You might find articles like these all over the web these days. This news has been going around that humans have lower attention span these days all because of our social media addiction.
Considered to be somewhere around 8 seconds which is lower than a gold fish’s 9 second attention span.
I’ll not really get into how social media platforms use game theory, cognitive biases or how our dopamine receptors react to getting more likes and followers. we’ll leave it for later as it can get pretty complex and I don’t intend to cover all of it in a short article. Consider this as part one! So there we go…
This survey was done in Canada. in 2015 and has been fueled by the media over the years after the results came in. The whole survey looks kind of fishy if you look into it. Attention span is related to the task we are handed. Its normal to have very low attention span for tasks with low priority.
This is the way our brain was developed to function. Minimizing effort and maximizing efficiency is the key to survival.
By the way the fact that Goldfishes have 8 seconds of attention span is wrong too in case you were wondering.
When people complain about having low attention span for these generation’s kids I really don’t believe so. When it comes to attention its all related to how interested the person is in doing the particular task at hand.
Having low attention span can be related to having more distractions around as well and it’s true that having continuous notifications telling you to check how many likes you have got on you Instagram or Facebook can be distracting.
Look at the good side of the argument. We are way more capable at multitasking between 4-5 things at a time. Updating my Facebook a second ago, now switching between various cryptocurrency charts, while check my instagram feed for something cool I found in there, also checking the news on web and listening to an audiobook. Doing all these things simultaneously while having my dinner or lunch.
Trust me I do this kind of things everyday and it becomes a habit to handle it well relatively soon. To be able to go from one thing to another without loosing my attention as to what is going on in my other 6 tabs is kind of cool, but having the ability to think and process all of it simultaneously is the real cool thing in the end.
We humans have the ability to adapt very quickly this is how we have been able to survive on planet earth. If we have been put into an environment where we need to be able to multitask.
Our brains will struggle in the beginning but eventually get very good at it. It all comes down to what kind of inputs we keep providing our brain for a long period of time so our brain can eventually adapt to the stimulation.
Over time when we get pretty good at our particular way of life we might struggle to do the other things especially when we have not been practicing those other things.
Brains just like muscles in the end although way more complex than any muscle. If we train our brain hard enough we’ll get pretty good at it eventually. Do keep in mind that we are not even talking about forming habits yet.
When we think about it, people usually do not necessarily sit down and concentrate on one task, unless they in an extremely important situation where their decisions can have great effects on their life or someone else’s. Practising concentrating our attention is definitely something that’s needed for everyone but this is a skill rarely practised in real life.
When our brains don’t have the habit of concentrating well we would suck at it obviously.
So what my conclusion is, Though we might be forming habits that might been seen as being distracted. In the end this is just how we are adapting our brains, but if we decide to do the complete opposite and are rewarded for it we might get pretty good at it too.
It all comes down to how you as a human being wants to shape your life. Although there are bad effects of being addicted to social media, but I’d say that we generally tend to focus on things we find important. If our social lives are just that important to us we might as well keep at it.
We can always walk away if we really need to or turn off our notifications like I have done. We always have the freedom to decide, its just a matter of realising if we consider ourselves free or trapped. This goes for anything in life, be it social media or any other situation you might be facing in life.
Then again we are habitual creatures. To realise that we are addicted and trapped by our minds takes more energy. Continuing to do what we have always done is way easier.