Let’s talk about what multi tasking is and how it can affect us. Mirriam-Webster defines mulit-tasking as “performing more than one job (or task) at once” (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/multitasking). We’ve developed a knack to cram as much as possible into each day. We can communicate with everyone from our life using 20 different technologies all at once. Are we better for it?
For a few minutes I thought I was not multi-tasking while writing this post. I am sitting in a study lab at Princeton with no TV on, no phone ringing…. Oh wait…. No matter how I try to avoid it, I seem to not be able to do only one thing at once. I’m actually sitting in the computer lab listening to music on my iphone, drinking coffee, texting a friend periodically all with 5 different tabs open on my computer with my email, facebook, and a link for school. Yikes. I feel tricked! I wonder how my seeming inability to do only one thing affects me.
What is interesting to me about multitasking in our society is that it is usually viewed as a good thing; someone who can multitask must be intelligent. “I can multitask! Hire me! I’ll write the office newsletter while standing on my head chewing gum on the phone with a client!” Time and time again I’ve seen job postings requiring that the candidate be “good at multitasking”. So is multitasking such a good thing? And when did our society become so obsessed with this concept?
As Britanica Blogger, Nicholas Carr states in his 2009 post We’re Always Multitasking, and That’s the Problem,
” …when we multitask we sacrifice understanding and learning. We do more but know less. And the more tasks we juggle and the more quickly we switch between them, the higher the cognitive price we pay.
The problem today is not that we multitask. We’ve always multitasked. The problem is that we’re always in multitasking mode. “
Multitasking is not a new thing… we were born to multitask. But as Mr. Carr points out it’s like we’ve flipped our “multitasking switch” and we seem to run our lives in a perpetual multitasking mode. Researchers at the University of California, Irvine found that today’s workers are interrupted every 3- 20 minutes and about half the time they interrupt themselves to do a new task (http://www.ics.uci.edu/~gmark/CHI2005.pdf). It seems we like to fragment our lives to almost unhealthy levels. Maybe we get bored? Perhaps we were trained to fragment and multitask?
So how does this affect us and our messages? BBC reported a study done by Hewlett Packard in 2005 (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4318351.stm). In this study HP found that 62% of people checked their work messages and email while at home or away from the office. I myself am guilty of this and I have no idea why! I go on vacation and can’t seem to leave my work at work. This same study also found that the excessive use of technology actually lowered intelligence. In fact, while multitasking individuals suffer an IQ drop twice that of someone using marijuana.
Yes, we just compared the effects of multitasking to the effects of using a drug.
Has multitasking become the 21st century drug of choice? Are you addicted?
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