The impact of modern technology on the ability to concentrate

Recently, on one of the local yellowish Internet portals, a loud headline came across - “What technologies do to a person, the ability to concentrate has become less than that of a goldfish!”. Moreover, the article referred to some recently published research by Microsoft. True, direct reference to this study was not cited, but despite the yellowness of the source, I wondered if such a study was really conducted, and if so, what was its real purpose and result in its original form, and not in the interpretation of journalists.

After some time spent searching, this research really came to light. It really mentioned goldfish and their ability to concentrate. However, as it turned out, this study was conducted mainly with the aim of increasing the effectiveness of advertising strategies, but even so, it contains very interesting points that deserve attention, regardless of the original purpose of the study. The study, which will be discussed, was conducted in late 2014 and early 2015 by the Canadian division of Microsoft. According to the statements of the researchers themselves, it does not claim to one hundred percent scientific accuracy, but, nevertheless, in its course a number of interesting regularities were revealed. For the study, we used data obtained in various ways (including by fixing brain activity using EEG methods) from a sample of 2000 Canadians. So, if this topic interests, welcome under the cat

Let's start with the fact that actually attracted my attention to this topic - goldfish. Oddly enough, but the loud title was not an ordinary journalistic gimmick. In the study, this comparison is indeed present. According to the data presented, the average time that a person focuses on something in 2013 was 8 seconds, while the same indicator for a goldfish was 9 seconds. At the same time, in 2000, when the degree of technology development was lower, the average human indicator was around 12 seconds. Thus, it turns out that the ability of a modern person to concentrate attention is lower than that of a goldfish, well, at least in terms of duration. True, if you are not content with such an introductory report and delve into the report, it turns out that everything is not so bad, and the goldfish were clearly used by researchers precisely to attract attention to their work, and nothing more.
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The study uses a model for assessing attention divided into three main categories:
- sustained attention, responsible for long-term focus on repetitive actions;
- selective attention to avoid distractions, in other words, filtering information;
- switching attention, responsible for the effective switching between tasks requiring the use of different types of perception.

Each of these subtypes was investigated separately.

According to the research on sustained attention, the following points emerged. Respondents had problems with concentration, which in turn had a significant impact on work / study, this was especially pronounced in people who often use various modern information technologies in their daily lives. Thus, 44% of respondents admitted that they had to make considerable efforts to concentrate on their tasks, while this response had a markedly higher frequency among some of the subgroups of respondents than the average for the entire sample:

- 68% early start using modern technology;
- 67% of active users of social networks;
- 67% of people aged 18-24;
- 57% actively using simultaneously several devices / sources of information at one time;
- 55% of active consumers of various media content.

45% of all respondents reported that they are often distracted from what they are doing, because of extraneous thoughts, the alignment of the previously mentioned subgroups is as follows:

- 66% of early start using modern technology;
- 65% of active users of social networks;
- 61% of people aged 18-24;
- 60% actively using simultaneously several devices / sources of information at one time;
- 55% of active consumers of various media content.

And finally, 37% do not use, by their own admission, their time as they should be, and because of this they have to work overtime. The distribution of the frequency of such a response by subgroups falling out of the average frequency of the response by the sample:

- 62% of early start using modern technology;
- 62% of active users of social networks;
- 71% of people aged 18-24;
- 51% actively using simultaneously several devices / sources of information at the same time;
- 48% of active consumers of various media content.

The main factors that have an impact on sustained attention turned out to be the consumption volumes of media products, the use of social networks, the simultaneous use of several devices, and involvement in technology (the age of use of modern technology). Thus, the proportion of people with a high level of sustained attention ranged from 36% among those who little use social services to 23% among those who used them with high intensity. A similar picture is for regular Internet browsing - 39% among few Internet site users who use up to 27% among those who devote a considerable amount of time to this.

The age and gender of the respondents did not have a significant impact, the relative number of people of different age groups with a high level of sustained attention differed slightly - from 31% among the age group 18-34 years old to 35% among people older than 55.

On the other hand, active users of technology, despite the decrease in the duration of sustained attention, in studies of brain activity showed higher activity and intensity of attention in short periods of time, that is, they simply assimilated more information in a shorter time. It was also noted that technically more advanced respondents showed better digestibility of data obtained from both interactive sources (Internet sites) and passive (television). Thus, it can be said that the shortening of the attention period is not always so terrible, and the fact that the average time for a person to concentrate on something is less than that of a goldfish does not mean anything without evaluating other factors.

Evaluation of selective attention, or filtering too much, is not reflected in the study in such detail. This is primarily due to the fact that, in general, the researchers did not reveal any strong correlations between various factors and this type of attention. The only thing that significantly affected the filtering ability was superfluous, it turned out to be the frequent simultaneous use of several devices / information sources at one time. That is, people who are addicted to multitasking should be more careful when they need to isolate something important from the stream of received information / tasks. It is even possible that in cases where increased attention to detail is necessary, give up the habit of covering everything at once.

As for the switching attention, then the situation is generally similar to the previous one. One of the main factors is also multitasking, only already working with a plus sign. For example, among people with little use of this method, the proportion of respondents with high levels of ability to switch attention was 27%, while among those who actively used multitasking, there were already 37%. The significance of other factors is not so great, however, an interesting pattern was observed in the process concerning active users of social networks. This activity also raised the ability of respondents to shift attention and assimilate information, but upon reaching a certain threshold, it sharply worsened the indicators of the respondents.

On the one hand, the study showed that often the influence on the development of a person, his behavior, which we are inclined to attribute to certain external factors and technologies, is exaggerated. On the other hand, it demonstrates that such an influence does exist and is not worth dismissing it, it is just that the influence often turns out to be more precise and concentrated somewhat not where it was intended, and therefore not always noticeable until certain situations arise. That is, to use technological advances that have firmly entered our lives, and which we simply take as a necessary and integral part of this life, in some cases, we need to look at the possible, and not always obvious, consequences, correcting our behavior and methods of using depending on the desired results.

The full report on this study (in English) is available for download here .