Multitasking during social interactions in adolescence and early adulthood

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Psychology
• Developmental Neuroscience
• Social Cognition

Background:

• Multitasking is common in daily life, involving simultaneous social and non-social information processing.
• Understanding how cognitive load affects social navigation, particularly in adolescents, is crucial.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the impact of non-social cognitive load on social interaction navigation in adolescents and adults.
• To compare multitasking abilities between adolescents and adults under varying cognitive loads.

Main Methods:

• Participants (ages 11-17 and 22-30) performed a social referential communication task alongside a non-social memory task.
• Cognitive load was manipulated by requiring memory of one (low load) or three (high load) two-digit numbers.
• Performance was assessed on social task accuracy and efficiency, considering perspective-taking demands.

Main Results:

• Performance deficits occurred under high cognitive load and when the social task required perspective-taking.
• Individual differences in working memory and trait perspective-taking predicted performance.
• Adolescents exhibited greater multitasking deficits than adults under high cognitive load.

Conclusions:

• Multitasking during social interactions leads to performance decrements.
• Adolescents are more susceptible than adults to cognitive load effects during social multitasking.
• Working memory and perspective-taking abilities are key factors in successful social multitasking.