Does a smartphone on the desk drain our brain? No evidence of cognitive costs due to smartphone presence in a short-term and prospective memory task.
Level 2 - randomized trial
Controlled laboratory experimental study evaluating the effect of smartphone presence versus absence on memory tasks.
PubMed 33137560 · doi:10.1016/j.concog.2020.103033
What was done
Researchers tested whether placing a smartphone on a desk versus removing it affected performance on short-term memory and prospective memory tasks. They also evaluated whether individual differences in smartphone dependency and impulsiveness moderated these effects.
What was found
The abstract reports no numerical data, confidence intervals, or exact p-values. There was no overall effect of smartphone presence on either short-term memory or prospective memory performance. A moderation effect was observed for prospective memory: participants with low smartphone dependency performed better when the smartphone was absent compared to when it was present.
Why it matters
This study challenges the assumption that the mere presence of a smartphone consistently causes a broad brain drain, demonstrating that working memory deficits reported in prior literature do not necessarily generalize to short-term or prospective memory domains.
Limits
The abstract does not disclose the sample size, participant demographics, exact task protocols, or numerical effect sizes. Long-term cognitive outcomes and real-world task environments were not evaluated.