AI Article Synopsis
- - The study explored how the changes in a film's narrative structure affect viewers' attention, particularly focusing on mind wandering during a film called The Red Balloon.
- - Researchers tracked instances of mind wandering from 108 participants and found that more frequent situational changes in the film correlated with fewer instances of mind wandering.
- - Specifically, when participants perceived event boundaries or changes in the film, they were less likely to lose focus, indicating that dynamic storytelling helps maintain attention.
Article Abstract
How does the dynamic structure of the external world direct attention? We examined the relationship between event structure and attention to test the hypothesis that narrative shifts (both theoretical and perceived) negatively predict attentional lapses. Self-caught instances of mind wandering were collected while 108 participants watched a 32.5 min film called The Red Balloon. We used theoretical codings of situational change and human perceptions of event boundaries to predict mind wandering in 5-s intervals. Our findings suggest a temporal alignment between the structural dynamics of the film and mind wandering reports. Specifically, the number of situational changes and likelihood of perceiving event boundaries in the prior 0-15 s interval negatively predicted mind wandering net of low-level audiovisual features. Thus, mind wandering is less likely to occur when there is more event change, suggesting that narrative shifts keep attention from drifting inwards.
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| http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2018.01.007 | DOI Listing |
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