从一心一意到三心二意：青少年的媒体多任务行为

计算机时代的到来带来了青少年媒体使用行为的变化,其中媒体多任务现象尤为显著。为全面了解在青少年群体中日渐普及的媒体多任务行为,本文首先介绍该现象的概念界定,其次概括研究中的理论基础和测量方式,并总结了青少年媒体多任务的影响因素和影响后果。未来应加强对智能手机等新兴媒体对媒体多任务行为的影响、媒体多任务行为的性别差异、媒体多任务行为的生态化测量以及媒体多任务行为积极影响的研究。     

Effects of Exposure to Sexual Content in the Media on Adolescent Sexual Behaviors: The Moderating Role of Multitasking with Media

Young audiences frequently combine media use (e.g., television viewing) with other activities (e.g., homework); this is referred to as multitasking. This research uses longitudinal data to examine the moderating role of multitasking by examining the effects of exposure to sexual content in the media on adolescents' sexual behavior. Consistent with the predictions based on the limited capacity approach, there was a significant multitasking by exposure interaction suggesting that multitasking reduces the impact of media. More specifically, the effect of exposure to sexual content in the media on sexual behavior was significantly greater among light multitaskers than among heavy multitaskers.     

Media Multitasking Effects on Cognitive vs. Attitudinal Outcomes: A Meta‐Analysis

Despite the recent proliferation of research on media multitasking, a comprehensive meta‐analytic review of its effects has not been available. Based on a review of 49 media multitasking studies, this meta‐analysis showed that multitasking has negative effects on cognitive outcomes, whereas it has positive effects on attitudinal (or persuasion‐related) outcomes. Moderator analyses suggested that the negative effects of multitasking on cognitive outcomes varied by (a) user control, (b) task relevance, and (c) task contiguity. Specifically, multitasking had greater effects (a) when media users had less control over the media, (b) for tasks that were unrelated, and (c) for tasks that were physically distant. Implications for future multitasking research are further discussed.     

Media multitasking behavior: concurrent television and computer usage

Changes in the media landscape have made simultaneous usage of the computer and television increasingly commonplace, but little research has explored how individuals navigate this media multitasking environment. Prior work suggests that self-insight may be limited in media consumption and multitasking environments, reinforcing a rising need for direct observational research. A laboratory experiment recorded both younger and older individuals as they used a computer and television concurrently, multitasking across television and Internet content. Results show that individuals are attending primarily to the computer during media multitasking. Although gazes last longer on the computer when compared to the television, the overall distribution of gazes is strongly skewed toward very short gazes only a few seconds in duration. People switched between media at an extreme rate, averaging more than 4 switches per min and 120 switches over the 27.5-minute study exposure. Participants had little insight into their switching activity and recalled their switching behavior at an average of only 12 percent of their actual switching rate revealed in the objective data. Younger individuals switched more often than older individuals, but other individual differences such as stated multitasking preference and polychronicity had little effect on switching patterns or gaze duration. This overall pattern of results highlights the importance of exploring new media environments, such as the current drive toward media multitasking, and reinforces that self-monitoring, post hoc surveying, and lay theory may offer only limited insight into how individuals interact with media.     

An Observational Study on How Situational Factors Influence Media Multitasking With TV: The Role of Genres,Dayparts, and Social Viewing

This study responds to the need for research on individuals' media multitasking behavior using observational data. Media multitasking can have a profound impact on media processing and effects. However, we have little knowledge on when people are likely to engage in media multitasking and, consequently, when these effects are likely to occur. This study examines how three important situational factors—television genres, dayparts, and social viewing—influence the amount of media multitasking. Granular observational data obtained by directly monitoring and recording media consumption behaviors of a large panel at 10-second intervals are used for the analysis. The study reveals that media multitasking with television is most prevalent when people watch sports or engage in channel surfing and less prevalent with commercials, news, and entertainment. Furthermore, the extent of media multitasking is greater in the morning and afternoon than in the evening, and also greater when individuals watch television alone than in the presence of others. Daypart differences are larger for genres associated with incidental viewing (commercials and channel surfing) than for genres associated with intentional viewing (news, entertainment, and sports). Sports is the only genre that is associated with higher amounts of media multitasking when watching television with others.     

Media multitasking and memory: Differences in working memory and long-term memory

Increasing access to media in the 21st century has led to a rapid rise in the prevalence of media multitasking (simultaneous use of multiple media streams). Such behavior is associated with various cognitive differences, such as difficulty filtering distracting information and increased trait impulsivity. Given the rise in media multitasking by children, adolescents, and adults, a full understanding of the cognitive profile of media multitaskers is imperative. Here we investigated the relationship between chronic media multitasking and working memory (WM) and long-term memory (LTM) performance. Four key findings are reported (1) heavy media multitaskers (HMMs) exhibited lower WM performance, regardless of whether external distraction was present or absent; (2) lower performance on multiple WM tasks predicted lower LTM performance; (3) media multitasking-related differences in memory reflected differences in discriminability rather than decision bias; and (4) attentional impulsivity correlated with media multitasking behavior and reduced WM performance. These findings suggest that chronic media multitasking is associated with a wider attentional scope/higher attentional impulsivity, which may allow goal-irrelevant information to compete with goal-relevant information. As a consequence, heavy media multitaskers are able to hold fewer or less precise goal-relevant representations in WM. HMMs’ wider attentional scope, combined with their diminished WM performance, propagates forward to yield lower LTM performance. As such, chronic media multitasking is associated with a reduced ability to draw on the past—be it very recent or more remote—to inform present behavior.     

Media multitasking and failures of attention in everyday life

Using a series of online self-report measures, we examine media multitasking, a particularly pervasive form of multitasking, and its relations to three aspects of everyday attention: (1) failures of attention and cognitive errors (2) mind wandering, and (3) attentional control with an emphasis on attentional switching and distractibility. We observed a positive correlation between levels of media multitasking and self-reports of attentional failures, as well as with reports of both spontaneous and deliberate mind wandering. No correlation was observed between media multitasking and self-reported memory failures, lending credence to the hypothesis that media multitasking may be specifically related to problems of inattention, rather than cognitive errors in general. Furthermore, media multitasking was not related with self-reports of difficulties in attention switching or distractibility. We offer a plausible causal structural model assessing both direct and indirect effects among media multitasking, attentional failures, mind wandering, and cognitive errors, with the heuristic goal of constraining and motivating theories of the effects of media multitasking on inattention.     

Multidimensions of Media Multitasking and Adaptive Media Selection

This study identifies 11 basic cognitive dimensions of media multitasking behaviors based upon resource theories. These dimensions provide a conceptual framework to help compare and synthesize media multitasking studies. In addition, using 2 empirical data sets, we examine how these cognitive dimensions interact with each other to predict choices of media multitasking behaviors in daily life in an adaptive manner to conserve limited mental resources. A systematic understanding of the multiple cognitive dimensions of media multitasking behaviors has the potential to foster theory‐guided designs and more mindful selection of media tasks, technologies, and environments to curb negative consequences of media multitasking and utilize its benefits.     

Can't See the Forest for the Trees? The Effect of Media Multitasking on Cognitive Processing Style

Media multitasking represents an important aspect of the recent evolution in media consumption habits. While some experimental research exists, it has primarily focused on the detrimental effects of multitasking on task performance. We go a step further by examining the impact of media multitasking on information processing style. Study I demonstrates that media multitasking, compared to sequential media consumption, leads to a more local perceptual processing style. Furthermore, the frequency of media switching predicts the level of perceptual processing. Study II extends these findings by showing that media multitasking also affects conceptual processing style. Specifically, media multitasking leads to lower-level (or more concrete) construal of behaviors in a subsequent task. It further shows that conceptual rather than visual switching between media drives the observed differences in conceptual processing. These findings suggest that, as a growing phenomenon, media multitasking behavior may substantially alter the way media viewers process media content.     

Individual differences in media multitasking and performance on the <Emphasis Type="Italic">n</Emphasis>-back

A number of studies have recently examined the link between individual differences in media multitasking (using the MMI) and performance on working memory paradigms. However, these studies have yielded mixed results. Here we examine the relation between media multitasking and one particular working memory paradigm—the n-back (2- and 3-back)—improving upon previous research by (a) treating media multitasking as a continuous variable and adopting a correlational approach as well as (b) using a large sample of participants. First, we found that higher scores on the MMI were associated with a greater proportion of omitted trials on both the 2-back and 3-back, indicating that heavier media multitaskers were more disengaged during the n-back. In line with such a claim, heavier media multitaskers were also more likely to confess to responding randomly during various portions of the experiment, and to report media multitasking during the experiment itself. Importantly, when controlling for the relation between MMI scores and omissions, higher scores on the MMI were associated with an increase in false alarms, but not with a change in hits. These findings refine the extant literature on media multitasking and working memory performance (specifically, performance on the n-back), and suggest that media multitasking may be related to the propensity to disengage from ongoing tasks.     

Tuning in and tuning out: media multitasking among young consumers

• While commercial media are increasingly attended to in multitasking contexts, advertising research is dominated by sequential marketing communication models where the consumer is a passive receiver of one type of media at a time. This study examine's media multitasking behaviors and experiences among young consumers. Media multitasking is the practice of participating in multiple exposures to two or more commercial media forms at a single point in time, including traditional, online, social, and entertainment media. Prior research argues that multitasking results in diminished comprehension and performance. Through a qualitative approach with a sample of 64 young consumers involving interviews and collages, this study highlights the paradoxical experiences of media multitasking. The authors develop a conceptual model that explains the personal benefits and costs associated with media multitasking, and proposes its impact on consumers' motivation, ability and opportunity (the MAO model) to process commercial media content. Further, the study suggests an inverted‐U relationship between media multitasking and the MAO model and proposes four behavioral coping moderators to this relationship.

Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Audience Personality and the Selection of Media and Media Genres

The impact of personality characteristics (Extraversion, Neuroticism, Psychoticism) on audiences' use of movies, television, and radio, and on genre preferences within these media was explored. Extraversion was associated positively with in-home movie viewing and with listening to urban, jazz-classical, and pop-rock music. Neuroticism was associated positively with pop-rock music listening. Psychoticism was associated negatively with watching romance and comedy films, but this relation was moderated by an interaction in that the impact of Psychoticism was most powerful among those who were also high in Neuroticism. Follow-up analyses evaluating the impact of personality within groups defined by gender and race were also carried out. The results point to the potential of incorporating audiences' perceptions of the gratifications offered by particular media into further research. These perceptions, which are likely to vary across audience groups, may contribute to how personality factors are expressed in media behavior.     

Media multitasking and implicit learning

Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics - Media multitasking refers to the simultaneous use of different forms of media. Previous research comparing heavy media multitaskers and light media...     

Impersonal Sex Orientation and Multitasking Influence the Effect of Sexual Media Content on Involvement With a Sexual Character

The aim of the present study was to investigate whether responses to sexual media content depend on personal and situational factors. Specifically, we studied the role of the personal factor impersonal sex orientation (IS) and the situational factor multitasking in the effect of sexual media content on involvement with the character, a concept that has received increasing attention as an explanation of sexual media effects. College-aged women who were low or high in IS watched a neutral scene or a sex scene. Half of the participants in the neutral and sex condition had to multitask (a tone detection task) while viewing the scene. In the sex condition, participants high in IS were more involved with the character than participants low in IS. Multitasking resulted in opposite patterns of involvement with the character in the sex condition: Participants high in IS became less involved with the character, whereas participants low in IS became more involved with the character.     

Media use, face-to-face communication, media multitasking, and social well-being among 8- to 12-year-old girls

An online survey of 3,461 North American girls ages 8-12 conducted in the summer of 2010 through Discovery Girls magazine examined the relationships between social well-being and young girls' media use--including video, video games, music listening, reading/homework, e-mailing/posting on social media sites, texting/instant messaging, and talking on phones/video chatting--and face-to-face communication. This study introduced both a more granular measure of media multitasking and a new comparative measure of media use versus time spent in face-to-face communication. Regression analyses indicated that negative social well-being was positively associated with levels of uses of media that are centrally about interpersonal interaction (e.g., phone, online communication) as well as uses of media that are not (e.g., video, music, and reading). Video use was particularly strongly associated with negative social well-being indicators. Media multitasking was also associated with negative social indicators. Conversely, face-to-face communication was strongly associated with positive social well-being. Cell phone ownership and having a television or computer in one's room had little direct association with children's socioemotional well-being. We hypothesize possible causes for these relationships, call for research designs to address causality, and outline possible implications of such findings for the social well-being of younger adolescents.     

Multitasking and Persuasion: The Role of Structural Interference

Although the inhibiting effects of multitasking can be explained by 2 components, capacity interference (CI) and structural interference (SI), studies that have specifically focused on SI are limited. Thus, the present study examined the effects of SI in persuasion using 2 experimental studies. Results of Study 1 showed that SI (not CI) reduced both comprehension and counterarguing. In addition, results of Study 2 showed that SI effects occur not only in single-channel multitasking but also in dual-channel multitasking, and that SI effects occur not only when content interference is high (language-based multitasking) but also when it is low (non–language-based multitasking). The role of SI in multitasking effects has important implications for research on audience behaviors and persuasive communication.     

Involvement with Local Television News Cognitive and Emotional Dimensions

This study considered involvement as audience activity, as an indication that audience members are participating in mass media content. On the basis of previous communication research, involvement is viewed as audience activity with both cognitive and affective dimensions. Cognitive involvement reflects attention to, recognition of, and elaboration on media content. Emotional involvement reflects internal feelings. The purpose of this study was to check the validity of this view of involvement in the context of local television news by (a) testing the relationship between the strength of news viewing motivation and involvement intensity, (b) testing the relationship between the type of news viewing motivation and involvement orientation, and (c) testing the relationship between cognitive and emotional involvement. Adult local news viewers (N = 305) completed pertinent questionnaires. Pearson and canonical correlation partly supported the proposed view of media involvement. Utilitarian viewing motivation was associated with higher cognitive involvement and feelings of anger while watching local news. Diversionary motivation was associated with feeling happy while watching news. There were links between cognitive and emotional involvement with news. The discussion focuses on the importance of involvement and motivation in media effects research.     

Why Do Young People Multitask With Multiple Media? Explicating the Relationships Among Sensation Seeking,Needs, and Media Multitasking Behavior

This study investigates the reason that young people multitask with multiple media. This study extends uses and gratification (U&G) theory by adding arousal theory to explain the mediated relationships among sensation seeking, needs for media use, and media multitasking behavior, thus, synthesizing previous studies that have supported the direct effect models. This project is based on an online survey of 938 valid respondents from four universities in different areas of Taiwan. The data supported the proposed mediation model and results show that high convenience, high social, and low efficiency needs for media use perfectly mediate the effect of sensation seeking on media multitasking frequency.     

Gut or Game? The Influence of Moral Intuitions on Decisions in Video Games

Recent theorizing on the role of morality in media entertainment suggests morality serves as a guiding force in audience reactions to content. Using moral foundations theory as a base, research has found significant associations between moral salience and audience preferences for and responses to film and television varying in their presentations of morality. Our study extends this work by testing the same relationship in video games. Because a distinguishing factor between video games and traditional media is interactivity, our study focuses on how moral salience predicts decisions made in a video game. We find that increased moral salience led to a decreased probability of moral violations, while decreased moral salience led to an observed random (50%) distribution of violations. This finding was largely stable across different morality subcultures (German, United States) and age groups (adolescents and elderly), with deviations from this pattern explained by theory. We interpret this as evidence for a gut or game explanation of decision making in video games. When users encounter virtual scenarios that prime their moral sensitivities, they rely on their moral intuitions; otherwise, they make satisficing decisions not as an indication of moral corruption but merely as a continuation of the virtual experience.     

Working memory, fluid intelligence, and impulsiveness in heavy media multitaskers

Ophir, Nass, and Wagner (Proceedings of the National Association of Sciences 106:15583–15587, 2009) reported that individuals who routinely engage in multiple forms of media use are actually worse at multitasking, possibly due to difficulties in ignoring irrelevant stimuli, from both external sources and internal representations in memory. Using the media multitasking index (MMI) developed by Ophir et al., we identified heavy media multitaskers (HMMs) and light media multitaskers (LMMs) and tested them on measures of attention, working memory, task switching, and fluid intelligence, as well as self-reported impulsivity and self-control. We found that people who reported engaging in heavy amounts of media multitasking reported being more impulsive and performed more poorly on measures of fluid intelligence than did those who did not frequently engage in media multitasking. However, we could find no evidence to support the contention that HMMs are worse in a multitasking situation such as task switching or that they show any deficits in dealing with irrelevant or distracting information, as compared with LMMs.