Are you drawing a blank?
Zoning out for a moment, or longer, is common – and scientists want to know more about it.
Have you ever lost all attention to what’s going on around you, been lost for thoughts, or grasping at memories?
These are all symptoms of “mind blanking", a common experience with a wide variety of definitions ranging from feeling drowsy to a complete absence of conscious awareness.
Now, a team of neuroscientists and philosophers from Europe and Monash University have published a paper in the journal Trends in Cognitive Sciences compiled of what we know about mind blanking, including insights from their own work observing people’s brain activity.
“During wakefulness, our thoughts transition between different contents. However, there are moments that are seemingly devoid of reportable content, referred to as mind blanking,” the research team said.
Dr Jennifer Windt, of Monash University’s Centre for Consciousness and Contemplative Studies, said a mind blank is more likely to occur when the brain is in a high – or low – arousal state.
“Even when we are trying to focus on what we are doing, our attention frequently drifts away from ongoing tasks and the here and now,” Dr Windt said.
“Moreover, when our attention lapses, we can experience a variety of mental states, such as daydreaming and freely moving thoughts, or even no thoughts at all, as in mind blanking.”
Antoine Lutz, of the Lyon Neuroscience Research Centre in France, said, “Our aim here is to start a conversation and see how mind blanking relates to other seemingly similar experiences, such as meditation.”
Athena Demertzi, of GIGA Research at University of Liège in Belgium, added, “We sought to better understand mind blanking by parsing through 80 relevant research articles, including some of our own in which we recorded participants’ brain activity when they were reporting that they were ‘thinking of nothing’.’’
Key findings from the research:
Mind blank frequency varies greatly between people, but a person experiences the phenomenon about 5% to 20% of the time on average.
Common experiences defined as “mind blanking” include lapses of attention, memory issues, and a cessation of inner speech.
Mind blanks tend to happen toward the end of long, sustained attention tasks such as exams and after sleep deprivation or intense physical exercise but are also a typical waking state.
Children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) report mind blanking more frequently than neurotypical people.
During mind blanks after sustained attention tasks, people’s heart rates and pupil sizes decreased, and their brains showed lower signal complexity – a state typically observed in unconscious people. During the blank, they observed disruptions in sensory processing and slow, sleep-like EEG waves. The authors describe these states in which parts of a person’s brain appear asleep as “local sleep episodes”.
The researchers speculate that the common factor between different forms of blanking may be related to changes in arousal levels, leading to a malfunction of key cognitive mechanisms such as memory, language, or attention.
Given that blanking experiences vary so greatly – both in terms of people’s subjective experiences and their neural activity – the researchers propose a framework that describes mind blanking as a dynamic group of physiologically driven experiences mediated by arousal states, or a person’s state of physiological “vigilance”.
Thomas Andrillon, a former research fellow in psychology at Monash, now at the University of Liège, said, “We believe that the investigation of mind blanking is insightful, important, and timely. Insightful because it challenges the common conception that wakefulness involves a constant stream of thoughts. Important because mind blanking highlights the interindividual differences in subjective experience.”
Subscribe to Health Matters today
As we age, our health really does matter – and it’s important to stay up to date with the latest advice and information on health and well-being. Subscribe to our informative digital newsletter Health Matters, where you’ll receive quality articles, healthy recipes and the latest health information relevant to older Australians. Each edition features contributions from Dr Libby (PhD) – Internationally acclaimed nutritional biochemist, best-selling author, and international speaker – who shares her insights on nutrition, energy, and healthy living. From practical tips to inspiring ideas, Health Matters covers everything you need to know to create and maintain a healthy lifestyle in your later years.
Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and should not be considered medical advice. Consult a healthcare professional about any health concerns or before making any changes to your medication, diet, or exercise routine.
