5D Library › Attention Networks, the Working-Memory Bottleneck and Self-Determination Theory · 中文
Chapter 8 Practice and a Pre-registered Trial
Note
The checklist in this chapter is a prompt for self-observation, not an assessment tool. It cannot be used to judge whether anyone has an attention deficit, anxiety or any other problem, and it does not replace professional assessment. If difficulties with attention or motivation persistently affect daily life, please seek professional help. This chapter deals with no medication.
Part 1 A four-step attention-and-motivation checklist
The checklist is for an individual or a team to keep for a week and then review. The aim is not to judge who lacks self-discipline but to see how surroundings and arrangements shape attention and motivation.
- Uninterrupted blocks and physical separation from notifications. How long a focus block was planned each day? What was the longest stretch actually free of interruption? Where was the phone (desk, bag, another room)? How many notifications were seen in a day? (Chapters 1 and 3)
- Offloading working memory. How many unfinished matters were written down externally (paper, list, board), and how many were carried in the head? Take particular note when more than about 4 are carried in the head. (Chapter 2)
- The ratio of challenge to skill. Use accuracy on practice items or checkpoints as a rough gauge: persistently above 95 % may be too easy, below 70 % too hard; record at the same time whether the feeling was boredom, anxiety or absorption. (Chapter 6)
- An audit of controlling rewards and punishments. What external incentives are in play? Are they expected and contingent on completion or performance, or are they informational feedback? Are there arrangements based mainly on threat or punishment? (Chapters 4 and 5)
Calculation
The checklist applied to five days of work logs kept by one fictional person.
# The four-step checklist on a FICTIONAL five-day work log: planned block, longest uninterrupted
# stretch (min), phone location, notifications, open loops written down / carried in the head,
# practice accuracy (%), feeling, incentives in play.
LOG = [
("Mon", 90, 18, "desk", 14, 1, 6, 97, "bored", "daily target with penalty"),
("Tue", 90, 25, "desk", 11, 2, 5, 62, "anxious", "daily target with penalty"),
("Wed", 90, 55, "bag", 4, 5, 2, 86, "absorbed", "none"),
("Thu", 90, 70, "other", 1, 6, 1, 83, "absorbed", "none"),
("Fri", 90, 30, "desk", 9, 3, 4, 95, "bored", "bonus per item finished"),
]
print("Step 1 uninterrupted blocks and the phone's place")
for loc in ("desk", "bag", "other"):
rows = [r for r in LOG if r[3] == loc]
if rows:
print(f" phone {loc:5s}: longest stretch {sum(r[2] for r in rows) / len(rows):4.0f} min"
f" of {rows[0][1]}, notifications {sum(r[4] for r in rows) / len(rows):4.1f} a day"
f" ({len(rows)} day{'s' if len(rows) > 1 else ''})")
print(" one week, one person, many differences between days: a prompt, not evidence")
print("Step 2 offloading working memory")
print(" written down / carried in the head: " + ", ".join(f"{r[0]} {r[5]}/{r[6]}" for r in LOG))
print(" more than about 4 carried in the head on: "
+ ", ".join(r[0] for r in LOG if r[6] > 4))
print("Step 3 challenge / skill (practice accuracy as a rough gauge)")
for r in LOG:
hint = ("too easy: raise difficulty" if r[7] > 92 else "too hard: break into steps"
if r[7] < 70 else "in range")
print(f" {r[0]}: {r[7]} % correct, felt {r[8]:8s} -> {hint}")
print("Step 4 incentive audit")
for inc in sorted({r[9] for r in LOG}):
days = [r[0] for r in LOG if r[9] == inc]
kind = ("controlling (threat of penalty)" if "penalty" in inc else
"expected, completion-contingent" if "bonus" in inc else "no external incentive")
print(f" {inc:26s}: {', '.join(days):13s} {kind}")
# Step 1 uninterrupted blocks and the phone's place
# phone desk : longest stretch 24 min of 90, notifications 11.3 a day (3 days)
# phone bag : longest stretch 55 min of 90, notifications 4.0 a day (1 day)
# phone other: longest stretch 70 min of 90, notifications 1.0 a day (1 day)
# one week, one person, many differences between days: a prompt, not evidence
# Step 2 offloading working memory
# written down / carried in the head: Mon 1/6, Tue 2/5, Wed 5/2, Thu 6/1, Fri 3/4
# more than about 4 carried in the head on: Mon, Tue
# Step 3 challenge / skill (practice accuracy as a rough gauge)
# Mon: 97 % correct, felt bored -> too easy: raise difficulty
# Tue: 62 % correct, felt anxious -> too hard: break into steps
# Wed: 86 % correct, felt absorbed -> in range
# Thu: 83 % correct, felt absorbed -> in range
# Fri: 95 % correct, felt bored -> too easy: raise difficulty
# Step 4 incentive audit
# bonus per item finished : Fri expected, completion-contingent
# daily target with penalty : Mon, Tue controlling (threat of penalty)
# none : Wed, Thu no external incentiveThe fictional log shows that on the three days with the phone on the desk the longest focused stretch averaged only 24 minutes, against 55 and 70 minutes on the two days with the phone in a bag or another room. The two days above 95 % accuracy felt boring, the day at 62 % anxious, and the two days at 83 to 86 % absorbing; the absorbing days happened to have no external incentive. But one week of data from one person can prompt reflection; it cannot serve as evidence: the day without the phone may simply have been a day with few meetings and well-suited tasks. Whether the phone’s presence actually matters needs a trial like the one below.
Part 2 A pre-registered randomised crossover trial
Question
Ward, Duke, Gneezy and Bos reported in 2017 that the mere presence of one’s own smartphone, even silenced and face down, reduces “available cognitive capacity”: people whose phones were in another room performed clearly better on tests including working-memory capacity (operation span) than people whose phones were on the desk (Ward et al. 2017). The conclusion is widely cited, but later evidence is inconsistent.
Evidence
Direct replication. Ruiz Pardo and Minda carried out a direct replication of Ward and colleagues’ study; the phone’s location had no effect on either the operation span task or a go/no-go inhibition task (Ruiz Pardo and Minda 2022). Another test. Hartmann, Martarelli, Reber and Rothen had 302 participants set their phones to flight mode, with half placing them on the desk and half on the far side of the room; they found no overall effect of the phone’s presence on short-term or prospective memory tasks (Hartmann et al. 2020). Meta-analyses. Parry pooled 56 studies with 7,093 participants in six meta-analyses; only one pooled effect was significant: the phone’s presence had a negative effect on working-memory capacity, but smaller than theorised; the pooled effects for the other domains, including sustained attention, response inhibition, cognitive flexibility and fluid intelligence, were null, and he noted substantial methodological heterogeneity and generally low statistical power in the field (Parry 2024). Böttger, Poschik and Zierer pooled 43 effects from 22 studies (covering both smartphone use and mere presence) and found a significant negative effect overall, but differing between cognitive domains (Böttger et al. 2023).
The question for this trial is: in a pre-registered, adequately powered randomised crossover trial, does locking one’s own phone in another room, compared with leaving it silenced and face down on the desk, improve scores on the operation span test?
Design
| Element | Specification |
|---|---|
| Design | Two-period, two-sequence randomised crossover trial (AB / BA); each participant is tested on two days at least 7 days apart, at the same time of day |
| Participants | Adults aged 18 or over who use their own smartphone daily; recruited through university and community advertisements, not from the author’s community, students or customers |
| Exclusions | People who must be reachable at all times during the study (on-call health workers, sole carers of another person, for example); people unable to complete computerised tests; people who have taken part in similar studies |
| Condition A | Own phone silenced and face down on the desk, in view |
| Condition B | Own phone locked by a researcher, in the participant’s presence, in a locker in another room; the laboratory provides an emergency contact number |
| Randomisation | Computer-generated blocked sequence, 1:1 to AB or BA, revealed only on the day of the first session |
| Blinding | Participants cannot be blinded to condition; tests are presented and scored automatically by software; analysts see only coded conditions until unblinding |
| Primary outcome | Automated operation span (OSPAN) absolute score (Unsworth et al. 2005); the two sessions use parallel forms, with form order balanced within sequence |
| Secondary outcomes | Commission errors and reaction-time variability on the Sustained Attention to Response Task (SART) (Robertson et al. 1997); self-rated frequency of “thinking about my phone” after testing; a smartphone-dependence scale (exploratory moderator) |
| Analysis | Linear mixed model with condition, period and sequence as fixed effects and participant as random effect; two-sided ; carry-over is reported but never used to change the analysis (Senn 2002) |
Why the primary outcome is OSPAN. The author’s framework listed two outcomes, OSPAN and SART; under this book’s rules there is one primary outcome. OSPAN is chosen because Ward and colleagues’ conclusion rests mainly on working-memory capacity, and the one significant pooled effect in Parry’s meta-analysis was also on working-memory capacity, while that for sustained attention was null. SART is reported as a secondary outcome and plays no part in the decision.
Practice and carry-over in a crossover design
A crossover design lets each person serve as their own control and needs far fewer participants than a parallel-group design, but it must deal with practice (the second test improves through familiarity) and carry-over (the first period’s condition affects the second).
Calculation
# Balancing a crossover: simulated OSPAN in SD units, period correlation 0.7, practice +0.35 SD
# at the second session, true effect +0.20 SD, optional carry-over +0.10 SD to a desk session
# after a phone-free one. Estimate = mean within-person (B - A). Values illustrative.
import random, math
random.seed(5)
RHO, PRACTICE, EFFECT, N, REPS = 0.7, 0.35, 0.20, 160, 400
NOISE = math.sqrt((1 - RHO) / RHO) # person SD 1 -> period correlation rho
def estimate(order, carry=0.0):
diffs = []
for i in range(N):
person = random.gauss(0, 1)
seq = order(i) # "AB" or "BA"
score = {}
for period, cond in enumerate(seq):
y = person + random.gauss(0, NOISE) + PRACTICE * period
y += EFFECT if cond == "B" else 0.0
if period == 1 and seq == "BA":
y += carry # desk session after a phone-free session
score[cond] = y
diffs.append(score["B"] - score["A"])
return sum(diffs) / N
def mean_est(order, carry=0.0):
return sum(estimate(order, carry) for _ in range(REPS)) / REPS
print(f"true effect {EFFECT:+.2f} SD; practice effect {PRACTICE:+.2f} SD at the second session")
print(f" everyone AB (desk first) : estimate {mean_est(lambda i: 'AB'):+.2f}")
print(f" everyone BA (other room first) : estimate {mean_est(lambda i: 'BA'):+.2f}")
bal = lambda i: "AB" if i % 2 else "BA"
print(f" balanced AB/BA : estimate {mean_est(bal):+.2f}")
print(f" balanced, with carry-over +0.10 : estimate "
f"{mean_est(bal, carry=0.10):+.2f}")
print("balancing cancels the practice effect; carry-over still biases the estimate, so it must be")
print("prevented by design (wash-out of at least 7 days, parallel task forms)")
# true effect +0.20 SD; practice effect +0.35 SD at the second session
# everyone AB (desk first) : estimate +0.56
# everyone BA (other room first) : estimate -0.15
# balanced AB/BA : estimate +0.20
# balanced, with carry-over +0.10 : estimate +0.14
# balancing cancels the practice effect; carry-over still biases the estimate, so it must be
# prevented by design (wash-out of at least 7 days, parallel task forms)The simulation shows that if everyone is tested in the same order, practice is confounded with the condition effect and the estimate can be pushed anywhere from +0.56 to −0.15; with balanced AB / BA allocation, practice cancels between the sequences and the estimate returns to the true +0.20. But balancing cannot remove carry-over: if “last time without the phone” makes the next session with the phone slightly better (+0.10), the estimate is pulled down to +0.14. This protocol therefore prevents carry-over by design: at least 7 days between sessions, and parallel forms.
Sample size
Calculation
# Sample size for the AB/BA crossover: A = own phone face down and silenced on the desk,
# B = phone locked in another room. Primary outcome OSPAN absolute score; effect in units of the
# between-person SD; SD of the within-person difference = SD * sqrt(2 (1 - rho)).
# Two-sided alpha 0.05, power 0.90, paired t approximation.
import math
from statistics import NormalDist
N = NormalDist()
def t_quantile(p, df):
# Cornish-Fisher style approximation to the t quantile (good enough for df > 20)
z = N.inv_cdf(p)
return z + (z ** 3 + z) / (4 * df) + (5 * z ** 5 + 16 * z ** 3 + 3 * z) / (96 * df ** 2)
def n_pairs(d, rho, alpha=0.05, power=0.90):
dz = d / math.sqrt(2 * (1 - rho))
n = 10
for _ in range(50):
n_new = math.ceil(((t_quantile(1 - alpha / 2, n - 1) + t_quantile(power, n - 1)) / dz) ** 2)
if n_new == n: break
n = n_new
return n
print("participants completing both periods, 90 % power")
print(" effect (SD) | rho = 0.6 | rho = 0.7 | rho = 0.8")
for d in (0.15, 0.20, 0.25, 0.30):
print(f" {d:.2f} | {n_pairs(d, 0.6):9d} | {n_pairs(d, 0.7):9d} | {n_pairs(d, 0.8):9d}")
n = n_pairs(0.20, 0.7)
n_even = n + n % 2
recruit = math.ceil(n_even / 0.85); recruit += recruit % 2
print(f"chosen: 0.20 SD, rho = 0.7 -> {n} completers (rounded to {n_even} for equal sequences);")
print(f"allowing 15 % who miss the second session: randomise {recruit}"
f" ({recruit // 2} per sequence)")
# participants completing both periods, 90 % power
# effect (SD) | rho = 0.6 | rho = 0.7 | rho = 0.8
# 0.15 | 376 | 283 | 189
# 0.20 | 213 | 160 | 108
# 0.25 | 137 | 103 | 70
# 0.30 | 96 | 73 | 49
# chosen: 0.20 SD, rho = 0.7 -> 160 completers (rounded to 160 for equal sequences);
# allowing 15 % who miss the second session: randomise 190 (95 per sequence)The smallest effect of interest is set at 0.20 standard deviations (the between-person SD of period-1 OSPAN scores), a deliberately conservative value reflecting the smaller estimates of later meta-analyses; the within-person correlation between periods is set at 0.7, and power at 90 %. Completing both periods requires 160 participants; allowing about 15 % who miss the second session, 190 are randomised, 95 per sequence. The table also shows the numbers for correlations of 0.6 and 0.8: the lower the correlation, the more participants are needed.
Decision rule
Calculation
# Decision rule, fixed in advance. d = B (phone in another room) minus A (phone on desk) in OSPAN
# absolute score, in between-person SD units; positive = better without the phone. 95 % CI from
# the mixed model (condition, period, sequence; participant random). SESOI 0.20 SD. Carry-over
# is reported but never used to switch analyses.
SESOI = 0.20
def verdict(d, lo, hi, adherence_ok, harms):
if harms:
return f"d = {d:+.2f}: PAUSE and report - {harms} serious adverse event(s) judged related"
if not adherence_ok:
return (f"d = {d:+.2f}: NOT INTERPRETABLE - phone placement verified in fewer than"
f" 90 % of sessions")
if lo >= SESOI: v = "phone absence improves OSPAN by at least the SESOI"
elif lo > 0: v = "phone absence improves OSPAN; size not shown to reach 0.20 SD"
elif hi < 0: v = "phone absence LOWERS OSPAN"
elif lo >= -SESOI and hi <= SESOI: v = "no difference worth acting on (equivalence)"
else: v = "unclear: the interval is too wide to decide"
return f"d = {d:+.2f} ({lo:+.2f} to {hi:+.2f}): {v}"
for case in ((0.34, 0.21, 0.47, True, 0), (0.15, 0.02, 0.28, True, 0),
(0.03, -0.10, 0.16, True, 0), (-0.05, -0.27, 0.17, True, 0),
(0.30, 0.17, 0.43, False, 0), (0.25, 0.12, 0.38, True, 1)):
print(verdict(*case))
print("SART commission errors, RT variability and self-rated phone urges are secondary:")
print("reported with intervals, never decisive")
# d = +0.34 (+0.21 to +0.47): phone absence improves OSPAN by at least the SESOI
# d = +0.15 (+0.02 to +0.28): phone absence improves OSPAN; size not shown to reach 0.20 SD
# d = +0.03 (-0.10 to +0.16): no difference worth acting on (equivalence)
# d = -0.05 (-0.27 to +0.17): unclear: the interval is too wide to decide
# d = +0.30: NOT INTERPRETABLE - phone placement verified in fewer than 90 % of sessions
# d = +0.25: PAUSE and report - 1 serious adverse event(s) judged related
# SART commission errors, RT variability and self-rated phone urges are secondary:
# reported with intervals, never decisiveThe example results are made up. If fewer than 90 % of sessions have the phone’s placement verified as specified, the report states “not interpretable” whatever the result; if a serious adverse event judged related to the study occurs, the trial is paused and the event reported. Only if the lower limit of the confidence interval is at least 0.20 SD will the report state that “absence of the phone improved OSPAN by at least the smallest effect of interest”; if the interval lies entirely between −0.20 and +0.20, the report states “no difference worth acting on”. The results will be published whether positive or negative.
What this trial cannot show
First, participants know whether their phone is with them and may guess the hypothesis, so expectations could affect performance; automatic scoring only partly mitigates this. Second, the trial compares two specific placements; it says nothing about the effects of notifications, checking or using the phone, and cannot be generalised to other situations such as “phone in a bag”. Third, the outcome is a short laboratory test and says nothing about everyday work efficiency or academic results. Fourth, a negative result shows only that, in this set-up, an effect smaller than 0.20 SD is likely, not that phones have “no effect at all” on attention. Fifth, those recruited will mostly be people willing to part with their phones for a while; the most phone-dependent may be less likely to take part.
Ethics and conflicts of interest
The trial must be approved by an independent ethics committee, participants must give informed consent, and the protocol and analysis plan must be registered before the first participant is enrolled (Nosek et al. 2018). The consent form explains that the phone may be placed in another room; participants may ask for their phone back or withdraw at any time without giving a reason (sessions in which the phone is retrieved are recorded as protocol deviations). After the study participants receive a full explanation of its purpose. Data are stored anonymously, and nothing on the phone is accessed or collected.
Disclosure
The author uses the works of 5D Library, including this book, as the methodological basis of his community courses, the 5D Ascension Cards (Dimensional Shift Card Decks) and the Yafu AI knowledge base, and therefore has a commercial interest in the subject of this book. The book promotes no course, card deck or service; the Chapter 8 trial is designed to be run and analysed by researchers independent of the author’s business and does not recruit from the author’s community, students or customers; all the code and the study protocol are published openly for anyone to check. To limit the influence of this interest, the test software and analysis code will be published before enrolment, and results, data and code will be published whatever the outcome.
Chapter summary
The four-step checklist turns the earlier chapters’ findings into a week of self-observation: time blocks and the phone’s location, external offloading, the ratio of challenge to skill, and controlling rewards and punishments. The fictional example shows that a week’s data can prompt reflection but cannot serve as evidence. To test the widely cited but inconsistently replicated claim that a phone’s mere presence drains cognitive capacity, the chapter gives a pre-registered randomised crossover trial: phone silenced and face down on the desk versus locked in another room, a single primary outcome of OSPAN absolute score, sessions at least 7 days apart with parallel forms, 160 completers and 190 randomised, a decision rule written as code in advance, and publication whatever the result.
References
Fan, Y. (2026). Attention Networks, the Working-Memory Bottleneck and Self-Determination Theory: From Posner's Tripartite Network and Motivation Crowding-Out to the Information Theory of Flow, Read Beside Neo-Confucian Reverence (Jìng) [注意力网络、工作记忆瓶颈与内在动机的自决定理论] (Version 1.0.0). 5D Library. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23761341 · Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0).