While in a lecture, it is more interesting to observe what people are doing instead of paying attention to the monotonous and droning voice of a professor. If you allow yourself to sit at the back of the classroom, you can get an open view of other people's distraction. Shopping on-line, Facebooking, eating, drinking Red Bulls, Youtubing, etc. Whew~! These people are spectacular multi-taskers. And with the advancement of digital age, becoming a multi-tasker is a requirement or you won't be able to compete with others with such limited time that we are given. But, how much can we multitask? How much can we perform well in the middle of multitasking? Ed Yong gives a nice overview of our brain in the middle of multi-tasking. Referring to a study done by a Parisian scientist, Ed Yong summarizes that...
They have found that the part of our brain that controls out motivation to pursue our goals can divide its attention between two tasks. The left half devotes itself to one task and the right half to the other. This division of labour allows us to multi-task, but it also puts an upper limit on our abilities.
All in all the study suggests that the most multitasking projects that we can engage in is two. Ahh... I agree, it gets hard when you are trying to eat, call someone, and write a report all at the same time.
No comments:
Post a Comment