Data from: Visual environment, attention allocation, and learning in young children: when too much of a good thing may be bad

There is a large body of evidence supporting the importance of focused attention for encoding and task performance. Yet, young children with immature regulation of focused attention are often placed in elementary school classrooms containing large amounts of displays not relevant for on-going instruction. We investigated whether such displays can affect children’s ability to maintain focused attention during instruction and children’s ability to learn the lesson content. We placed kindergarten children in a laboratory classroom for six introductory science lessons, and we experimentally manipulated the classroom visual environment. When the laboratory classroom walls were highly decorated, children were more distracted by the visual environment, spent more time off-task, and demonstrated smaller learning gains than when the classroom decorations were removed.