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Rooted in neuroscience, psychology and evolutionary biology, this study explores what happens when we stop paying attention and the effect on our behavior.

If we've done our job well -- and, let's be honest, if we're lucky -- you'll read to the end of this description. Most likely, however, you won't. Somewhere in the middle of the next paragraph, your mind will wander off. Minds wander. That's just how it is.

That may be bad news for me, but is it bad news for people in general? Does the fact that as much as fifty percent of our waking hours find us failing to focus on the task at hand represent a problem? Michael Corballis doesn't think so. With The Wandering Mind, he shows us why, rehabilitating woolgathering and revealing its incredibly useful effects. Drawing on the latest research from cognitive science and evolutionary biology, Corballis shows us how mind-wandering not only frees us from moment-to-moment drudgery, but also from the limitations of our immediate selves. Mind-wandering strengthens our imagination, fueling the flights of invention, storytelling, and empathy that underlie our shared humanity; furthermore, he explains, our tendency to wander back and forth through the timeline of our lives is fundamental to our very sense of ourselves as coherent, continuing personalities.

Full of unusual examples and surprising discoveries, The Wandering Mind mounts a vigorous defense of inattention -- even as it never fails to hold the reader's.

Praise for The Wandering Mind

"[A] conversational, sincere and amusing book about the tendency of our minds to stray from whatever it is we are actually supposed to be focusing on... [An] engaging exploration of the subject." -- Times Higher Education, Book of the Week

"Michael Corballis, the scientist, takes you by the hand and weaves through an avalanche of information from psychology, literature, history, and more to elucidate my favorite mental state -- mind wandering. His high capacity for erudition, lucidity, and warmth have never shined more brightly." -- Michael S. Gazzaniga

"The Wandering Mind is a pleasure to read -- a lively book that will appeal to a broad spectrum of readers." -- Thomas Suddendorf, author of The Gap

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Price Summary

  • We started tracking this book on January 24, 2015.
  • This book was $9.99 when we started tracking it.
  • The price of this book has changed 92 times in the past 3,721 days.
  • The current price of this book is $9.99 last checked one day ago.
  • This lowest price this book has been offered at in the past year is $2.99.
  • The lowest price to date was $2.99 last reached on March 20, 2025.
  • This book has been $2.99 26 times since we started tracking it.
  • The highest price to date was $15.20 last reached on October 2, 2023.
  • This book has been $15.20 11 times since we started tracking it.

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Additional Info

  • Text-to-Speech: Disabled
  • Lending: Disabled
  • Print Length: 186 Pages
  • File Size: 24 KB

We last verified the price of this book about one day ago. At that time, the price was $9.99. This price is subject to change. The price displayed on the Amazon.com website at the time of purchase is the price you will pay for this book. Please confirm the price before making any purchases.