Transient Frontal Fracturing: A Theoretical Account of Hyperfocus

Many people have experienced being so engrossed in an activity that they lost awareness of their surroundings, had difficulty stopping the activity, and found their perception of time condensed. This experience is known colloquially as hyperfocus. There is a small but quickly growing body of peer-reviewed research on hyperfocus. Most of this research is dependent upon self-report measures with little consideration given to the neurocognitive mechanisms responsible for hyperfocus. To advance hyperfocus research, this nascent field must move beyond self-report to uncover the neurocognitive mechanisms underlying this not-uncommon experience. On the basis of the reported phenomenology of hyperfocus, we propose that this experience frequently stems from a fracturing of prefrontal control hierarchies, which reduces the ability of higher-order contextual information to govern the contents of thought and action. More precisely, we propose that diminished functioning of fronto-striatal-thalamic loops, brought about by changes in the ascending arousal system, leads to a decoupling of intermediate-level contextual information (e.g., the activity one is hyperfocusing on) from the regulation of higher-order contexts.