LATINNUDISTS

Home Tech Scientists now know what happens when your mind goes blank

Scientists now know what happens when your mind goes blank

Tech • January 6, 2026 • 0 Comment
You know when someone asks you a question and you just blank? Scientists now know what happens. They call it ‘mind blanking’ and it feels like a brief internal blackout – no thoughts, no distractions, no emotions. But research says that it could be consciousness briefly stepping away, and suggests that it’s a distinct mental state, separate from daydreaming or distraction. In these moments, awareness can actually pause, even while the body stays awake. (Picture: Getty)
In their study, researchers at Sorbonne Université looked at 62 adults during a simple attention task. Then, every 40 to 70 seconds, participants were asked what had been happening in their minds just before the prompt. They could report focused attention, mind wandering, mind blanking, or uncertainty. Mind blanking happened around 16% of the time, nearly half as often as mind wandering, which suggests it’s far from rare. (Picture: Getty)
However, the researchers reveal that mind wandering made people quicker and more impulsive, with more false alarms, but mind blanking slowed people down, which led to lagged responses, and missed cues. The researchers say that it looks like a brief absence. And this was shown in brain activity.  EEG recordings showed that mind blanking came with a strange split. (Picture: Getty)
The researchers found that the front of the brain showed bursts of fast activity, while the back, including regions tied to visual processing, showed the opposite pattern, but this disconnect didn’t appear during mind wandering. The most striking finding involved vision as during focused attention and mind wandering, images moved through the brain in stages associated with conscious perception. (Picture: Getty)
But, during mind blanking, those later stages never arrived. The eyes still took in the image, but the brain failed to process it in a way that reached awareness. The researchers found that machine learning tools could identify what participants had seen during other states, but during mind blanking they couldn’t. These neural patterns resemble those seen during deep sleep or anesthesia, including disrupted communication between brain regions and impaired sensory processing. The difference is timing as these lapses happened briefly, inside otherwise normal wakefulness. (Picture: Getty)
The findings raise a question, as it suggests being awake doesn’t guarantee continuous awareness. Conscious experience can arrive in pieces, with short gaps in between. However, not everyone experienced mind blanking, and some participants never reported it, even though they mind-wandered. Previous research has suggested it might be more common in people with attention-related conditions, so it may differ person to person. (Picture: Getty)
It is important to note there are limits in the study, as self-reports are not always accurate, and sampling mental states every 40-70 seconds can’t capture everything happening in between. The study also couldn’t pinpoint exactly when mind blanking episodes began or ended, but behaviour and brain activity pointed in the same direction. So, maybe the next time your brain goes blank, it may actually be a short pause in consciousness itself. (Picture: Getty)

Related Posts

First country blocks access to Elon Musk’s Grok AI over sexual deepfakes

Tech January 11, 2026 • 0 Comment
Indonesia said non-consensual sexual deepfakes are a human rights violation (Picture: Lionel BONAVENTURE / AFP via Getty Images) Indonesia has…

Some people get drunk without drinking – scientists might finally know why

Tech January 9, 2026 • 0 Comment
People with the condition feel intoxicated, despite not drinking (Picture: Myles Goode/Getty Images) If you’re ever outraged at how much…

Elon Musk posts AI picture of Keir Starmer in a bikini and says X critics just want ‘censorship’

Tech January 9, 2026 • 0 Comment
Elon Musk hits back at Sir Keir Starmer with AI bikini picture of PM (Picture: Getty) Elon Musk has hit…

Doctors graft human ear onto foot in a world’s first

Tech January 9, 2026 • 0 Comment
Chinese surgeons have done something remarkable: they performed the world’s first operation to graft a patient’s torn-off ear onto her…

Fact-check: Is Google actually reading your emails to train Gemini AI?

Tech January 8, 2026 • 0 Comment
This isn’t the first time the tech giant has been accused of ‘spying’ (Picture: Shutterstock/Getty/Metro) Google users are being warned…

Has Maya Jama finally cracked the fight against Grok’s fake photos?

Tech January 8, 2026 • 0 Comment
Maya Jama has joined other women imploring Elon Musk’s Grok (Picture: Instagram/Getty) Love Island’s Maya Jama is leading a fight…

ChatGPT wants your medical records – these are the risks

Tech January 8, 2026 • 0 Comment
OpenAI stresses that the bot does not replace a doctor (Picture: Getty) Dr ChatGPT will see you now. The artificial…

‘I’ve watched child abuse online – I fear age ID checks is leading others to do the same’

Tech January 8, 2026 • 0 Comment
Bradley quickly became trapped in a cycle of extreme and illegal content and fears that will happen to others (Picture:…

Inside one UK city’s robot revolution where people get their deliveries from droids

Tech January 8, 2026 • 0 Comment
{“@context”:”https://schema.org”,”@type”:”VideoObject”,”name”:”Robots deliver groceries in Milton Keynes”,”duration”:”T46S”,”thumbnailUrl”:”https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2026/01/05/14/105245187-0-image-m-79_1767624721211.jpg”,”uploadDate”:”2026-01-05T14:51:50+0000″,”description”:”Starship’s robots have been delivering groceries in Milton Keynes since 2018.”,”contentUrl”:”https://videos.metro.co.uk/video/met/2026/01/07/2760695138315580592/640x360_MP4_2760695138315580592.mp4″,”height”:640,”width”:360} To view this video…

‘Impossible’ cluster found in deep space could change what we know about early universe

Tech January 7, 2026 • 0 Comment
As we try to peer into the deepest depths of space, we find more and more strange things – and…

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.