Two experiments examined the effects of time of day, introversion and neuroticism on selectivity in memory and attention. The first experiment showed that none of these factors interacted with task priority, which suggests that such variables do not produce the same changes in selectivity as do exogenous factors such as noise. In Exp. 2, colour names were read more quickly in the late afternoon than in the early morning, whereas patches of colour were named more quickly in the morning. Results from the Stroop interference condition showed that subjects classified as extraverts on the basis of Eysenck Personality Questionnaire scores were less susceptible to distraction than those scored as introverts, but the size of this effect was influenced both by time of day and by whether the subjects scored as stable or neurotic on the questionnaire.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
BroadbentD. E. (1971) Decision and stress. London: Academic Press.
2.
ColquhounP. (1981) Rhythms in performance. In AschoffJ. (Ed.), Handbook of behavioral neurobiology. Vol. 4. New York: Plenum. Pp. 333–348.
3.
ColquhounW. P. (1960) Temperament, inspection efficiency and time of day. Ergonomics, 3, 337–338.
4.
ColquhounW. P.FolkardS. (1978) Personality differences in body-temperature rhythm, and their relation to its adjustment to night work. Ergonomics, 21, 811–817.
5.
EasterbrookJ. A. (1959) The effect of emotion on cue utilization and the organization of behaviorPsychological Review, 66, 183–201.
6.
EysenckM W, (1982) Attention and arousal. Berlin: Springer-Verlag.
7.
FolkardS. (1979) Time of day and level of processing. Memory & Cognition, 7, 247–252.
8.
FolkardS. (1980) A note on ‘Time of day effects in school children's immediate and delayed recall of meaningful material’—the influence of the importance of the information tested. British Journal of Psychology, 71, 95–97.
9.
FolkardS.MonkT. H. (1979) Time of day and processing strategy in free recall. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 31, 461–475.
10.
FolkardS.MonkT. H. (1985) Circadian performance rhythms. In FolkardS.MonkT. H. (Eds.), Hours of work: Temporal factors in work-scheduling. Chichester, UK: Wiley. Pp. 37–52.
11.
GrayJ. A. (1972) The psychophysiological nature of introversion-extraversion: A modification of Eysenck's theory. In NebylitsynV. D.GrayJ. A. (Eds.), Biological bases of individual behaviour. London: Academic Press. Pp. 183–208.
12.
HartleyL. R.AdamsR. G. (1974) Effects of noise on the Stroop task. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 102, 62–66.
13.
HartleyL. R.ShirleyE. (1976) Colour name interference at different times of day. Journal of Applied Psychology, 61, 119–122.
14.
HockeyR.HamiltonP. (1983) The cognitive patterning of stress states. In HockeyR. (Ed.), Stress and fatigue in human performance. Chichester, UK: Wiley. Pp. 331–360.
15.
HoustonB. K.JonesT. M. (1967) Distraction and Stroop colour-word performance. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 74, 54–56.
16.
HowarthE. (1969) Personality differences in serial learning under distraction. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 28, 379–382.
17.
ImanA. (1974) Extraversion and incidental learning. Pakistan Journal of Psychology, 7, 41–45.
18.
MillarK.StylesB. C.WastellD. G. (1980) Time of day and retrieval from long-term memory. British Journal of Psychology, 71, 407–414.
19.
OakhillJ. (1986) Effects of time of day and information importance on adults' memory for a short story. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 38A, 419–430.
20.
RabbittP. M. A. (1979) Current paradigms and models in human information processing. In HamiltonV.WarburtonD. M. (Eds.), Human stress and cognition. Chichester, UK: Wiley. Pp. 115–140.
21.
RevelleW.HumphreysM. S.SimonL.GillilandK. (1980) The interactive effect of personality, time of day and caffeine: A test of the arousal model. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 109, 1–31.
22.
ShanmuganT. E.SanthanomM. C. (1964) Personality differences in serial learning when interference is presented at the marginal visual level. Journal of the Indian Academy of Applied Psychology, 1, 25–28.
23.
SmithA. P. (1982) The effects of noise and task priority on recall of order and location. Acta Psychologica, 51, 245–255.
24.
SmithA. P. (1987a) Activation states and semantic processing: A comparison of the effects of noise and time of day. Acta Psychologica, 64, 271–288.
25.
SmithA. P. (1987b) Task-related motivation and time of testing. In SchwarzerR.van der PloegH. M.SpielbergerC. D. (Eds.), Advances in test anxiety research. Vol 5. Lisse: Swets & Zeitlinger. Pp. 115–123.
26.
SmithA. P.BroadbentD. E. (1985) The effects of noise on the naming of colours and reading of colour names. Acta Psychologica, 58, 275–285.
27.
SmithA. P.MilesC. (1985) The combined effects of noise and nightwork on human function. In OborneD. (Ed.), Contemporary ergonomics 1985. London: Taylor & Francis. Pp. 33–41.
28.
SmithA. P.MilesC. (1986) The combined effects of nightwork and noise on human function. In HaiderM.KollerM.CervinkaR. (Eds), Studies in industrial and organizational psychology night and shiftwork: Long-term effects and their prevention. Frankfurt: Peter Lang Pp 331–338.
29.
SmithA. P.MilesC. (1987a) The combined effects of occupational health hazards: An experimental investigation of the effects of noise, nightwork and meals. International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health, 59, 83–89.
30.
SmithA. P.MilesC. (1987b) Effects of lunch on selective and sustained attention. Neuropsychobiology, 16, 117–120.
31.
TilleyA.WarrenP. (1983) Retrieval from semantic memory at different times of day. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 9, 718–724.
