Merlin’s weekly podcast with Dan Benjamin. We talk about creativity, independence, and making things you love.
Merlin’s weekly podcast with Dan Benjamin. We talk about creativity, independence, and making things you love.
”What’s 43 Folders?”
43Folders.com is Merlin Mann’s website about finding the time and attention to do your best creative work.
NYT: New data on the problems of "multitasking"
Merlin Mann | Mar 26 2007
Slow Down, Multitaskers, and Don’t Read in Traffic - New York Times Yesterday's New York Times front page ran an article pulling together the results of several recent studies looking at how interruptions and attempts to multitask can affect the quality of work as well as the length of recovery time. Here's one bit that really grabbed me:
And, from a PDF of another of the studies cited ("Isolation of a Central Bottleneck of Information Processing with Time-Resolved fMRI"), here's a telling snippet from the article's abstract (yes, most of the rest of it is well over my head):
My own feelings on the myth of multi-tasking are well-documented, but it's fascinating to see research interest focused in this area -- although it's certainly not surprising, given its potential impact on knowledge workers and the industries that employ them. Again, from yesterday's NYT article:
36 Comments
POSTED IN:
Jim - I was thinking EXACTLY...Submitted by Morgan (not verified) on March 26, 2007 - 4:48am.
Jim - I was thinking EXACTLY the same thing about this little diversion I am taking to "collect my thoughts" by seeing what Merlin is up to. Oh no - my 2 minute break is worse than not taking one... I know that this information is about interuptions and multitasking, but does this information impact the need to take mental breaks (and their length)? We should also be taking breaks to improve productivity... how does that work in light of the central bottleneck and the 15 minutes to return to work? Does that mean I should MORE 43folders (or for longer periods of time) or do I have to pzizz until my mind is like water again before returning to work... The other thought while reading this (and it isn't new but a different spin on this research) is that GTD supports trying to reduce multitasking even when you are working on one task. When I am too busy "planning while doing" and not getting anything done, there is nothing like a good dose of WSD (writing stuff down) to get the planning cycles out of my head and THEN doing. It is such a great productivity boost that is shows, once again, that the less multitasking the better. Anyone know of any studies that look at this type of multitasking? Morgan » POSTED IN:
|
|
EXPLORE 43Folders | THE GOOD STUFF |