Thursday, 28 March, 2024
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Canadian attention span now worse than a goldfish

goldfishIn the digital age, where the news is limited to 140 characters and conversations take place in the form of emojis, attention span has shortened. Medical Daily reports that a recent study of Canadians by Microsoft found that the human attention span has shortened from 12 seconds to eight seconds in more than a decade. That’s a second shorter than the proverbial goldfish.

‘Heavy multi-screeners find it difficult to filter out irrelevant stimuli — they’re more easily distracted by multiple streams of media, according to the report. On a positive note, reports Medical Daily, the researchers found the ability to multitask has significantly improved.

These findings coincide with a 2014 by the British unit of advertising buyer OMD that found the average person shifts their attention between their smartphone, tablet and laptop 21 times in an hour. This suggests the human attention span is smaller due to the growing presence of these gadgets. The desire to be constantly connected can compromise attention but in exchange for being better multitaskers.

[link url="http://www.medicaldaily.com/human-attention-span-shortens-8-seconds-due-digital-technology-3-ways-stay-focused-333474"]Full MedicalDaily report[/link]
[link url="http://advertising.microsoft.com/en/cl/31966/how-does-digital-affect-canadian-attention-spans"]Full Microsoft report[/link]
[link url="http://www.brandrepublic.com/article/1225960/people-swap-devices-21-times-hour-says-omd"]Full OMD report[/link]

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