Abstract
Smartphones and social media have become an increasingly common form of distraction in recent years. However, there is limited research investigating the impacts of social media-specific distractors. The content of social media notifications, whether negative or positive, may differentially impact attention. A Continual Temporal Expectancy Task (CTET) was used to examine sustained attention in 16 undergraduate students in three separate conditions: positive, negative, and neutral. Relationships between executive function and affective measures were also examined. Results indicated no significant differences in task accuracy among conditions, but there was a significant interaction between time and condition in terms of time on task effects. In addition, higher scores on the reflection subscale of the Rumination-Reflection Questionnaire (RRQ) were correlated with better task performance, notably in the negative condition. Implications include that individuals who partake in more positive self-reflection or introspection may be better able to filter out unpleasant stimuli. Future research should examine the relationship between social media and attention in a more robust sample and possibly look into sex differences in distractibility.