“We spend so much of our daily lives engaged in things that are completely unrelated to what’s in front of us”
– Aaron Kucyi
Why do we zone out? I hoped the answers would be simple and uniform; unfortunately, that’s not how neuroscience and psychology typically work. Today, I want to tell you about why you zone out, what the implications of zoning out are, and how we can reduce unhealthy levels of mind wandering. We can all relate to mentally “checking out” when we are doing an activity that we would rather not be doing. Last Thursday in my three-hour Digital Revolution class, I could not bring myself to pay any attention – my mind was already on spring break. I still had to figure out my ride to the airport and knew that the upcoming journey to Oregon was about to be extremely mentally exhausting. Professor Cutting could have been teaching me how to end world hunger or make a million dollars and I still would not have the mental bandwidth to retain any of it. Although I am normally engaged in this class, I could not stop zoning out. After class, I realized that I had not picked out an interesting topic to talk about in my upcoming blog post because I was zoning out for most of the class.
In an effort to avoid researching and discussing the ins and outs of UTF-8, ASCII, or the Teletype, I would much rather learn more about the human mind. The natural starting point for this research was asking why do humans zone out? It’s clearly detrimental to our productivity and daily lives, so why is it in our DNA? According to the theory of evolution, humans retain and pass on traits that help them survive long enough to reproduce and help raise our youth. Using this framework, zoning out must do something that increases our survival rate or helps us reproduce at higher rates. Is this our brain telling us that we need to prioritize reflection or planning? Are we mentally preparing or planning for a future event? Are we just bored? Does everyone zone out? How can we be more attentive and engaged? Is it realistic to avoid zoning out in general? My list of questions continued to grow…I needed some answers
When I began researching this topic, it became clear that plenty of other people had similar questions, and scientists had some answers. Believe it or not, the first source I found, Medical News Today, had many of the answers I was looking for. The first question I wanted to answer was, what is zoning out and why do we do it? The Medical News Today article provided a pretty good answer, saying, “the brain occasionally seeks a break from external stimuli, leading to moments of zoning out. It can mean the mind switches to autopilot, with no focus on thoughts, feelings, or bodily sensations.” Ok, that makes some sense – our brains can recognize when they are overwhelmed so they seek immediate relief by ignoring the things that are bothering us. The article adds that “it can serve as a mental break, allowing the mind to recharge and process information unconsciously.”
I was curious if there are downsides to zoning out; a mental break and opportunity to do some introspection sound pretty nice, right? One of the issues with zoning out is that it would be more advantageous in the long term to come up with solutions to our issues. If I am stressed about the amount of homework I have, mental planning will only do me so much good; at some point, I just have to do it. I can think about writing this blog post until Thursday morning, but the stress of it hanging over my head will only be relieved once the blog is posted. This is where “procrastination” becomes a massive hindrance for people who habitually zone out. It has been found that “a habit of zoning out to run away from reality can prevent a person from coming up with real solutions and can have adverse effects on life.”
The Medical News Today article made it clear that “zoning out is a natural and universal experience that occurs in various situations and across different age groups.” It’s important to recognize that zoning out is a normal response, but it raised the question, why do some people zone out more than others? The next article I read discussed habitual zoning out. According to Harley Therapy, excessive zoning out can be classified as a defense mechanism called dissociation. Their definition of dissociation is, “when instead of staying present in the face of stress you exit your thoughts, feelings, and bodily sensations and zone out.” Defense mechanisms, like dissociation, are developed in adolescent years when the child “is too young and vulnerable to run off. And they obviously can’t fight against an adult.” I found that tidbit especially interesting, and it sounded like the internal, subconscious, version of a fight or flight response. When we are faced with a risky situation, we are forced to choose between fighting against the issue or leaving the situation. Well, we can’t physically leave our own brain, so zoning out serves as an internal equivalent to the flight response. In other words, people who experience stressful environments as children develop dissociation as a coping mechanism. Dissociation affords them the chance to shift their focus away from their immediate physical environment and external stimuli, therefore avoiding the accompanying discomfort. It was interesting to hear that unresolved and untreated dissociation coupled with additional trauma as an adult can lead to more complicated and serious personality disorders.
I became curious what occurs in the brain when people zone out, which led me to an an article from MIT, which referenced a study posted in nature.com. This group of researchers used an MRI scanner to map brain activity when respondents self-report their mind wandering. The MIT article primarily discusses the results of the study with the research team and decodes the data in a more digestible way. This study made some extremely interesting discoveries, like “Many more parts of the brain seem to be engaged in mind-wandering than previously thought, supporting the idea that it’s actually a quite dynamic and fundamental function of our psychology.” This suggests that zoning out is not just a phenomenon, it’s a core feature of the human experience. It also isn’t as simple as you may think; it actually involves many parts of the brain. Since our thoughts are scattered, many parts of our brain are activated. The process of zoning out involves “drawing from our memory, making predictions about the future, dynamically switching between topics that we’re thinking about, fluctuations in our mood, and engaging in vivid visual imagery while ignoring immediate visual input.” Although you may not be outwardly alert, many parts of your brain are extremely alert since each of these functions draws from very different parts of the brain.
As I mentioned above, using an MRI machine allowed them to find that “SITUT (stimulus-independent, task-unrelated thought) is represented within a common pattern of brain network interactions across multiple time scales and contexts.” In other words, there are a common set of signals that occur in the brain when we let our minds wander. This discovery makes it easier to measure and track data on zoning out in future studies. In the discussion, the researchers noted that “Growing evidence suggests that changes in SITUT characterize a wide range of diseases and could be an early marker of Alzheimer’s disease”. This bit was really interesting to think about. Are SITUT behaviors just a signal from our brain that something is wrong? Our bodies obviously can’t self-diagnose diseases like Alzheimer’s, but it would make sense for them to provide some signal that there is something wrong.
In general, zoning out can be a healthy chance to recalibrate ourselves, but in excess, zoning out can have some serious consequences and negative health-related outcomes. We may think of zoning out as a simple and easy phenomenon, but my research today allowed me to realize just how complex it is. Moreover, it forced me to appreciate just how special the human mind is. The brain performs more functions than we could ever imagine, many of which we don’t think about on a daily basis. We rarely think about thinking, but every once in a while its important to appreciate the miracle that rests atop our shoulders.
Although I discuss mental health issues in today’s blog post, I am in no way an expert on the subject and this article should not be used to self-diagnose. If you think that you may suffer from disassociation, I encourage you to seek an expert opinion and create a treatment plan with medical professionals. As stated in many of the articles I have used in my research, therapy is an effective tool to digest trauma and manage mental health issues. Stay safe and healthy, you are loved and valuable.
Darcy, A. M., & Jacobson, S. (2023, May 16). Known to ‘Zone Out’? The dangers of dissociation. Harley TherapyTM Blog. https://www.harleytherapy.co.uk/counselling/dissociation.htm
Kucyi, A., Esterman, M., Capella, J., Green, A., Uchida, M., Biederman, J., Gabrieli, J. D. E., Valera, E. M., & Whitfield‐Gabrieli, S. (2021). Prediction of stimulus-independent and task-unrelated thought from functional brain networks.
Nature Communications, 12(1). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-22027-0
Mph, Z. S. (2023, August 15). Zoning out: Causes and when to seek help. https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/zoning-out
Pryor, J. (2023, May 24). What’s happening in your brain when you’re spacing out? – MIT McGovern Institute. MIT McGovern Institute. https://mcgovern.mit.edu/2021/03/25/whats-happening-in-your-brain-when-youre-spacing-out/
Edited using ChatGPT3.5