The fact that social media and smartphones in particular reduce our attention span now seems to be widely accepted. It's not for nothing that you waste 30 minutes on Instagram in the morning, instead of getting up, you suddenly jump over to TikTok instead of dedicating yourself to your own obligations and the youth of today, phew, you don't even want to start from there! You've probably heard or thought something like this before, assuming that social media causes brain rot, but that's not really true at all, as you might already hear in the undertone. 😉 At least the problem is far more complex than often presented.
We took a look at why so many of us are plagued by the feeling that we can no longer concentrate, where our attention span is and how we can claim it again.
It was 2015 when the Internet got into a furore due to a new, shocking study result from well-known leading media such as Time magazine, The Independent Or even New York Times Opinion was disseminated and reproduced: The average human attention span is now eight seconds — shorter than that of a goldfish. It is hardly surprising that such news is spreading like wildfire. It is scandalous, offers reason to complain (as is well known, the Internet loves to complain), comes from a reputable source and confirmed for many what they have believed for a long time: My cell phone is to blame that I can no longer concentrate! But the trick is that this is not really true at all.
There is reason to breathe a sigh of relief in advance insofar as the claim about the eight-second attention span Really nonsense is, as Forbes also explains. The thesis found its origin of popularity in a report by Microsoft Ads, where the “study result” of an SEO website that posed as an academic institution was adopted somewhat carelessly, based on a test in which 25 test subjects left websites they found uninteresting after a few seconds. Scientifically, this would be equated with a school study in which the average teaching interest of students is examined using mathematics and transferred to the entire curriculum. 🧮 Not particularly empirical. For good reason, the said report has now been withdrawn.
Even though the study (lovingly said!) It may be nonsense, but — in a small, happy coincidence — it sheds light on the actual crux of studies in terms of attention: Concentration cannot really be quantified if it depends on a concentration object. If you prefer watching an action movie with Tom Cruise, huge explosions and cool airplanes than watching paint dry, that is not indicative that you can no longer concentrate, but that one object is simply more interesting than the other; that attention caught must be.
The healthy skepticism certainly tempts you to say: “Well, maybe not eight seconds, but I already have the feeling that I'm paying less attention.” Think of the frequently told anecdote of reading books in one go as a child and now you pick up your smartphone every 10 minutes. Something seems to be wrong after all — especially when it is probably the mere The presence of a cell phone has a negative effect on one's attention Can.
It must be noted that much of the content that we consume digitally is designed to claim our attention. Social networks, for example, naturally want us to spend time on them and have developed sophisticated mechanisms for this purpose — and with great success. In 2020 alone, more than a billion people have spent three hours a day on social media.
This often involved no real discussion of the content, but Mindless scrolling: The passive consumption of social media, without real awareness of what you're actually doing right now. A behavior that is certainly familiar to many. A push notification is enough to suddenly sink into the Instagram feed for ten minutes until the realisation follows: What am I actually doing right now? The only thing missing is the necessary impetus and we often give it to ourselves. Do I have a message? Did one of my friends post anything? Or just that clumsy notification. The main thing is that it is more exciting than what you are currently dedicating yourself to. There is also no shame in watching a cat video rather than reading Woyzeck, to be honest. 😉
But that's not really nice. But before we address the implications of common scrolling behavior, one more thing is probably important to present: Why do we get distracted by technology so quickly? 🤔 Is our social media consumption a symptom of a much more common problem? After all, our synapses will hardly be wired so simply that a message on the screen is enough to completely tear us out of concept.
That is precisely why it could sound ironic to talk about boredom right now, when there wasn't a moment left when you don't have to do anything, where something always wants to draw your attention and when you're actually already overloaded with all the external stimuli that our sensors want for themselves. The problem is that mindless scrolling prevents more important processes. But boredom is not just, as we often assume, doing nothing. Mariusz Finkielsztein defines boredom as follows:
A negatively perceived sense of meaninglessness connected to disengagement from interaction with our environment.
Boredom therefore comes from the need to do something meaningful but not be able to pursue it — and that is a feeling that is more acute today than ever before, despite all these networks and media. A rising trend over the last three centuries, although you might think that everything has become a bit more exciting. In direct correlation with the industrialization and urbanization of the western world, it can unfortunately be attested that that these resulted in less satisfying and significant work and social lives — and that in turn is responsible for the said boredom. More boring than ever before. To backtrack: What exactly does this have to do with smartphones, social media and the like?
We are too happy to fall into the fallacy that smartphones could apparently get a grip on the boredom that is developing by giving us an activity that is perhaps no less meaningless, but is at least more interactive and therefore less detached. To put it briefly: No. It's called for good reason Mindless Scrolling. In fact, said boredom is simply postponed until it accumulates, which not only makes said boredom chronic: Getting bored without actually registering it, but knowing that something could be missing, which in turn prevents the actual triggers of this boredom from addressing the actual triggers of this boredom. Maybe you feel underwhelmed, maybe you're dissatisfied with your own job, maybe our social relationships aren't fulfilling us. Just the classics.
It goes without saying that this is not a healthy interrelationship. And on top of that, it's pretty hard to escape from it. More and more platforms are practicing providing a digital grab bag, whether on TikTok, Instagram or the like. After all, you never know what video or content is next when every swipe is a reset. Maybe the next video will even be really sincere! Or funny. Maybe you learn something and maybe there's gossip. But you only know that when you swipe. Social media in its current form follows the format of a gambling machine, or scientifically named: Operant conditioning. The last link in the chain, so to speak, which ensures that our attention is stopped at the actual distraction.
Anyone who is sensitive to this can quickly develop a media addiction, which is not so rare. This is not only due to the said operant conditioning itself, but also to the status of the smartphone. There is a fear of excluding oneself from discourse, missing out on something, or alienating oneself. However, spending too much time on a smartphone is also not good, as previous examples have already shown. Other consequences also include loss of control over user behavior, a preference for analog activities (perhaps you know this a person who is stuck on the cell phone all the time when you go out to eat) or even the neglect of everyday obligations.
One Exemplary study states, for example, that 77% of all American employees also use social media during their working hours, sometimes for several hours. Often, this is not a conscious decision or mere laziness, but the said game with attention. After all, you're only kicking yourself up when the deadline is getting closer and closer. HBR explainedthat the big danger is really the loop you get into — one video after another, right down to the eponymous mindlessness. However, it is also apparent that this effect particularly occurs when you go beyond the first video — i.e. cultivate awareness and make the active decision to click away from a video. 😊
Ultimately, there's nothing wrong with watching a cat video or two, or scrolling through a few memes from a friend. It only becomes a problem when consuming all this media keeps you from doing the things you actually want to be doing. So, if you're worried about falling down a rabbit hole (or if you've already fallen into one and you're struggling to climb out), see if you can find ways to reduce the similarity, repetitiveness, and relatedness of the content you're consuming. It can be difficult, but it's not impossible — and once you manage to break free, you'll be back at that big report in no time.
However, all these results also make one thing clear: This is not a problem that we cannot get a grip on. In the end, we only ever fall for the same few tricks — and we can get ahead of them.
We already included some methods some time ago in our Contribution to digital wellbeing listed, but here is our best selection again:
Fortunately, cell phones are not the cause of an alleged intellectual decline, but they are definitely a troublemaker. After all, real life doesn't take place on any screen, even though it may sometimes look like it. 😉 Digital consumer behavior is not an overriding force that we have to bow to, but in particular a personal problem that can be addressed. It may not be a piece of cake, but it can be done. Good information about this is at least the first step towards spending more time with less mindless scrolling.
What are your tips for conscious scrolling behavior?
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