Slashdot Mirror
Technology and Ever-Falling Attention Spans
An anonymous reader writes: The BBC has an article about technology's effect on concentration in the workplace. They note research finding that the average information worker's attention span has dropped significantly in only a few years. "Back in 2004 we followed American information workers around with stopwatches and timed every action. They switched their attention every three minutes on average. In 2012, we found that the time spent on one computer screen before switching to another computer screen was one minute 15 seconds. By the summer of 2014 it was an average of 59.5 seconds." Many groups are now researching ways to keep people in states of focus and concentration. An app ecosystem is popping up to support that as well, from activity timing techniques to background noise that minimizes distractions. Recent studies are even showing that walking slowly on a treadmill while you work can have positive effects on focus and productivity. What tricks do you use to keep yourself on task?
>> What tricks do you use to keep yourself on task?
None - I'm a frequent commenter on SlashDot.
I just simply don't believe that ... oooh, shiny ... oh, gotta do my timesheets, it's Friday.
What was I saying?
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
They switched their attention every three minutes on average. In 2012, we found that the time spent on one computer screen before switching to another computer screen was one minute 15 seconds. By the summer of 2014 it was an average of 59.5 seconds.
I know my average has plummeted over the years; especially when I bought a second display, and then a third.
Fortunately, this year I may replace them all with a large 4k display and then I'll have a long attention span again.
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
tl;dr
I can't bring myself to close tabs. I find myself with my hand shaking over the 'x' in the browser like a junkie trying to flush his last hit down the toilet. What if there's a comment that's really interesting? Or, worse, what if someone is wrong on the internet? What if I want to re-read that article? How will I find it again? I opened up that Stack Overflow page for a reason. I better leave it open until I remember what it was. Of course I can't close the gmail tab, what if there's an important email. Better leave twitter up because, reasons. Any new articles on Reddit? Oh, yeah, that was that Medium article I meant to read. Let me finish up writing this comment on Slashdot.
Waltz, nymph, for quick jigs vex Bud.
Once people realized you were timing them, they started to do everything quicker because they thought it would make themselves look good.
I am loving reading all these responses explaining how people avoid distractions, even while succumbing to the distraction of posting on reading and posting on Slashdot.
(Yeah yeah, I know, maybe they're in a different time zone... I would bet money the majority are still in their working hours. Including myself.)
This is another one of those "we need empirical data to prove what everyone already knows", like studies on the differences between men and women, how peoples behaviors are affected by wealth, etc;
We can chalk it up in the "no shit sherlock" category.
FTFA:
This is perhaps because there is relatively little research available about the impact of websites like Twitter and Facebook, or games like Candy Crush, that seem to be deliberately aimed at keeping us constantly engaged, to the detriment of work.
I have to don my tinfoil cap now and surmise that in all liklihood, it isn't in the best interest of Google, Facebook, Apple or the rest to point out that yes, using our "products" and living this fast and loose, jittered-stimmed out existence of tweets, posts, statuses, etc isn't in your best interest, even if your best excuse is the usual "but this is how I stay current with my family"
What we are creating ladies and gentlemen is a generation of people who will HAVE TO HAVE computers and AI run things for them, because their attention span and critical thinking will be in the toilet.
Removing my tinfoil cap...
We play the game with the bravery of being out of range
I use one window to log into slashdot and keep it always in focus and on-top, and maximized so that it gets 100% of my attention. The other window is for distracting things like hacking out code, building, running test cases, updating rally etc etc. My attention span to slashdot has increased to nearly 30 minutes now.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
What tricks do you use to keep yourself on task?
I know that this trick isn't possible for everybody, but I find that actually working on something interesting leads to far fewer distractions. When I'm working on something I like, I don't care when a new email arrives and I don't have any interest in hitting Slashdot. (I am not working on something interesting at the moment.) Difficult work (either mentally or physically) also seems to makes it harder to get distracted.
Maybe people's jobs are just getting more boring and cluttered with seemingly worthless tasks.
If you want a vision of the future, imagine a youtube comments section scrolling - forever.
You'd drive me insane. I don't mind a quick drop by. It frees you up if you're blocked, allows for some human interaction, and if I'm too busy I'll just say no. Now put a meeting on my calendar and the 15-20 minutes before it is totally lost, as I avoid starting anything anticipating the meeting. Just come and talk to me.
Not to mention that unless you have a good rapport with your manager a 1:1 is a huge cause of stress. Its a "oh shit, what' the matter now" issue, especially if a non-regular one appears on my calendar.
I still have more fans than freaks. WTF is wrong with you people?