关键词: 媒体多任务, 创造力, 心智游移, 工作记忆容量, 创造力双通道理论

Abstract: In the digital age, media multitasking has permeated every aspect of human life. However, previous studies have mainly explored the negative effects of media multitasking, ignoring its potential to stimulate creativity. If media multitasking can be used effectively to promote creativity, individuals and companies can take the lead in innovation in this digital wave. Therefore, the present study aimed at examining the effects of media multitasking on creativity, revealing the mediating role of mind wandering, and further exploring the important boundary condition of working memory capacity. To achieve the research objectives, three experiments were conducted. These experiments setted up simulation operating contexts to manipulate media multitasking and used multiple creativity tasks to measure creativity performance, including a standardized alternative uses task (Experiment 1 and Experiment 2) and a higher ecological validity idea generation task (Experiment 3). Specifically, Experiment 1 verified the boosting effect of media multitasking on creativity and initially explored the mediating role of mind wandering through thought probe; Experiment 2 further tested whether mind wandering is the psychological mechanism causing differences in creativity performance through manipulating the frequency of mind wandering; and Experiment 3 explored possible boundary conditions to test the moderating role of working memory capacity on media multitasking and creativity. As predicted, the present research found significantly higher creativity performance in the media multitasking group than in the non-media multitasking group, and this difference was robust (Experiment 1, Experiment 3). Using thought probe (Experiment 1) and experimental manipulations (Experiment 2), we further identified mind wandering as a potential mechanism for the difference in creativity performance. Specifically, compared to non-media multitasking, media multitasking caused individuals to produce a higher frequency of mind wandering and therefore exhibit better levels of creativity. By measuring individuals' working memory capacity (Experiment 3), we also found that the effect of mind wandering on creativity was moderated by working memory capacity. For those with low working memory capacity, performing media multitasking not only resulted in a higher frequency of mind wandering experiences, but also enhanced creativity performance; for those with high working memory capacity, although media multitasking still resulted in a higher frequency of mind wandering experiences, this mind wandering state impaired creativity performance. In summary, this study demonstrates the causal relationship between media multitasking and creativity, examines the mediating effect of mind wandering, and provides insight into the moderating role of working memory capacity. The results of this study have important implications for revealing the positive functions of media multitasking, expanding the persistence-flexibility interaction perspective to compensate for the parallel perspective of the dual pathway to creativity model, and helping individuals with different traits to effectively use media multitasking to enhance creativity.

Key words: media multitasking, creativity, mind wandering, working memory capacity, dual pathway to creativity model