Variation in cognitive investment: making time fly… or drag!

Abstract

Social media is increasingly prevalent in the daily lives of young people as a source of entertainment and social interaction. However, the time spent on such stimuli reduces availability for other activities that used to be more prevalent, such as reading, development of motor skills, and face-to-face social interaction. Little is known about the effects of this habit changes on the cognitive development of young individuals. One possible way to assess cognitive investment in a particular task is through the perception of time passage. In the present study, we investigated the cognitive investment in different activities and its relationship with the perception of time passage in young individuals aged 14 to 15 years old. Four groups of volunteers were formed. Each group performed a different activity for 23 minutes. Group 1 spent the 23 minutes browsing a social network (TikTok); Group 2 read classics of Brazilian literature; Group 3 played the board game “Pictionary”; and Group 4 was instructed to practice a complex pen spinning around the fingers. The duration of the activity was not disclosed, and at the end of the 23 minutes, volunteers were individually asked how much time they thought had passed during the activity. The group that engaged in TikTok had an average perception of 20 minutes, a value almost identical to the pen spinning, which was 19 minutes, with no statistically significant difference between them (p > 0.05). On the other hand, activities requiring greater cognitive effort and social interaction, such as reading and the board game, had average time perceptions of 25 and 28 minutes, respectively. The latter two even reached time perception values of 40 and 44 minutes, which were the highest in the entire experiment. According to analysis of variance, groups with the lowest mean time perception (TikTok and pen spinning) were significantly different from the board game group (p < 0.05). Based on our results, we can conclude that the nature of the activity undertaken affects time perception on the brain. This may be related to the amount of new information presented and absorbed during novelty and learning activities. Engaging in new and cognitive demanding experiences give the impression that time lasted longer. Conversely, repetitive activities without new stimuli give the sensation that the same time interval seems shorter. Further studies investigating the consequences of overexposure to repetitive and unstimulating activities are necessary to understand their potential effects on the brain development of adolescents.