There is a growing recognition that thoughts often arise independently of external demands. These thoughts can span from reminiscing your last vacation to contemplating career goals to fantasizing about meeting your favorite musician. Often referred to as mind wandering, such frequently occurring unprompted thoughts have widespread impact on our daily functions, with the dominant narrative converging on a negative relationship between unprompted thought and affective well-being. In this systematic review of 76 studies, we implemented a meta-analysis and qualitative review to elucidate if and when unprompted thought is indeed negatively associated with affective well-being in adults. Using a multilevel mixed-model approach on 386 effect sizes from 23,168 participants across 64 studies, our meta-analyses indicated an overall relationship between unprompted thought and worse affective well-being (r¯ = -.18, 95% CI [-.23, -.14]); however, the magnitude and direction of this relationship changed when considering specific aspects of the phenomenon (including thought content and intentionality) and methodological approaches (including questionnaires vs. experience sampling). The qualitative review further contextualizes this relationship by revealing the nuances of how and when unprompted thought is associated with affective well-being. Taken together, our meta-analysis and qualitative review indicate that the commonly reported relationship between unprompted thought and affective well-being is contingent upon the content and conceptualization of unprompted thought, as well as the methodological and analytic approaches implemented. Based on these findings, we propose emerging directions for future empirical and theoretical work that highlight the importance of accounting for when, how, and for whom unprompted thought is associated with affective well-being. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

中文翻译：

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关于无意识思维与情感幸福之间的关系：系统回顾和荟萃分析。


人们越来越认识到，思想常常独立于外部需求而产生。这些想法可以涵盖从回忆你上次的假期到思考职业目标，再到幻想见到你最喜欢的音乐家。这种频繁出现的无意识的想法通常被称为走神，它对我们的日常功能产生了广泛的影响，主流的叙述集中在无意识的想法和情感幸福之间的负面关系。在对 76 项研究的系统回顾中，我们进行了荟萃分析和定性回顾，以阐明自发思维是否以及何时确实与成人的情感健康呈负相关。使用多级混合模型方法对 64 项研究中 23,168 名参与者的 386 种效应大小进行分析，我们的荟萃分析表明，无提示的想法与较差的情感幸福感之间存在总体关系（r ́ = -.18, 95% CI [-.23 ，-.14]）；然而，当考虑到现象的具体方面（包括思想内容和意向性）和方法论方法（包括问卷调查与经验抽样）时，这种关系的大小和方向发生了变化。定性审查通过揭示自发思维如何以及何时与情感幸福相关的细微差别，进一步将这种关系置于背景中。综上所述，我们的荟萃分析和定性审查表明，普遍报道的无提示思维和情感幸福之间的关系取决于无提示思维的内容和概念化，以及所实施的方法和分析方法。 基于这些发现，我们为未来的实证和理论工作提出了新的方向，强调了解释自发思维何时、如何以及为谁与情感幸福感相关的重要性。 （PsycInfo 数据库记录 (c) 2024 APA，保留所有权利）。