Internet, Smart phones and Social media have all made our lives easy in unimaginable ways and they have made it really hard for anyone trying to focus on one particular task for a lengthy period of time too. Exploiting these technologies and the way human mind works, we are constantly bombarded by the things which are designed for us to stay glued to the screens for a very long time.
Needless to say, organisations spend millions of dollars every year just to come up with the products that are habit-forming and addictive. In case of social media for instance, it has gone beyond a point where we now see that most content producers on most (if not all) of the platforms are more interested in creating habit-forming, high-intensity contents than focusing on the quality of the message they deliver.
When we were introduced to the internet in the late 80’s (the official DOB of the internet is Jan 1, 1983), little did we imagine that it would change the way we work, spend time, and do pretty much everything.
Number of internet users worldwide from 2005 to 2023(in millions)
https://www.statista.com/statistics/273018/number-of-internet-users-worldwide/
Then on February 14, 2005, came a video streaming platform called YouTube, which revolutionised the way we killed our boredom and learnt new things. It made watching videos so easy and fun, that almost everyone who has a mobile device or a computer, uses YouTube as a primary mode of entertainment.
According to Statista, as of April 2024, the United Arab Emirates was the country with the highest YouTube penetration, at approximately 94.2 percent. Israel ranked second with a reach of 93.6 percent, followed by the United Kingdom with a reach of 90.6 percent. The global YouTube reach in April 2024 was approximately 38.1 percent (the average number 38.1% might look odd to some but please know that, almost 90% of the world has penetration of more than 75% and the countries where the penetration is not on par are also the one’s with higher population) Approximately, YouTube users view a 1 billion hours of video each day. That accounts for around 5 billion YouTube videos being watched each day!!!
Most popular YouTube videos based on total global views as of January 2024(in billions)
Around the same time we saw the birth of many social media platforms, some of which have ceased to exist and some have become a part of our everyday habits (every-minute in actuality)
As of 2024, the average daily social media usage of internet users worldwide amounted to 143 minutes per day, down from 151 minutes in the previous year. Currently, the country with the most time spent on social media per day is Brazil, with online users spending an average of three hours and 49 minutes on social media each day. In comparison, the daily time spent with social media in the U.S. was just two hours and 16 minutes.
Daily time spent on social networking by internet users worldwide from 2012 to 2024 (in minutes)
Currently, the global social network penetration rate is 62.3 percent. Northern Europe had an 81.7 percent social media penetration rate, topping the ranking of global social media usage by region. Eastern and Middle Africa closed the ranking with 10.1 and 9.6 percent usage reach, respectively.
According to one report that analyses mobile unlocking behaviours, Gen Z smartphone users in the United States unlock their devices on average 79 times daily. Millennials ranked second, averaging 63 unlocks a day, while the Silent Generation had the lowest number of daily unlocks at 18 times per day.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1050339/average-unlocks-per-day-us-smartphone-users/
Now with all these numbers, one must be feeling overwhelmed and maybe to free themselves of this guilt they might reason themselves to be masters of multitasking.
To disprove the myth of multitasking, here’s the finding of an experiment published in 2001,
Joshua Rubinstein, PhD, Jeffrey Evans, PhD, and David Meyer, PhD, conducted four experiments in which young adults switched between different tasks, such as solving math problems or classifying geometric objects. For all tasks, the participants lost time when they had to switch from one task to another. As tasks got more complex, participants lost more time. As a result, people took significantly longer to switch between more complex tasks. Time costs were also greater when the participants switched to tasks that were relatively unfamiliar. They got up to speed faster when they switched to tasks they knew better.
According to Meyer, Evans and Rubinstein, converging evidence suggests that the human “executive control” processes have two distinct, complementary stages. They call one stage “goal shifting” (“I want to do this now instead of that”) and the other stage “rule activation” (“I’m turning off the rules for that and turning on the rules for this”). Both of these stages help people to, without awareness, switch between tasks. That’s helpful. Problems arise only when switching costs conflict with environmental demands for productivity and safety.
Although switch costs may be relatively small, sometimes just a few tenths of a second per switch, they can add up to large amounts when people switch repeatedly back and forth between tasks. Thus, multitasking may seem efficient on the surface but may actually take more time in the end and involve more error. Meyer has said that even brief mental blocks created by shifting between tasks can cost as much as 40 percent of someone’s productive time.
What can we do to solve this?
While I mostly struggle to focus on a particular task for long myself, for starters, I’ve come to realise that an individual should be aware of his shortcomings which will eventually allow him to take necessary actions to get better and start his journey of being more mindful and more productive in whatever he does going forward.
Cal Newport in his book Deep Work argues that deep work is rare in today’s world, yet it is essential for mastering complicated information and producing high-quality results. Those who cultivate this skill can thrive and differentiate themselves. He sets forth a few rules that help us in making our life a bit more clutter-free and a bit more productive, and they are:
Rule 1: Work Deeply: Create rituals and routines that promote deep work. This can include establishing a conducive workspace, setting defined work blocks, and using time management techniques.
Rule 2: Embrace Boredom: Train your brain to handle boredom by resisting the urge to seek distractions. This builds focus and resilience.
Rule 3: Quit Social Media: Assess the tools you use (especially social media) to determine if they are significantly contributing to your goals. If not, consider quitting or limiting their use.
Rule 4: Drain the Shallows: Reduce the time spent on shallow work. Set strict limits on the amount of time you dedicate to these tasks, allowing more room for deep work.
Additional tips to enhance Deep/Focused work :
Prioritise Tasks: Identify the most important tasks and tackle them during your peak focus hours.
Set Time Limits: Setting up time limits for each work type can drastically increase your chances of focusing on the task at hand and the one which matters.
Create a Dedicated Workspace: Set up an area for focused work that is separate from spaces associated with leisure or distraction.
Practice Mindfulness: Techniques such as meditation can enhance your ability to concentrate and improve overall mental clarity (I am yet to try this personally)
Limit Multitasking: Focused work thrives on single-tasking. Attempting to juggle multiple tasks can dilute focus and reduce overall productivity.
Reflect and Adjust: After focused work sessions, reflect on what strategies were effective and adjust your approach as needed. The more you adjust the approach, the more you will be able to understand what works best for you.
The objective is not to be perfect, it is to get better every single day as we move forward in this journey.
Conclusion :
The numbers, facts and statistics tell us that we humans are spending quite a lot of time being connected to the network and social media, which is definitely decreasing our attention span and our ability to focus deeply. By cultivating the ability to focus deeply, we can produce more meaningful work and lead a more fulfilling professional and personal life.
The question is, will we be humble enough to accept the facts and take corrective actions or continue to stay in the realm of “online world” ? Will we loose our ability to focus deeply altogether and surrender to sudden bursts of motivation or shape the future of humankind due to long lasting inspiration?
References and Further Reading :
On Attention Deficit – https://time.com/6302294/why-you-cant-focus-anymore-and-what-to-do-about-it/
Research on Multi-Tasking and it’s cost – https://www.apa.org/topics/research/multitasking
History of Social Media – https://postfity.com/blog/history-social-media
Book – Deep Work by Cal Newport
Be Great!
Praveen.
Praveen's Blog 