Familiar Music Reduces Mind Wandering and Boosts Behavioral Performance During Lexical Semantic Processing
Music has been shown to increase arousal and attention and even facilitate processing during non-musical tasks, including those related to speech and language functions. Mind wandering has been studied in many sustained attention tasks. Here, we investigated the intersection of these two phenomena:...
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MDPI AG
2025-05-01
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| author | Gavin M. Bidelman Shi Feng |
| author_facet | Gavin M. Bidelman Shi Feng |
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| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Music has been shown to increase arousal and attention and even facilitate processing during non-musical tasks, including those related to speech and language functions. Mind wandering has been studied in many sustained attention tasks. Here, we investigated the intersection of these two phenomena: the role of mind wandering while listening to familiar/unfamiliar musical excerpts, and its effects on concurrent linguistic processing. We hypothesized that familiar music would be less distracting than unfamiliar music, causing less mind wandering, and consequently benefit concurrent speech perception. Participants (<i>N</i> = 96 young adults) performed a lexical-semantic congruity task where they judged the relatedness of visually presented word pairs while listening to non-vocal classical music (familiar or unfamiliar orchestral pieces), or a non-music environmental sound clip (control) played in the background. Mind wandering episodes were probed intermittently during the task by explicitly asking listeners if their mind was wandering in that moment. The primary outcome was accuracy and reactions times measured during the lexical-semantic judgment task across the three background music conditions (familiar, unfamiliar, and control). We found that listening to familiar music, relative to unfamiliar music or environmental noise, was associated with faster lexical-semantic decisions and a lower incidence of mind wandering. Mind wandering frequency was similar when performing the task when listening to familiar music and control environmental sounds. We infer that familiar music increases task enjoyment, reduces mind wandering, and promotes more rapid lexical access during concurrent lexical processing, by modulating task-related attentional resources. The implications of using music as an aid during academic study and cognitive tasks are discussed. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-8b64c1b2f53c4f3ca64c12ff0d42ab1f |
| institution | OA Journals |
| issn | 2076-3425 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-05-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
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| series | Brain Sciences |
| spelling | doaj-art-8b64c1b2f53c4f3ca64c12ff0d42ab1f2025-08-20T01:56:25ZengMDPI AGBrain Sciences2076-34252025-05-0115548210.3390/brainsci15050482Familiar Music Reduces Mind Wandering and Boosts Behavioral Performance During Lexical Semantic ProcessingGavin M. Bidelman0Shi Feng1Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN 47408, USAInstitute for Intelligent Systems, University of Memphis, Memphis, TN 38152, USAMusic has been shown to increase arousal and attention and even facilitate processing during non-musical tasks, including those related to speech and language functions. Mind wandering has been studied in many sustained attention tasks. Here, we investigated the intersection of these two phenomena: the role of mind wandering while listening to familiar/unfamiliar musical excerpts, and its effects on concurrent linguistic processing. We hypothesized that familiar music would be less distracting than unfamiliar music, causing less mind wandering, and consequently benefit concurrent speech perception. Participants (<i>N</i> = 96 young adults) performed a lexical-semantic congruity task where they judged the relatedness of visually presented word pairs while listening to non-vocal classical music (familiar or unfamiliar orchestral pieces), or a non-music environmental sound clip (control) played in the background. Mind wandering episodes were probed intermittently during the task by explicitly asking listeners if their mind was wandering in that moment. The primary outcome was accuracy and reactions times measured during the lexical-semantic judgment task across the three background music conditions (familiar, unfamiliar, and control). We found that listening to familiar music, relative to unfamiliar music or environmental noise, was associated with faster lexical-semantic decisions and a lower incidence of mind wandering. Mind wandering frequency was similar when performing the task when listening to familiar music and control environmental sounds. We infer that familiar music increases task enjoyment, reduces mind wandering, and promotes more rapid lexical access during concurrent lexical processing, by modulating task-related attentional resources. The implications of using music as an aid during academic study and cognitive tasks are discussed.https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3425/15/5/482music familiaritymind wanderinglexical processing |
| spellingShingle | Gavin M. Bidelman Shi Feng Familiar Music Reduces Mind Wandering and Boosts Behavioral Performance During Lexical Semantic Processing Brain Sciences music familiarity mind wandering lexical processing |
| title | Familiar Music Reduces Mind Wandering and Boosts Behavioral Performance During Lexical Semantic Processing |
| title_full | Familiar Music Reduces Mind Wandering and Boosts Behavioral Performance During Lexical Semantic Processing |
| title_fullStr | Familiar Music Reduces Mind Wandering and Boosts Behavioral Performance During Lexical Semantic Processing |
| title_full_unstemmed | Familiar Music Reduces Mind Wandering and Boosts Behavioral Performance During Lexical Semantic Processing |
| title_short | Familiar Music Reduces Mind Wandering and Boosts Behavioral Performance During Lexical Semantic Processing |
| title_sort | familiar music reduces mind wandering and boosts behavioral performance during lexical semantic processing |
| topic | music familiarity mind wandering lexical processing |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3425/15/5/482 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT gavinmbidelman familiarmusicreducesmindwanderingandboostsbehavioralperformanceduringlexicalsemanticprocessing AT shifeng familiarmusicreducesmindwanderingandboostsbehavioralperformanceduringlexicalsemanticprocessing |