Attention management

Attention management refers to models and tools for supporting the management of attention at the individual or at the collective level (cf. attention economy), and at the short-term (quasi real time) or at a longer term (over periods of weeks or months).

The ability to control distractions and stay focused is essential to produce higher quality results. A research conducted by Stanford[1] shows that single-tasking is more effective and productive than multi-tasking.[2] Different studies have been conducted in using Information and Communications Technology (ICT) for supporting attention, and in particular, models have been elaborated for supporting attention (Davenport & Beck 2001) (Roda & Nabeth 2008).

Background

The scarcity of attention is the underlying assumption for attention management; the researcher Herbert A. Simon pointed out that when there is a vast availability of information, attention becomes the more scarce resource as human beings cannot digest all the information.[3]

Fundamentally, attention is limited by the processing power of the brain. Applying information theory, estimates from Hungarian-American psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and engineer Robert Lucky expect the processing capacity of the human conscious mind to be around 120 bits per second; listening to a person speak requires about 60 bits per second of processing; this implies you can barely comprehend two people speaking at the same time.[4][5] According to German physiologist Manfred Zimmermann, the human sensory system can pick up information at a much higher rate: he estimates a channel capacity of 10 million bits/s for the eyes alone, 1 million bits/s for the skin and 100 000 bits/s for the aural channel while conscious perception can cover only a small fraction of this.[6] Consequently, the brain needs to employ mental filters to determine the most important information needing to be processed. Most of these filtering processes happen automatically and beyond conscious awareness.[4] Limitations of attention capacities are revealed in many contexts, for example when speaking on a telephone while driving. The resulting high-frequency switching between processing of visual and auditory input is proven to constrict recognition of important information; driver’s reactions to cars breaking in front of them are affected, so is recollection of roadside billboards.[7][8]

Attention is also limited by the resources available to the neurons in the brain that enable humans to maintain focus as all processed information contributes to mental fatigue. Estimates suggest that the daily information input of an American in 2011 was five times as high as that in 1986.[4] Therefore, according to Maura Thomas, attention management is the most important skill for the 21st century. With digital revolution and the advent of internet and communication devices, time management is no longer enough to guarantee a good quality of work. Allocating time to perform one activity does not mean that it will receive attention if constant interruptions and distractions come across. Therefore, people should stop worrying about time management and focus on attention management.[9]

Beside the implications on work and productivity, attention management can also be applied with regard to other areas such as happiness. British behavioral scientist Paul Dolan identifies the allocation of attention as a key component in improving personal well-being. Life events only affect the individual to the extend he or she is attending to it; illnesses are perceived as worse if they are more salient and repeatedly expose a person to new negative stimuli. Consequently managing attention and focusing on things that make the individual happy is one of Dolan’s approaches towards greater happiness.[10]

Attention Problems

Supporting the management of attention the objective is to bring a certain number of solutions to attention problems. A selection of these are:

  • people perception cognitive limitations, such as the limited capacity of the human short-term memory (an average number of 4 items (Cowan 2001) can be managed at a given time), or the theoretical cognitive limit to the number of people with whom one can maintain stable social relationships (the Dunbar's number of 150).
  • information overload
  • social interaction overload (that may for instance originate from the online social networking services from which people get a lot of solicitations)
  • interruption (Kebinger 2005)
  • multitasking (Rosen 2008)
  • Attention Residue – an individual needs to completely abandon a task in order to fully focus on a secondary task. However, humans experience difficulties switching and moving their attention between multiple activities[11]

Strategies

Tools can be designed for supporting attention

These tools are often adaptive hypermedia, and often rely on profiling the user (Nabeth 2008) in order determine how to better support people's attention.

Research distinguishes between autonomous reactions to sensory stimuli (stimulus-driven) and deliberate direction of attention (goal-driven).[12] Correspondingly, attention management can focus on the alteration of external and internal factors.[13]

External Factors

Attention management strategies commonly include the minimization of interruptions as a variety of evidence suggests that eliminating distractions increases productivity. For example, a series of studies has demonstrated that productivity at the workplace is generally higher on days with bad weather due to the absence of distracting thoughts about outdoor activities experienced in good weather.[14] Diverted attention can result in reduced performance and stress; research has shown that interruption can cause higher completion time, double task error rate as well as increase the annoyance of the individual. Interruptions are also proven to contribute to higher anxiety.[15][16]

Notifications from electronic devices are some of the most common external stimuli causing distraction and studies indicate that social pressure frequently leads to immediate handling of these interruptions. Thus, attention management is considered a field of rising importance in ubiquitous computing and application design. Digital attention management systems utilizing machine learning recognize phases in which interruptions are counterproductive for the user and delay notifications.[15]

Beside utilizing digital systems, strategies minimizing interruptions and irrelevant information can also incorporate human resources in form of secretaries, consultants and other assisting employees; this is common practice observable in higher executive levels of companies and in politics.[4]

Internal Factors

A goal of attention management is to reach the highest level of unobstructed attention and focus, at state widely referred to as flow. The term, coined by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, describes a state of full involvement in a task, essentially a level of absorption where the individual forgets about everything but the current activity, even the own existence; all conscious processing capacity is devoted to the task. Characteristic for that state is the underlying intrinsic motivation; staying focused seemingly doesn’t require any additional energy and one experiences motivation to pursue the activity purely for the sake of the activity itself.[5]

Correspondingly, psychologist Adam Grant views inducing motivation as an integral part of attention management. In his eyes, focus on the essential information can be supported by finding the underlying motivation and discovering fascination and meaning in the task at hand.[17]

Projects

A certain number of projects have been conducted to investigate how to use ICT to support attention such as:

  • AtGentive – Attentive Agents for Collaborative Learners.
  • SAKE – Semantic-enabled Agile Knowledge-based eGovernment (IST 027128)
  • SUITOR (Maglio et al. 2000)

See also

References
  1. Gorlick, Adam (2009). "Media multitaskers pay mental price, Stanford study shows".
  2. Thomas, Maura (2015). "Time Management Training Doesn't Work". Harvard Business Review.
  3. The Economist profile on Herbert Simon (20th of march, 2009). Accesssed May 13th, 2017. http://www.economist.com/node/13350892
  4. Levitin, Daniel J. (2015-09-23). "Why It's So Hard To Pay Attention, Explained By Science". Fast Company. Retrieved 2020-04-09.
  5. Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly, Flow, the secret to happiness, retrieved 2020-04-09
  6. Zimmermann, M. (1986), "Neurophysiology of Sensory Systems", Fundamentals of Sensory Physiology, Springer Berlin Heidelberg, pp. 68–116, ISBN 978-3-540-15870-7, retrieved 2020-04-12
  7. Shomstein, S. (2004-11-24). "Control of Attention Shifts between Vision and Audition in Human Cortex". Journal of Neuroscience. 24 (47): 10702–10706. doi:10.1523/jneurosci.2939-04.2004. ISSN 0270-6474.
  8. Strayer, David L.; Drews, Frank A.; Johnston, William A. (2003). "Cell phone-induced failures of visual attention during simulated driving". Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied. 9 (1): 23–32. doi:10.1037/1076-898x.9.1.23. ISSN 1939-2192.
  9. Thomas, Maura. "Attention Management Website".
  10. Dolan, Paul, 1968- author. Happiness by design : change what you do, not how you think. ISBN 978-1-4104-7845-0. OCLC 899229105.CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  11. Leroy, Sophie (2009-07-01). "Why is it so hard to do my work? The challenge of attention residue when switching between work tasks". Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes. 109 (2): 168–181. doi:10.1016/j.obhdp.2009.04.002. ISSN 0749-5978.
  12. Attention and Performance (Symposium) (18th : 1998 : Windsor, Windsor and Maidenhead, England) (2000). Control of cognitive processes : Attention and Performance XVIII. MIT Press. ISBN 978-0-262-28011-2. OCLC 53970461.CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  13. Thomas, Maura (2018-03-15). "To Control Your Life, Control What You Pay Attention To". Harvard Business Review. ISSN 0017-8012. Retrieved 2020-04-12.
  14. Lee, Jooa Julia; Gino, Francesca; Staats, Bradley R. (2012). "Rainmakers: Why Bad Weather Means Good Productivity". PsycEXTRA Dataset. Retrieved 2020-04-09.
  15. Anderson, Christoph; Hübener, Isabel; Seipp, Ann-Kathrin; Ohly, Sandra; David, Klaus; Pejovic, Veljko (2018-07-05). "A Survey of Attention Management Systems in Ubiquitous Computing Environments". Proceedings of the ACM on Interactive, Mobile, Wearable and Ubiquitous Technologies. 2 (2): 1–27. arXiv:1806.06771. doi:10.1145/3214261. ISSN 2474-9567.
  16. Bailey, Brian P.; Konstan, Joseph A. (2006-07-01). "On the need for attention-aware systems: Measuring effects of interruption on task performance, error rate, and affective state". Computers in Human Behavior. Attention aware systems. 22 (4): 685–708. doi:10.1016/j.chb.2005.12.009. ISSN 0747-5632.
  17. Grant, Adam (2019-03-28). "Productivity Isn't About Time Management. It's About Attention Management". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-04-09.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.