Focus, Maggie
DISTRACTED:
The Erosion of Attention and the Coming Dark Age
By Maggie Jackson
327 pp. Prometheus Books $25.95
Reviewed by Roger Poppen
To the list of threats to civilization as we know it—global warming, soaring oil prices, American Idol—Maggie Jackson adds a new item: distraction. She warns that the current culture of “social diffusion, intellectual fragmentation, and sensory detachment,” is on the cusp of collapse into a dark age of “mistrust, [information] skimming, and a dehumanizing merging between man and machine.” Fortunately, there is hope. Recent research into the neuropsychological properties of attention points the way toward enhancing this vital skill.
Although Ms. Jackson writes in a personable, colorful style, this is not a book for the easily distracted. She covers a lot of ground and, in some areas, digs quite deeply. She interviews many experts, describing their physical features and the setting to make them seem like real people with interesting stories rather than producers of dry data. Research results are presented anecdotally, with no more than occasional mention of a percentage. For the more academically inclined, a wealth of endnotes and citations invites further study.
Ms. Jackson begins with the premise that, “deep, sustained, perceptive attention [is] the building block of intimacy, wisdom, and cultural progress.” She presents both data and vignettes to show that a fragmented, multitasking lifestyle erodes one’s ability to concentrate. For example, a study of 15-year-olds showed the U.S. ranked 24th out of 29 developed countries in tests of problem solving and analytic reasoning. The implication is that a distracted lifestyle is to blame for American teenagers’ poor performance. In the absence of direct measures of cultural differences, however, this is a questionable conclusion. It is indisputable, though, that much research demonstrates the deleterious effects of distraction on learning and memory. As an everyday example, studies show cell phone use is comparable to alcohol as a factor in driving accidents.
Interpersonal relationships also take a hit. Ms. Jackson traces the impact of electronic media, beginning in the nineteenth century, on the way people relate to each other and to machines. Today’s social milieu of emailing, text messaging, online dating, and distance conferencing results in a great many superficial connections but few deeply meaningful ones. She is uneasy with the increasing amount of electronic surveillance that promotes a culture of distrust. Also alarming is the ease with which people develop rapport with ersatz electronic creatures such as videogame avatars and robotic pets. Ms. Jackson would be aghast at David Levy’s predictions in the book I reviewed here some months ago, Love and Sex with Robots.
A chapter is devoted to our peripatetic, fast-food culture, even including a riff on the history of the fork, to illustrate our “untethered” existence. Another chapter delves into the history of writing and the neural processes involved in reading. Today’s surfeit of information, easily available on the Internet, all too often results in skimming for snippets rather than critical analysis. Efforts to teach college students information literacy are notoriously unsuccessful. She notes, “professors who cajole and demand students to dig deeply tend to have high class withdrawal rates and poor scores on teacher-rating sites.”
Ms. Jackson describes brain structures involved in memory and attention in order to make these constructs more concrete. Of greater interest is the operation of these processes in daily life. She points out how early cultures relied on memorization to pass down important stories across generations. Inscribed on stone monuments and ancient scrolls, they have lasted thousands of years. Today, we “outsource memory almost entirely to our gadgets.” Even worse, “digital data is kept on incredibly precise and fragile media—the archival equivalent of quicksand.”
With respect to the nature of attention, Ms. Jackson cites research identifying three components: awareness (alerting), focus (orienting), and judgment (executive function). The influence of focus of attention on judgment and action is illustrated in the classic studies by Walter Mischel on delay of gratification in preschoolers. Children were given the choice of a small marshmallow immediately or a larger number after some interval of time. Follow-up showed that self-control at an early age is related to social and scholastic success as teenagers. In other studies, self-control is influenced by cognitive strategies: ‘hot’ emotional thoughts, like how yummy the candy tastes, decreases delay; whereas ‘cool’ thoughts, like imagining the marshmallow as a fluffy white cloud, increases delay. The point is that as a culture we are focused on immediate gratification, with little thought of long-term consequences of our choices.
In the closing pages, Ms. Jackson considers methods of enhancing attention. She visits the “Shamatha Project,” in which thirty adults engaged in three months of cloistered meditation while myriad physiological and psychological measures were taken. She regards this as groundbreaking: “we’re on the verge of learning how to meet head-on a distraction-charged world.” She recognizes such intense training is not a feasible solution, and mentions “mindfulness” programs for stress-related illnesses and computerized attention-training programs for ADHD children. She concludes, “the journey is just beginning.”
In fact, we’ve been down this road before. Ms. Jackson’s otherwise extensive research overlooks the popularity of meditation and related procedures, beginning in the 1960s. Maharishi Mahesh Yogi achieved worldwide fame with Transcendental Meditation, while Baba Ram Dass became a cultural icon. Both touted their practices as a cure for societal ills. In a more scientific vein, Elmer and Alyce Green studied the physiological capabilities of yogis at the Menninger Institute, and pioneered development of biofeedback in the treatment of stress-related disorders. Similarly, Herbert Benson studied meditation at Harvard University, popularizing a procedure he termed “the relaxation response.” These methods and their offshoots remain a mainstay in the field of behavioral medicine.
This book would have made a greater contribution if the author had been less distracted by brain mechanics and other sidetracks, and more focused on procedures to enhance awareness and attention. These have been around for decades but are used only after an individual suffers a disorder. How to integrate them into homes, schools, and workplaces, as prophylaxes for our frazzled lifestyle remains a question worth pursuing.
Roger Poppen has a Ph.D. in psychology from Stanford University and spent over thirty years as researcher and professor. He authored two books and over a hundred professional articles and presentations in the field of behavior analysis and therapy. His focus since retiring is creative writing.
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