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Momentary Interruptions Can Derail the Train of Thought

American Psychological Association
Journal of Experimental Psychology: General
Authors:
Erik Altmann at Michigan State University
Erik Altmann
J. Gregory Trafton
J. Gregory Trafton
J. Gregory Trafton
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Zach Hambrick at Michigan State University
Zach Hambrick
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Abstract

We investigated the effect of short interruptions on performance of a task that required participants to maintain their place in a sequence of steps each with their own performance requirements. Interruptions averaging 4.4 s long tripled the rate of sequence errors on post-interruption trials relative to baseline trials. Interruptions averaging 2.8 s long-about the time to perform a step in the interrupted task-doubled the rate of sequence errors. Nonsequence errors showed no interruption effects, suggesting that global attentional processes were not disrupted. Response latencies showed smaller interruption effects than sequence errors, a difference we interpret in terms of high levels of interference generated by the primary task. The results are consistent with an account in which activation spreading from the focus of attention allows control processes to navigate task-relevant representations and in which momentary interruptions are disruptive because they shift the focus and thereby cut off the flow. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
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Momentary Interruptions Can Derail the Train of Thought
Erik M. Altmann
Michigan State University
J. Gregory Trafton
Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, District of Columbia
David Z. Hambrick
Michigan State University
We investigated the effect of short interruptions on performance of a task that required participants to
maintain their place in a sequence of steps each with their own performance requirements. Interruptions
averaging 4.4 s long tripled the rate of sequence errors on post-interruption trials relative to baseline
trials. Interruptions averaging 2.8 s long—about the time to perform a step in the interrupted task—
doubled the rate of sequence errors. Nonsequence errors showed no interruption effects, suggesting that
global attentional processes were not disrupted. Response latencies showed smaller interruption effects
than sequence errors, a difference we interpret in terms of high levels of interference generated by the
primary task. The results are consistent with an account in which activation spreading from the focus of
attention allows control processes to navigate task-relevant representations and in which momentary
interruptions are disruptive because they shift the focus and thereby cut off the flow.
Keywords: task interruption, procedural error, cognitive control, placekeeping
Understanding the mechanisms of cognitive control is one of the
main aims of cognitive psychology, with consequences for under-
standing human abilities and brain– behavior relationships in a
wide range of domains and populations. Cognitive control is
expressed in many ways, one of which involves selecting the next
thought to focus on when there are multiple options and when
interruptions or distractions can intervene. An example is a con-
versation, which generally follows a coherent thread. If an inter-
ruption occurs, such as an interlocutor’s cell phone ringing, the
thread may get lost, leading to a “Where were we?” moment (e.g.,
Trafton, Jacobs, & Harrison, 2012).
An important question for practical and theoretical reasons is
just how minimal such an interruption can be and still affect the
train of thought. For the cell phone example, the question is
whether the interlocutor need only attend to his or her phone for a
couple of seconds—to shut it off, for example, rather than to
actually take the call. In safety-critical contexts, the question is
whether it is safe to interrupt someone even for a few seconds in
the middle of a procedure without increasing the chance of error.
To operationalize “train of thought,” we used a task in which
subtasks— or what we call steps— have to be performed in a
particular sequence, and correct performance depends on remem-
bering one’s place in this sequence. In behavioral research, se-
quential tasks like this arise mainly in two domains, one focused
on errors in sequential action selection, and the other on effects of
task interruption. In the error domain, the focus has been on
“routine” tasks (Norman & Shallice, 1986), like coffee-making
(Botvinick & Bylsma, 2005;Botvinick & Plaut, 2004;Cooper &
Shallice, 2000,2006), packing a lunch (Cooper, Schwartz, Yule, &
Shallice, 2005), or cleaning the house (Botvinick & Plaut, 2004).
However, routine tasks are generally performed with high accu-
racy, so the error data they generate are sparse. Reason (1990) used
diary methods to collect errors in routine tasks over long periods,
and others have focused on neurological patients for whom routine
tasks are difficult (Schwartz, Reed, Montgomery, Palmer, &
Mayer, 1991). In the task interruption domain, sequential tasks
with “post-completion” steps (Byrne & Bovair, 1997;Li, Bland-
ford, Cairns, & Young, 2008;Trafton, Altmann, & Ratwani, 2011)
generate elevated error rates on those steps, but by design those
steps are still a small proportion of the total. In a study of
interrupted routine performance, Botvinick and Bylsma (2005) had
to have their participants make 50 actual cups of coffee to generate
enough errors to analyze.
We therefore saw a need for a procedure that generates rich and
interpretable data on sequence errors, from healthy populations
performing under controlled laboratory conditions. To meet this
need, we developed a sequential task that combines a routine
sequencing component with relatively complex individual steps.
An important criterion was that every participant should effec-
tively be a trained expert on the step sequence, so that sequence
errors could be attributed to on-line control mechanisms rather
than lack of knowledge about the sequence. We therefore built the
This article was published Online First January 7, 2013.
Erik M. Altmann, Department of Psychology, Michigan State Univer-
sity; J. Gregory Trafton, Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, District
of Columbia; David Z. Hambrick, Department of Psychology, Michigan
State University.
This research was supported by grants from the Office of Naval Re-
search to Erik M. Altmann (N000140910093) and J. Gregory Trafton
(N0001412RX20082, N0001411WX30014). The authors thank Rick Coo-
per and Dave Plaut for their comments during the review process, Mark
Becker and Amber Markey for comments on earlier drafts, and Amber
Markey for collecting the data.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Erik M.
Altmann, Department of Psychology, Michigan State University, East
Lansing, MI 48824. E-mail: ema@msu.edu
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.
This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.
Journal of Experimental Psychology: General © 2013 American Psychological Association
2014, Vol. 143, No. 1, 215–226 0096-3445/14/$12.00 DOI: 10.1037/a0030986
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