Whether you’re lost in thought at work or mindlessly checking your phone while watching TV, you may find it nearly impossible to stay focused on one task for long periods of time. And according to a 2018 article in the journal Neuron, it’s not your fault. In studies of humans and monkeys, researchers from Princeton University and the University of California, Berkeley found that attention pulses four times per second. That means you’re up against distractions even for a few minutes of focused attention. So how can you improve your focus?
Content What is attention? How technology disrupts our attention How to improve attention at work
WomanEL found out that there are some factors that prevent you from giving your 100%. Read on to learn about them.
What is concentration of attention?
Before we learn how to improve concentration, let's understand this term.
Defined as “the length of time a person is able to mentally focus on a particular activity,” attention refers to where we direct our thoughts (and for how long).
“Attention is a seemingly all-encompassing, general term, but it can mean many, many things,” says neuroscientist Elizabeth Ricker. “There are different kinds of attention—sustained, selective, and divided. Attention depends on other mental faculties that also do their job—such as working memory (sort of like your brain’s working memory), inhibition (suppressing stimuli that are irrelevant to a task or mental behavior), and mental flexibility (switching between concepts and synthesizing them).”
There are an infinite number of events happening around us all the time, but the brain can only process a certain number of them. To illustrate how our brain decides what to pay attention to, psychologists use the classic example of a cocktail party.
At this cocktail party, you could be focusing on any number of stimuli in the room: the music playing, the clinking of glasses, the person walking by, or the conversation going on behind you. Because of the filtering processes of the brain, you would normally tune in to the person in front of you, and the surrounding sights and sounds would become background noise. But let's say someone walks by and calls your name. Even if you hadn't been paying attention to their conversation before, it now becomes noticeable because the person in front of you fades into the background.
Of course, this process can be more challenging for people with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) or autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Both disorders involve problems with executive functioning, which involves paying attention and focusing. This can be compounded by hypersensitive sensory systems, which make it easier to focus on certain sounds and stimuli in the environment and harder to distract from others.
How technology disrupts our attention
Digital devices have infiltrated our daily lives, specifically designed to steal our attention. Source: freepik.com
The most obvious example of how technology hijacks our attention is push notifications. Pop-ups distract us from the task at hand and force us to look at our newsfeed or inbox. After a while, this habit becomes so ingrained that we no longer need these reminders to reach for our device. We do it automatically.
In a 2015 study published in the journal Computers in Human Behaviors, half of respondents reported experiencing “phantom phone signals” at least once a week, and up to 63% reported experiencing them monthly. Phantoms are when you think you can hear or feel your phone, but you can’t.
Researchers have suggested that this is due to the brain's use of schemas, or frameworks, to interpret complex information. The brain relies on past examples to interpret new information. For example, if you regularly hear and see messages on your phone, your brain may mistakenly attribute a different kind of signal to the phone (such as the sound of your neighbor's TV). The study also found that more frequent phone use leads to more phantom phone signals.
In a 2019 review published in the Yale Journal of Biology and Medicine, researchers found that even the healthiest brains can fail to notice significant differences between two images when interrupted by a flash of light. They suggested that similar distractions (like a pop-up warning or other digital message) can also completely take your attention away.
How to improve concentration at work
It's clear that our society has a serious attention problem. The inability to focus can reduce productivity at work, make it harder to fulfill personal responsibilities, and even affect relationships (if you've ever disconnected in the middle of a friend's story or reached for your phone during dinner with your partner, you know the results aren't the most pleasant).
Fortunately, recent research shows that there are scientifically proven ways to stay more mindful and focused. Here's what you can do:
- Limit the frequency of task switching. According to research, this constant switching between tasks significantly reduces the quality and efficiency of your work, which researchers call the “switching cost effect.”
- Don't multitask. We've known for a long time that multitasking doesn't work. But research shows that for those who frequently multitask, the negative effects last a long time. They can affect productivity even when they're not multitasking.
- Meditate. Meditation can change brain chemistry and has a number of benefits, including improving attention. The ideal is to meditate regularly. However, a 2019 review in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience found that even a single 10-minute guided meditation session can improve your ability to pay attention for longer.
- Eat foods that support brain function. There's no magic pill that will help you get in the mood. However, there are studies that link certain foods (caffeine, chocolate, blueberries) to improved attention and cognitive function.
- Check yourself. To better understand how you switch your attention, Ricker recommends keeping a work journal. Set a specific amount of time to do your work and set a timer. After the time is up, evaluate yourself: whether you completed the task, how focused you were, and whether you were in a state of flow.
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