 523–553.
48.
LoganG. D.ZbrodoffN. J. (1979). When it helps to be misled: Facilitative effects of increasing the frequency of conflicting stimuli in a Stroop-like task. Memory & Cognition, 7(3), 166–174.
49.
LosierB. J.McGrathP. J.KleinR. M. (1996). Error patterns on the continuous performance test in non-medicated and medicated samples of children with and without ADHD: A meta-analytic review. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 37(8), 971–987.
50.
MackworthN. H. (1950). Researches on the measurement of human performance (Medical Research Council special report series no. 268).
51.
MacLeodC. M. (1991). Half a century of research on the Stroop effect: An integrative review. Psychological Bulletin, 109, 163–203.
52.
MacLeodC. M.MacDonaldP. A. (2000). Interdimensional interference in the Stroop effect: Uncovering the cognitive and neural anatomy of attention. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 4(10), 383–391.
53.
MailletD.RajahM. N. (2013). Age-related changes in frequency of mind-wandering and task-related interferences during memory encoding and their impact on retrieval. Memory, 21, 818–831.
54.
MangunG. R.HillyardS. A. (1995). Mechanisms and models of selective attention. In RuggM. D.ColesM. G. H. (Eds.), Electrophysiology of mind: Event-related brain potentials and cognition (pp. 40–85). Oxford University Press.
55.
MatthewsG.JoynerL.GillilandK.CampbellS.FalconerS.HugginsJ. (1999). Validation of a comprehensive stress state questionnaire: Towards a state big three. Personality Psychology in Europe, 7, 335–350.
56.
McKiernanK. A.D’AngeloB. R.KaufmanJ. N.BinderJ. R. (2006). Interrupting the “stream of consciousness”: An fMRI investigation. NeuroImage, 29(4), 1185–1191.
57.
McVayJ. C.KaneM. J. (2009). Conducting the train of thought: Working memory capacity, goal neglect, and mind wandering in an executive-control task. Journal of Experimental Psychology Learning Memory and Cognition, 35(1), 196.
58.
McVayJ. C.KaneM. J. (2010). Does mind wandering reflect executive function or executive failure? Comment on Smallwood and Schooler (2006) and Watkins (2008). Psychological Bulletin, 136(2), 188–197.
59.
McVayJ. C.KaneM. J. (2012). Drifting from slow to “d’oh!”: Working memory capacity and mind wandering predict extreme reaction times and executive control errors. Journal of Experimental Psychology Learning Memory and Cognition, 38(3), 525.
60.
MowlemF. D.SkirrowC.ReidP.MaltezosS.NijjarS. K.MerwoodA.BarkerE.CooperR.KuntsiJ.AshersonP. (2019). Validation of the mind excessively wandering scale and the relationship of mind wandering to impairment in adult ADHD. Journal of Attention Disorders, 23(6), 624–634.
61.
MrazekM. D.PhillipsD. T.FranklinM. S.BroadwayJ. M.SchoolerJ. W. (2013). Young and restless: Validation of the Mind-Wandering Questionnaire (MWQ) reveals disruptive impact of mind-wandering for youth. Frontiers in Psychology, 4,560.
62.
NiggJ. T.BlaskeyL. G.Huang-PollockC. L.RappleyM. D. (2002). Neuropsychological executive functions and DSM-IV ADHD subtypes. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 41, 59–66.
63.
OpenhaimB.BreznitzS. Z., (2004). 2 Minutes calculation test (Unpublished test). University of Haifa, Israel.
64.
PolanczykG.RohdeL. A. (2007). Epidemiology of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder across the lifespan. Current Opinion in Psychiatry, 20, 386–392.
65.
RavenJ. C. (1960). Guide to the standard progressive matrices. H.K. Lewis.
66.
RubyF. J.SmallwoodJ.SackurJ.SingerT. (2013). Is self-generated thought a means of social problem solving?Frontiers in Psychology, 4, 962.
67.
SchoolerJ. W. (2002). Re-representing consciousness: Dissociations between experience and meta-consciousness. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 6(8), 339–344.
68.
SchoolerJ. W.SmallwoodJ.ChristoffK.HandyT. C.ReichleE. D.SayetteM. A. (2011). Meta-awareness, perceptual decoupling and the wandering mind. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 15, 319–326.
69.
SchwartzK.VerhaeghenP. (2008). ADHD and Stroop interference from age 9 to age 41 years: A meta-analysis of developmental effects. Psychological Medicine, 38(11), 1607.
70.
SeeJ. E.HoweS. R.WarmJ. S.DemberW. N. (1995). Meta-analysis of the sensitivity decrement in vigilance. Psychological Bulletin, 117(2), 230.
71.
SeidmanL. J.BiedermanJ.FaraoneS. V.WeberW.MenninD.JonesJ. (1997). A pilot study of neuropsychological function in girls with ADHD. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 36, 366–373.
72.
SeidmanL. J.BiedermanJ.MonuteauxM. C.WeberW.FaraoneS. V. (2000). Neuropsychological functioning in nonreferred siblings of children with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 109, 252–265.
73.
SeliP. (2016). The attention-lapse and motor decoupling accounts of SART performance are not mutually exclusive. Consciousness and Cognition, 41, 189–198.
74.
SeliP.SmallwoodJ.CheyneJ. A.SmilekD. (2015). On the relation of mind wandering and ADHD symptomatology. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 22(3), 629–636.
75.
SeliP.WammesJ. D.RiskoE. F.SmilekD. (2016). On the relation between motivation and retention in educational contexts: The role of intentional and unintentional mind wandering. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 23(4), 1280–1287.
76.
ShatilE. (1995a). One-minute test for words (Unpublished test). University of Haifa.
77.
ShawG. A.GiambraL. (1993). Task-unrelated thoughts of college students diagnosed as hyperactive in childhood. Developmental Neuropsychology, 9, 17–30.
78.
SmallwoodJ.ObonsawinM.HeimD. (2003b). Task unrelated thought: The role of distributed processing. Consciousness and Cognition, 12, 169–189.
79.
SmallwoodJ.DaviesJ. B.HeimD.FinniganF.SudberryM.O’ConnorR.ObonsawinM. (2004). Subjective experience and the attentional lapse: Task engagement and disengagement during sustained attention. Consciousness and Cognition, 13(4), 657–690.
80.
SmallwoodJ.FitzgeraldA.MilesL. K.PhillipsL. H. (2009). Shifting moods, wandering minds: Negative moods lead the mind to wander. Emotion, 9(2), 271.
81.
SmallwoodJ. M.BaracaiaS. F.LoweM.ObonsawinM. (2003a). Task unrelated thought whilst encoding information. Consciousness and Cognition, 12, 452–484.
82.
SmallwoodJ.O’ConnorR. C.HeimD. (2005). Rumination, dysphoria, and subjective experience. Imagination Cognition and Personality, 24(4), 355–367.
83.
SmallwoodJ.SchoolerJ. W. (2006). The restless mind. Psychological Bulletin, 132(6), 946.
84.
SongX.WangX. (2012). Mind wandering in Chinese daily lives – An experience sampling study. PLoS One, 7(9), e44423.
85.
StawarczykD.MajerusS.MajM.Van der LindenM.D’ArgembeauA. (2011a). Mind-wandering: Phenomenology and function as assessed with a novel experience sampling method. Acta Psychologica, 136(3), 370–381.
86.
StawarczykD.MajerusS.MaquetP.D’ArgembeauA. (2011b). Neural correlates of ongoing conscious experience: Both task-unrelatedness and stimulus-independence are related to default network activity. PLoS One, 6(2), e16997.
87.
StawarczykD.MajerusS.CataleC.D’ArgembeauA. (2014). Relationships between mind-wandering and attentional control abilities in young adults and adolescents. Acta Psychologica, 148, 25–36.
88.
StawarczykD.MajerusS.Van der LindenM.D’ArgembeauA. (2012). Using the daydreaming frequency scale to investigate the relationships between mind-wandering, psychological well-being, and present-moment awareness. Frontiers in Psychology, 3, 363.
89.
SternP.ShalevL. (2013). The role of sustained attention and display medium in reading comprehension among adolescents with ADHD and without it. Research in Developmental Disabilities, 34(1), 431–439.
90.
ThomsonD. R.BesnerD.SmilekD. (2013). In pursuit of off-task thought: Mind wandering-performance trade-offs while reading aloud and color naming. Frontiers in Psychology, 4, 360.
91.
TuchaL.TuchaO.WalitzaS.SontagT. A.LaufkötterR.LinderM.LangeK. W. (2009). Vigilance and sustained attention in children and adults with ADHD. Journal of Attention Disorders, 12(5), 410–421.
92.
TzelgovJ.HenikA.BergerJ. (1992). Controlling Stroop effects by manipulating expectations for color words. Memory & Cognition, 20(6), 727–735.
93.
Van Den DriesscheC.BastianM.PeyreH.StordeurC.AcquavivaÉ.BahadoriS.DelormeR.SackurJ. (2017). Attentional lapses in attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder: Blank rather than wandering thoughts. Psychological Science, 28(10), 1375–1386.
94.
van MourikR.OosterlaanJ.SergeantJ. A. (2005). The Stroop revisited: A meta-analysis of interference control in AD/HD. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 46, 150–165.
95.
VerheulI.BlockJ.Burmeister-LampK.ThurikR.TiemeierH.TurtureaR. (2015). ADHD-like behavior and entrepreneurial intentions. Small Business Economics, 45(1), 85–101.
96.
WeyandtL. L.IwaszukW.FultonK.OllertonM.BeattyN.FoutsH.SchepmanS.GreenlawC. (2003). The internal restlessness scale: Performance of college students with and without ADHD. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 36(4), 382–389.
97.
WhiteH. A.ShahP. (2006). Uninhibited imaginations: Creativity in adults with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. Personality and Individual Differences, 40(6), 1121–1131.
98.
WhiteH. A.ShahP. (2011). Creative style and achievement in adults with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. Personality and Individual Differences, 50(5), 673–677.
99.
WillcuttE. G.PenningtonB. F.BoadaR.OglineJ. S.TunickR. A.ChhabildasN. A.OlsonR. K. (2001). A comparison of the cognitive deficits in reading disability and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 110, 157–172.
100.
YankoM. R.SpalekT. M. (2014). Driving with the wandering mind: The effect that mind-wandering has on driving performance. Human Factors, 56(2), 260–269.
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
