Mobilizing Effort to Reduce Lapses of Sustained Attention: Examining the Effects of Content-free Cues, Feedback, and Points

Three experiments with the psychomotor vigilance task examined whether presenting content-free cues, feedback, and points would reduce lapses of sustained attention. In all three experiments, behavioral lapses of attention (particularly slow reaction times) were reduced with the motivation manipulations compared with control conditions, but self-reports of off-task thinking (e.g., mind-wandering) were unaffected. Pupillary responses (preparatory and phasic) also tended to be larger with the different manipulations compared to control conditions. Collectively, the results are consistent with attentional effort models, suggesting that sustained attention was improved and lapses of attention reduced owing to participants in the motivation conditions mobilizing more attentional effort than participants in the control conditions. These results are consistent with recent research, which suggests that the locus coeruleus norepinephrine system is associated with the mobilization of effort.