Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: Dealing With Electronics-Induced Inattentiveness?
An anonymous reader writes: I am a graduate student in his twenties who used to be able to read dozens and dozens of lengthy books in his childhood. Over the years, I have noticed that my attention span and ability to concentrate has decreased noticeably, seemingly in synchronization with society's increased connectedness with the Internet and constant stimulation from computers and mobile devices alike. I have noticed that myself and others seem to have a difficult time really sitting down to read anything or focus on anything relatively boring for even more than ten seconds (the "TL;DR Generation," as I sometimes call it).
I see it when socializing with others or even during a professor's lecture. I have tried leaving my mobile phone at home and limiting myself to fewer browser tabs in an effort to regain concentration that I believe has been lost in recent years. Nonetheless, this is an issue that has begun to adversely affect my academic studies and may only get worse in time. What advice do fellow Slashdot users have with regard to reclaiming what has been lost? Should such behaviors simply be accepted as a sign of the times?
I see it when socializing with others or even during a professor's lecture. I have tried leaving my mobile phone at home and limiting myself to fewer browser tabs in an effort to regain concentration that I believe has been lost in recent years. Nonetheless, this is an issue that has begun to adversely affect my academic studies and may only get worse in time. What advice do fellow Slashdot users have with regard to reclaiming what has been lost? Should such behaviors simply be accepted as a sign of the times?
Yes. A proper root cause analysis is important here.
Is electronics the actual root cause? I suspect not. Most of the issues the OP describes are pretty typical examples of stress/burnout.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Forget about how it affects your academic studies -- the academic world has always been a far stretch from reality, so the older most people get, the less it makes sense to study and learn in heavily structured environments.
Now, regarding the distraction, here's what I do.
Every week, I measure my happiness. There are countless psych-industry surveys, and a few very official ones, but any technique that makes sense for you will work just as well. It can be the number of times you smiled, the ease with which you slept, your willingness to go to work on monday, the number of times you went out with friends, the amount of chocolate you ate, or didn't eat, whatever. Your measure of happiness is all that matters, and any will do, provided that it's the same technique for six months at a time.
So every week, measure your happiness. Again, not your joy (emotion), your happiness (state of mind).
Buy an old "dumb" phone for $10. Basic address book, telephone, crappy texting. The kind of phone that was AMAZING in 1998. The kind of phone that only the very wealthy had in 1996. The kind of phone that only kings had in 1995. The kind of phone that only freakin' astronauts had in 1994.
Use it for two weeks instead of your modern smart phone.
See what happens to your happiness measurements. Maybe they'll go up. Maybe they'll go down.
The point is simply this. Every week, make an arbitrary change from what you're doing today, to something that is or was perfectly amazing to someone else. See if you become a happier person. Forget about measuring by price, or appearance, or opinion, or status. Just look at your own face in the mirror, or feel your own face with your hands, and see what makes you happier.
Do so objectively, and within a year you'll transform so many different parts of your life that you won't even recognize it anymore -- because it'll be a perfect extension of you.
I bought a piece of furniture that most people haven's seen seen the 16th century. It doesn't match any other piece of furniture in the house. But it's super-comfortable, and my favourite place in the house. Sitting in it is an instant-soothe.
1) Experiment. 2) Measure. 3) Adjust. 4) Measure. 5) Iterate.
I've only recently gotten a smartphone, after being a holdout for a long time. Before that, one of my beefs with smartphone users was that they were always reaching for their phones whenever they might otherwise have been bored. It seemed to me that they had lost something valuable: time to contemplate.
However, now that I have a smartphone, I no longer think about that.
Definitely this. Don't bring your laptop to class, bring a notebook and pen. Don't check your phone unless you've got an incoming call you need to take.
You might not be quite as efficient in note-taking (if you're in certain disciplines), but you'll be a lot more able to focus on what's going on, and you'll retain a lot more.
When studying, turn off your phone, or at least disable notifications.
TL;DR: When you're doing something, do one thing well.
I'm also a graduate student who has noticed a reduction in my (and my peers') ability to concentrate. It's a daily struggle to fight back against sources of distraction, but I've made some small changes that have helped me and might help you (and other Slashdotters) as well:
- I try to print really important papers and read them on paper. It is wasteful (recycle nonessential papers if desired), but pulp has no tabs;
- If I read analog media at my desk, I turn off my monitors to avoid notifications;
- I turn my phone on silent and flip it over on the desk for the same notification avoidance--works well with OS' that allow repeated callers to ring through while other notifications you designate keep the phone silent;
- I try to be a more "engaged" reader, taking notes on the paper (see my first point) to force my own engagement with the material. My mind wanders if I'm bored, which is entirely possible with academic material, so to stave off the boredom I'll do more to insert myself into the reading process.
Baby steps to change habits over time.
Maybe Bennett can provide a summary and share his thoughts?
This, in spades! The passive intake of information has, over the last few decades, grown from an occasional relaxation activity to a full-time pattern. Watching televised entertainment, watching training videos and sitting in long useless meetings all suppress mental activity. Then come the interruptions from phone calls, deleting 99% of emails, reading text messages and twits. Even if you are seriously trying to get into flow, too frequent interruptions leads to a kind of fatigue where you tend to just sit and wait for the next one to hit.
Since so much of "work", both white and blue collar, is now done on computers this pattern is extremely common. You can't get away from the computer and still do what you want to focus on. Simple solution: control your own micro-climate. Kill all the interrupting processes, put the office phone on DND, hang a sign that says "Working", plug in noise-cancelling headphone and play pleasant, non-distracting music or continuous nature sounds to drown office noise.
Some people will become annoyed that you don't instantly drop everything and respond to them. Too bad for them.
Bent, folded, spindled, and mutilated.