Think Deep: Processing Information in the Digital Age

How our Attention, Creativity and Memory are Affected by Technology

Technology has provided us with numerous ways to be more efficient, effective, and entertained. But with each advancement, there has been reluctance to change and concerns regarding cultural shifts. Information Technology is no different, and while many concerns can be shrugged away as generational, there is compelling evidence for changes to how we process information. Changes to attentiveness, creativity, and memory should be examined and understood. It is important we do not lose inventiveness or imagination. These are, after all, the abilities that have made our advancement possible.

Pay Attention

Still here?

This is an increasingly valid question. An oft-cited study from Microsoft corp found that since the year 2000 (at the start of the mobile revolution) the average attention span dropped from 12 to 8 seconds. In 2015 Time Magazine rather dramatically declared, “You Now Have a Shorter Attention Span Than a Goldfish”.

Writer Luci Gutierrez revisited the study in 2018 for The Atlantic with a “don’t panic” message. She says, “this sort of alarmism is as old as the hills. An 1897 article in The American Electrician worried that a growing dependence on the telephone would turn us all into ‘transparent heaps of jelly’.”

Dr. Gemma Briggs, a psychology lecturer at the Open University, pointed out for the BBC, “It’s very much task-dependent. How much attention we apply to a task will vary depending on what the task demand is.”

Learning and Prioritizing Focus

Instead of nurturing the panic that we are becoming goldfish-brained we should be prioritizing focus and increasing awareness that the best way to teach young children is not always the most entertaining way.

One of our suggestions for reducing rumination is to live mindfully, specifically by practicing mindful meditation. Meditation is useful for improving attention as well. Gutierrez cites a 2016 study which found that mindfulness meditation led to short-term improvements in attention and focus.

Much of the lack of attention in adults stems from the pressure to multitask (a pressure that is intensified by our devices) and the study Gutierrez cites found the benefits of mindfulness meditation were disproportionately large among heavy multimedia multitaskers.

Young Minds

When it comes to children, who are still learning how to pay attention, we haven’t done them many favors since the start of educational programming. The “make learning fun” model has been taken to the next level with a variety of educational games. But are these children really learning? And will they learn focus if everything has to be entertaining?

Dr. Jim Taylor answers with a firm no in Psychology Today , “studies have shown that reading uninterrupted text results in faster completion and better understanding, recall, and learning than those who read text filled with hyperlinks and ads. Those who read a text-only version of a presentation, as compared to one that included video, found the presentation to be more engaging, informative, and entertaining, a finding contrary to conventional wisdom, to be sure.”

In her excellent book i-Minds, Dr. Mari K Swingle informs her readers that nobody in her field recommends a child two or younger have access to tech (many experts feel four is still too young and Swingle herself leans towards nothing for anyone under six).

Be Creative

An interesting aspect of Swingle’s work involves tech and the stifling of creativity. Much of her research uses EEG scans.

Research has already found, “When moving from eyes-open to eyes-closed if Alpha brainwaves rose more and thirty percent centrally and well above 50% occipitally it was highly correlated with creativity”. What she found was that “All the self-proclaimed ‘internet addicts’ in my study on i-addictions had innovative artistic brains”.

In the earlier years of her research Swingle would question parents of children exhibiting addictive gaming behaviors and find that prior to the introduction of gaming (or social media) the child being tested showed artistic promise but that interest had waned. She finds this artistic promise less now and theorizes that it is because the children are not exploring artistic outlets at any stage. That they are not introduced to creativity at all and therefore don’t lose it. It is a depressing thought that even potential artistic interest and talent is sidetracked by gaming or social media.

Take Time to Create

Here we return to Swingle’s opinion that older is better in terms of introducing kids to games etc.

And for adults who feel the loss of creativity and creeping need to check social, she reminds us the brain is plastic.

Adults whose creativity has become stagnant can schedule their tech use. Leave blocks of time for meditation or creative pursuits.

Those children who have yet to find their creativity need adults to monitor for them, perhaps even cutting them off in some cases.

On Memory

Memory is how we learn. It is also an important part of who we are. It holds all our life experiences and how those experiences shaped us.

I no longer memorize phone numbers. I feel little embarrassment about this because none of my friends memorize phone numbers either. How has this lack of memorization affected me? More importantly, what about children who have grown-up in a world without having to memorize phone numbers? How has this affected their development?

According to Jim Taylor in Psychology Today it hasn’t. Or at least not in a significant way, ”the ubiquitous use of Internet search engines is causing children to become less adept at remembering things and more skilled at remembering where to find things. Given the ease with which information can be found these days, it only stands to reason that knowing where to look is becoming more important for children than actually knowing something. Not having to retain information in our brain may allow it to engage in more “higher-order” processing such as contemplation, critical thinking, and problem solving.”

Contemplation

While Taylor has point regarding this being a different type of memorization Swingle might object to the characterization of our brains being “freed up” to engage in more “higher-order” processing.

It doesn’t appear to be happening. She states; “Many primary and high-school children on the surface seem more intelligent; they know many snippets of science and historical trivia. Why do I call this trivia instead of knowledge? Apart from the scope itself being narrow, I am finding many children and young adults do not extend the knowledge. They do not integrate the information into broader concepts, theories, or philosophies. If individuals cannot do this, then indeed, trivia is all it remains: disconnected facts with no larger platform”.

Knowing (remembering) where to look up information online but being unable to extend (relate) the knowledge into broader concepts, theories, or philosophies is another example where innovation and creativity may shrink. It implies that it is not only rote memorization (memorizing phone numbers) taking a hit.

Other forms memorization require the ability to make meaningful accociations. To do this one must be able to extend  knowledge and possess some creativity.

Memory Games

While the overall effects regarding memory remain largely unknown it can’t hurt to keep your brain active offline. Games and activities such as crosswords, Scrabble, Trivial Pursuit, and reading. Learning about the various forms of memorization can be beneficial as can (yet again) meditation.

For children I would lean towards Swingle’s advice of no online activity before age six. Or perhaps (more realistically for many parents) a scaled version of this, with the moderate introduction into tech at each age milestone (two, four, six).

Thoughts and Recommendations

The research in this area is new. While the fact that our attentiveness, creativity, and memory are affected by the digital age is not contested, there are varying interpretations of the data in terms of how important these changes are.

With very young children, caution seems the wisest way to proceed in order to ensure informed, moderate, and useful applications of technology in later life.

Swingle’s work in particular provokes thought about time spent online, especially with regards to creativity. Mindfulness Meditation is widely recommended by multiple sources. Beyond that, allow time for (or actively schedule) creative pursuits that are only for you and purely for enjoyment.

Learning about memory is also useful. Joshua Foer’s book, Moonwalking With Einstein presents an excellent overview of memory techniques that is informative and entertaining.

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Recommendations and Sources

• Goldfish Attention span by Time Magazine
• Attention span by The Atlantic
• Attention span myth by BBC
• Technology, Children and Focus by Psychology Today
• Uninterrupted text results study by NYTimes
• Wisdom by Psychology Today
• i-Minds, by Mari K Swingle PhD
• Moonwalking With Einstein, Joshua Foer
• Featured image by Mohamed Hassan from Pixabay