Do concerns about COVID-19 impair sustained attention?

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Psychology
• Neuroscience
• Public Health

Background:

• The COVID-19 pandemic heightened health and financial worries globally.
• Poverty-related concerns are known to impair cognitive control.
• Potential impact of COVID-19 concerns on sustained attention and task performance was unknown.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the correlation between COVID-19 concerns and sustained attention in young adults.
• To determine if pandemic-related worries degrade performance on cognitive tasks.

Main Methods:

• Two pre-registered experiments involving young adults.
• Participants completed surveys on COVID-19 concerns.
• Performance assessed using a continuous performance task (CPT) measuring sustained attention.

Main Results:

• No significant correlation found between COVID-19 concerns and CPT performance in either experiment.
• Experiment 2 showed that task-unrelated thoughts negatively impacted CPT performance.
• Individual differences in attention were observed, but not linked to pandemic worries.

Conclusions:

• Young adults can maintain sustained attention despite COVID-19 concerns.
• Concerns about the pandemic may be held latently, with minimal impact on demanding cognitive tasks.
• Task-unrelated thoughts, rather than pandemic worries, were associated with poorer attention performance.