You will not believe whathappens in the 11th paragraph of thisarticle. But don’t skip ahead, yet.
In this age of clickbait and constantdistraction, we struggle to stayfocused at almost every turn. Thephone chimes and announces anemail. A colleague pops into yourcubicle and wants to chat. Or hey—this other magazine article looksinteresting, too. It’s akin to havinga chorus of creatures howling at the
What’s up with our attention span?
Technology may be shrinking our ability to focus
top of their lungs at you.
How do we protect our fragileattention spans when the worldaround us chips away with eachadvertisement, text message andinterruption?
“Human beings have alwayshad problems with being easilydistracted,” says Dr. BrentMacdonald, PhD, a Calgarypsychologist who specializes inlearning disabilities and anxiety.
“But today there are more things
competing for our attention—it feels
very difficult to focus at any one
time.”
Don’t surrender just yet—
Macdonald says several strategies can
keep the chaos at bay.
Clear away the visual clutterStimuli that draw your attention fromthe task at hand, such as the weatherwidget on your computer screen or
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More things are competing for our attention, making it very difficult to focus on any one, says
psychologist Brent Macdonald.
