A New Methodology for the Study of Mind-Wandering Process

Mind-wandering is a quite common psychological experience that raises a number of issues, when occurring for instance at school. Is it a productive or disruptive phenomenon? The current research focuses on pre-post methods that lose the essential of the process. The article proposes a new methodological approach to observe mind-wandering in its development. Italian students of different school grades have been observed and interviewed using a new protocol in order to approach the phenomenon, according to an ecological valid context approach, giving importance to the array of situations and interviewed students (individually or in group) on their mind-wandering experience. The analysis shows that mind-wandering con be understood as psychic process rather than an attention deficit or a compensation for boredom. It is a complex mental experience in which several aspects of body-mind and social interaction converge into elaborated meaning-making processes.