Unnoticed intrusions: Dissociations of meta-consciousness in thought suppression

Baird, B.; Smallwood, Jonathan; Fishman, D. J. F.; Mrazek, M. D.; Schooler, J. W.

doi:10.1016/j.concog.2013.06.009

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Unnoticed intrusions: Dissociations of meta-consciousness in thought suppression

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Baird, B., Smallwood, J., Fishman, D. J. F., Mrazek, M. D., & Schooler, J. W. (2013). Unnoticed intrusions: Dissociations of meta-consciousness in thought suppression. Consciousness and Cognition, 22(3), 1003-1012. doi:10.1016/j.concog.2013.06.009.

Cite as: https://hdl.handle.net/11858/00-001M-0000-0014-4606-D

Abstract

The current research investigates the interaction between thought suppression and individuals’ explicit awareness of their thoughts. Participants in three experiments attempted to suppress thoughts of a prior romantic relationship and their success at doing so was measured using a combination of self-catching and experience-sampling. In addition to thoughts that individuals spontaneously noticed, individuals were frequently caught engaging in thoughts of their previous partner at experience-sampling probes. Furthermore, probe-caught thoughts were: (i) associated with stronger decoupling of attention from the environment, (ii) more likely to occur under cognitive load, (iii) more frequent for individuals with a desire to reconcile, and (iv) associated with individual differences in the tendency to suppress thoughts. Together, these data suggest that individuals can lack meta-awareness that they have begun to think about a topic they are attempting to suppress, providing novel insight into the cognitive processes that are involved in attempting to control undesired mental states.