Understanding the Impact of Cyberloafing on the Multiple Dimensions of Individual Attention: An EEG-Based Lab Experiment

Hemin Jiang () and Wenpei Zhang ()
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Hemin Jiang: University of Science and Technology of China, International Institute of Finance, School of Management
Wenpei Zhang: Anhui University of Technology, School of Business

A chapter in Information Systems and Neuroscience, 2025, pp 205-213 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract Many employees justify their cyberloafing behavior as a mental break that can replenish their attentional resources. However, there is little empirical research to examine the effect of cyberloafing on employee attentional state. We conducted an EEG-based lab experiment to investigate the effects of two types cyberloafing activities as a mental break (i.e., watching short funny videos and browsing online news) and an offline mental break (i.e., sitting quietly and resting) on individual attentional state (including attention reengagement, attention concentration, and attention sustainability). Our findings show that, compared with browsing online news and quiet sitting, watching short funny videos as a mental break can result in a difficulty of attention reengagement, but a higher level of attention concentration and attention sustainability. The findings of our experiment indicate that the choice of mental break should be tailored to the specific type of work task at hand.

Keywords: Cyberloafing; Mental break; Attention; EEG; ERP (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:lnichp:978-3-032-00815-2_19

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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-032-00815-2_19

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