Emily Elliott
Professor Louisiana State University
- Baton Rouge LA
Dr. Elliott has a primary research interest in memory, working memory, attention, and the development of attention and memory in children.
Areas of Expertise
Research Focus
Working Memory & Auditory Distraction
Dr. Elliott’s research focuses on working memory and attention, examining how auditory distraction affects memory in children and adults. She pairs controlled lab experiments with auditory–visual paradigms and developmental assessments to uncover the mechanisms of irrelevant sound and sharpen strategies for sustaining cognitive performance.
Answers
- Do background noises like chatter or phone alerts hurt our memory and focus?
It depends on the background noise. There have been studies that looked at a different number of voices in the background when people were doing a memory task. One or two voices were very disruptive, but once it became a larger number of voices it was not as disruptive. In essence, with a larger number of voices (like 16) the individual words/voices could no longer be distinguished and it became less disruptive because it was more "general noise" instead of specific conversations.Phone alerts are designed to capture our attention and get us to switch away from our focal task and to attend to the phone. They are unpredictable, which makes them much more likely to distract a person away from whatever they were working on before the phone alert. If a phone chimed (say every 15 minutes) it would be predictable and much less disruptive.
Education
University of Missouri-Columbia
Ph.D.
Cognitive Psychology
2001
University of Missouri-Columbia
M.S.
Psychology
1998
Louisiana State University
B.S.
Psychology
1996
Accomplishments
University College Tiger Athletic Foundation Teaching Award
2016
Media Appearances
Can Music Make You Smarter? LSU Student’s Research Works to Answer that Question
Louisiana State University online
2020-02-04
“When you look at the relationship between music training and to memory what do you see? And when you look at music training and the influence of auditory distractions, what do you see?” said Emily Elliot, interim associate chair for the psychology department and psychology professor.
Articles
Religiosity and social support predict resilience in older adults after a flood
The International Journal of Aging and Human Development2023
In this study, we examined religiosity and social support as predictors of resilience after a devastating flood. Three flood exposure groups of primarily middle-aged and older adults were compared: (1) non-flooded adults as controls, (2) once-flooded adults with structural damage to homes and property in the 2016 flood, and (3) twice-flooded adults who had relocated inland because of prior catastrophic losses in the 2005 Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and then flooded again in 2016. Resilience was assessed using the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC). Correlation analyses confirmed that older age was correlated with higher religiosity, charitable work done for others, and resilience.
Deconfounding serial recall: Response timing and the overarching role of grouping.
Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition2023
We used the timing of serial recall in several situations to reveal important aspects of recall groupings that participants construct and the reasons those groupings occur. We examined the timing of responses in the recall of digit strings within two published experiments. Cowan, Saults, Elliott, and Moreno (2002) examined memory for nine-item lists in a way that deconfounded the presentation modality, input versus output serial position (using a varied starting point of recall), memory load from items not yet recalled (using whole vs. partial recall), and the presence or absence of the temporal grouping of the lists into triads. Accuracy was strikingly different in the two modalities, with grouping drastically changing recall of acoustic lists but with little difference between grouped versus ungrouped visual lists.
Auditory distraction can be studied online! A direct comparison between in-person and online experimentation
Journal of Cognitive Psychology2022
Referring to the well-replicated finding that the presence of to-be-ignored sound disrupts short-term memory for serially-presented visual items, the irrelevant sound effect (ISE) is an important benchmark finding within cognitive psychology. The ISE has proven useful in evaluating the structure, function and development of short-term memory. This preregistered report focused on a methodological examination of the paradigm typically used to study the ISE and sought to determine whether the ISE can be reliably studied using the increasingly popular method of online testing. Comparing Psychology students tested online, in-person and participants from an online panel, results demonstrated successful reproduction of the key signature effects of auditory distraction (the changing-state effect and the steady-state effect), albeit smaller effects with the online panel.
Disaster stressors and psychological well-being in older adults after a flood.
Psychology and Aging2021
We examined the inoculation and stress sensitization explanations concerning mental health outcomes in 223 predominately middle-aged and older adults after a flood (M age= 49.6 years, SD= 17.7 years, range: 18–88 years). In multiple linear regression models, having flood damage was associated with higher levels of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depressive symptoms, while social support was associated with fewer symptoms. Greater lifetime trauma and flood-related stress were associated with more symptoms of depression and PTSD, respectively. Older age was associated with more religious coping and fewer depressive and worry symptoms. Future directions for research on postdisaster vulnerabilities and resilience are discussed.
Multilab direct replication of Flavell, Beach, and Chinsky (1966): Spontaneous verbal rehearsal in a memory task as a function of age
Advances in Methods and Practices in Psychological Science2021
Work by Flavell, Beach, and Chinsky indicated a change in the spontaneous production of overt verbalization behaviors when comparing young children (age 5) with older children (age 10). Despite the critical role that this evidence of a change in verbalization behaviors plays in modern theories of cognitive development and working memory, there has been only one other published near replication of this work. In this Registered Replication Report, we relied on researchers from 17 labs who contributed their results to a larger and more comprehensive sample of children. We assessed memory performance and the presence or absence of verbalization behaviors of young children at different ages and determined that the original pattern of findings was largely upheld: Older children were more likely to verbalize, and their memory spans improved.
Affiliations
- American Psychological Association : Division 3 Fellow
- American Psychological Society
- Psychonomic Society
- Southern Society for Philosophy and Psychology
- Southeastern Psychological Association
Research Grants
Enhancement of EEG/ERP Research Activities
Louisiana Board of Regent
2014
Media
