Mind Wandering

Summary

Previous research (Sayette, Reichle, and Schooler, 2009) has shown that after consuming alcohol a person's mind wanders drastically more then it usually would and also that the person is unaware of their wandering mind. Another study shows that alcohol effects people's emotions and can reduce stress levels (Conger, 1956). This theory focusses on the fact that an intoxicated person would have less stress when giving a speech or anything of that nature because they would be distracted more easily and not be as focused on the actually speech compared to how a sober person would be. Mind wandering is something we as humans do every day without even noticing it. A prime example would be when reading a book or newspaper. We are fully aware of what is distracting us while reading but not aware of the fact that we are mind wandering. Eventually we realize we are mind wandering and that the whole time we were reading without understanding (Schooler, 2002). In this specific article the authors have many ideas and many hypotheses. I feel the main hypothesis is that alcohol has many bad side effects and one of the bigger ones being that it can alter your thinking process and also your concentration. Alcohol is a central nervous system depressant and it is the central nervous system which is the bodily system that is most severely affected by alcohol. Another part of the hypothesis is that while alcohol has some pros such as feeling good, feeling less stress, and overall taste, it also has a larger number of cons. Things such as reducing bone mass, being more prone to breast cancer, and also it disrupts an individual's ability to realize his or her mind has wandered. These findings suggest that distinct processes are responsible for causing a thought to occur, as opposed to allowing its presence to be noticed. So when a person has drank the individual is not able to realize their mind is actually wandering because they are intoxicated where as a normal sober person would have been able to recognize their brain wandering and make any adjustments they might have needed to make depending on the situation they are in.

Applications

I believe the author's goal was to better educate people not only on the effects of drinking alcohol but the deeper, internal details about what happens to the human body when alcohol is consumed. Everyone knows what happens when you drink. You get drunk. But not many people actually know that alcohol slows down and almost disables your central nervous system which leaves you more vulnerable to accidents and not being able to control what is going on around you. I feel this article gives readers a better understanding and more of a realization of what happens when they consume alcohol.