Is Multitasking Counterproductive?
Pay attention. At least for a few minutes, forget the other applications on your computer. Ignore the e-mails that ceaselessly stream in or your cell phone as it pleads for your attention. Try not to do what modern life often demands: multitask. If you find it difficult, you’re not alone. So many of us feel our attention is constantly divided that Linda Stone, a former executive at both Microsoft and Apple, coined the term “continuous partial attention” to describe the phenomenon (Johnson 2006). Because this “splintering” is potentially a significant drain on productivity, experts are looking for ways of focusing the attention of today’s employees. Research suggests that the very word “multitask” is a misnomer: “There’s substantial literature on how the brain handles multitasking. And basically, it doesn’t … what’s really going on is a rapid toggling among tasks rather than simultaneous processing,” explains Jordan Grafman, chief of the cognitive neuroscience section at the National In
