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Study reveals that mental blanking is not a failure of thought, but a specific brain state, with implications for mental health and consciousness.
On a typical day, thoughts jump from one topic to another—shopping lists, deadlines, repetitive songs. But at certain moments, they stop altogether, leaving your mind blank.
These pauses are known as “blank mind“Despite being recognized in everyday life, they were also often seen as memory lapses.
A new study led by Thomas Andrillon and colleagues proposes something different. Mind blanking may be a distinct and quantifiable conscious state.
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A void within consciousness
Normally the mind is compared to a river in constant flow of thoughts — memories, plans, reflections. It has always been believed that something was circulating in this flow. But this new study suggests that sometimes the river simply dries up.
Researchers have treated mind blanking as part of mind wandering, those moments of distraction when thoughts stray from the task at hand. But Andrillon and his colleagues propose that mind blanking is a separate thing.
In mind-wandering, there are thoughts present, even if disconnected. In blanking, there are no thoughts at all.
People report feeling drowsier and more sluggish during the whiteout. They are also more likely to make mistakes. It is estimated that we spend between 5% and 20% of our waking time in this state, whether we realize it or not.
These episodes appear most often during repetitive tasks, after a bad night's sleep, or after intense physical exercise. The clues are subtle: lapses in attention, forgetting information, and a sudden silencing of the internal monologue.
Different types of mind erasure
According to the study, there are several types of brain whitening. Some people enter this state deliberately, as occurs during meditation practices.
Others get there involuntarily. In some cases, the person realizes their mind is blank at the moment it happens. In others, only when they remember it later.
These whites tend to be more frequent when we are tired, sleepy or after physical exertion.
In laboratory tests, they have been associated with slower behavior and slower reactions. Physiological changes also occur: heart rate decreases and pupils constrict.
Antoine Lutz, from the Lyon Neuroscience Research Center, said the goal is to better understand how brain whitening relates to other similar experiences, such as meditative states.
What happens in the brain during a blank out?
To study the phenomenon, scientists used EEG and fMRI scans. They observed an increase in slow waves in the brain, similar to the onset of sleep, even when the participants were awake and responsive. This was described as “local sleep” — a kind of partial shutdown of the brain while the rest of the brain remains awake.
Just before the mind goes blank, changes are recorded: heart rate slows, pupils contract, and perception of the environment becomes blurred.
When participants were instructed to empty their minds, areas related to speech, memory and motor planning, such as Broca's area and the hippocampus, showed deactivation.
In addition, scientists noted more uniform connectivity between brain regions, unlike the common pattern, which is more specialized. This equal communication may be linked to reduced levels of vigilance.
Interestingly, not all blanks occur in the same way. In some cases, spikes in neural activity in the posterior regions of the brain preceded the blanking. This suggests that an overload of fast thinking can also lead to the blank state.
The researchers suggest that brain arousal—or the level of physiological alertness—may be key to understanding the different pathways that lead to a brain blank. When arousal is too high, there is exhaustion. When it is too low, there is drowsiness. In both cases, the mind quiets down.
Philosophical reflections on emptiness
The study also discusses mind whitening from a philosophical perspective. Can a contentless state still be a conscious experience?
Many meditation traditions say yes. Practitioners describe “pure awareness” as the absence of thought but with strong conscious presence.
Researchers draw parallels between mind-whitening and these meditative states, although they point out differences: meditation is usually deliberate, while mind-whitening is often involuntary.
Despite these differences, the comparison is intriguing. By contrasting different forms of consciousness, scientists seek to identify the characteristics that distinguish contentless states from thought-filled ones.
Thomas Andrillon, the study’s lead author, emphasizes that the research is important for challenging the notion that the waking mind is always thinking. He also highlights how brain whitening reveals individual differences in subjective experiences.
Study published on April 24 in Trends in Cognitive Sciences magazine.
