Is multitasking turning us into unproductive dolts?

The New Atlantis explores this idea with a well-researched article concluding that our 'info overload' routine is a poor way to treat our brains. For starters, the practice of processing multiple stimuli simultaneously is, contrary to popular opinion, a time-waster as the brain naturally requires a period of recuperation to shift from one task to another. And the practice of responding to emails, text messages, Facebook queries and Twitter tweets, on top of what you are supposed to be doing, is less than ideal for long-term learning as it creates "a bottleneck" of responses in our brain and causes stress.

As the article states, "In one recent study, Russell Poldrack, a psychology professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, found that 'multitasking adversely affects how you learn. Even if you learn while multitasking, that learning is less flexible and more specialized, so you cannot retrieve the information as easily.'"

You've been warned.

Comments

[Peter Athey]

Henry Ford discovered almost a century ago that specialization increases productivity leading to cheaper products for all. But the mind-dulling monotony of these tasks (as seen in Charlie Chaplin's Modern Times) makes most people shy away from such intense focus.

With so much stimulii on our screens and in our lives, how do you expect people to willingly go back to mono-tasking? This is a conundrum that all parents have to face when trying to bring up their offspring: TV, video-games, all and the other paraphenalia of modern life have led (or are rapidly leading) to the death of books, participative team sports and many other activities that are considered wholesome.

We would need an army of psychologists and behavioural specialists to define the best way to educate the next generation of adults. And meanwhile, the R & D labs and factories will be churning out ever more flashy and seductive products or gadgets to increase our desire to multi-task.

The politicians have a lot of work on their plates over the next few decades.

[Dos]

Tell that to my boss... please!

[Tim]

Well, clearly there is multi-tasking and then there is multi-tasking.
If you multi-task by doing something else while there is a bottle-neck holding you up on the main task, then it is efficient, as long as the bottle-neck is sufficiently long enough to switch and allow for the brain to adjust to the new task.
The time needed to adjust to the new task varies from task to task and person to person.

[iain]

Multi tasking sounds clever but the brain requires about 3 seconds to adapt to a new set of rules for a new task. When people try to do different tasks at the same time -- talking on the phone while updating a spreadsheet and typing a text message for example -- the brain is virtually "grabbed by the throat" and forced to hold rules and methods to maintain the flow of activity. The sum total of time on all tasks performed this way is about a third more than if they were all performed in sequence, but of course nobody has the patience to wait. That call needs answering now and that invoice has to be in the post in ten minutes.

So what the brain does is co-opt the short term memory for a task it was not designed for. The end result is that these clever, gabbling, self-sure multi taskers end up burning out their short term memory. After their impressive periods of multi tasking displays they become literally "burnt out" and useless at even mundane tasks, as their complete lack of short term memory causes them to constantly lose their way.

It is constant dedication to one task, working within the varying limits of the brain to absorb new material at a stretch, and long periods of sleep in which this experience is transferred to long term memory and becomes part of our repertoire, which leads to successful mastery.

The circus clowns who show off their multitasking are making their brains into fireworks, for a short term meteoric display, followed by a lengthy period of empty burnout. They finish up on the scrap heap long before the calmer types who travelled slow and steady.

[Mike]

I would like to point out to Peter Athey that specialisation as a way to improve efficiency was written about by Adam Smith in "Wealth of Nations" over 100 years before Henry Ford's production lines.

[FloridaPat]

I bet Einstein was not multi-tasking when he came up with the Theory of Relativity.

Hoping for widespread distribution!

[Alan Curtis Montgomery, Mesa AZ]

Multitasking may indeed be harmful for long term learning but it is becoming an absolute necessity in this ever increasing fast paced world. I mean we could all go back to how things were long ago and ditch technology and the industrial revolution and do everything the long drawn out way we would learn and remember better and live longer due to less stress but we would loose far more then we gain. I do agree when you can even in a fast paced enviornment doing things in sequence is faster in the long run, more efficient, less stressful, and is more conducive to learning but this is very difficult to do and becoming increasingly so.

[mike harrop geneva]

since there are distributed bits of brain in various parts of the body, such as round the stomach, a multi-tasker simple needs to do some distributed processing. then each part can become specialized and taylorism be added to adamsmithism.