Interruptions - Quareness Series 203rd "Lecture".
Several research studies in USA have shown that information/knowledge workers frequently switch tasks...on average every three minutes. Indeed it appears they are focused on the core job for only about eleven minutes before switching attention due to internal (interrupting themselves) or external (interrupted by others) disruption. It has also been found that these workers subsequently take an average of twenty five minutes to reconnect to their central task. Such a habit norm appears to come at a rather steep cost...it looks like nearly thirty minutes of productivity is lost each time a knowledge worker switches tasks and s/he changes between working spheres every eleven minutes...a recipe for "cognitive fog"?
This research also suggests that the more challenging we perceive a task to be, the more likely we are to self-distract. And today's "everywhere" smartphone provides an enticing escape pod. Once our attention has shifted to the smartphone for one purpose, we tend to engage in a chain of subsequent acts thereon which are task-unrelated and thereby extend the period of disruption. Some of the evidence also suggests that the more enhanced (e.g. by including visual imagery rather than just text) the information encountered during an interruption, the more detrimental the distraction is likely to be for primary task completion.
Perhaps constant interruptions also exert a high cost for our human health? In our information age, multitasking seems to be a veritable job requirement for knowledge workers. In trying to manage the gush of information coming at them, these people will likely tend to work faster and thus experience greater pressure than if they were to concentrate on one task alone. And such high-density/high-pressured work can quite easily trigger excess stress. Indeed growing numbers of people are now beginning to suspect that all this multitasking is fundamentally changing our very mindsets. More of us can feel we're not really thinking the way we used to e.g. when reading we can find our concentration drifting very quickly and it's becoming more and more of a struggle to drag our wayward brains back to the text.
Could a growing inability to pay attention to more than one thing for a couple of minutes be symptomatic of a chipping away at our capacity for concentration and contemplation? Are we looking at a widespread acquiring of attention deficit disorder? Is heavy use of our modern technology and multitasking creating ADD in those not otherwise susceptible to such? It's at least possible (even likely?) that habitual switching multitasking can degrade our attentional abilities over time. And I dare say it's more than likely true that our brains can be remodeled both for good and for ill.
Sean.
Dean of Quareness.
March, 2024.