The roots of anticipatory mental involvement

Sometimes, we perform repetitive tasks in an automatic fashion, such as not paying attention to what we read and thinking about where we will have dinner instead. However, the anticipation of a change in task could trigger reinvolvement. In this study, we will contrast two explanations of such anticipatory reinvolvement, that is bringing information to mind due to the anticipation of a change. In one, people could have a precise estimate of when they will need to adjust to new settings and prepare in advance. Another possibility is that people might have an imprecise internal clock that leads them to think they will need to adjust to new settings now. We will contrast these two possibilities in a behavioral experiment that utilizes the mental storage of simple colors and previous research that shows when the color is brought to mind, it involuntarily guides attention in the external world.

- Students are expected to spend at least 6 hours/week. Approximately 4 hours will be spent on data collection, 30 minutes on the weekly project meeting, and 1.5 hours on reading and data analysis.

- Interested students are encouraged to reach out to Eren Günseli to describe what motivates them to participate in this project and their current level of research experience.

- For more information on our research, check out our website at gunselilab.com