Multitasking + Technology
"Multitasking on a computer typically involves having more than one application window open and stacked on the screen... and the user shifts back and forth among them as needed or impulse arises. We get so used to the constant shifting, that it may begin to seem as if we are completing various tasks simultaneously. But are humans really capable of true multitasking, either in terms of predisposed cognitive tendencies or trained acquisition?"
--Thomas Mach, "Distraction Addiction: What Language Educators Ought to Know
about Digital Media's Effects on Human Cognition and Communication"
--Thomas Mach, "Distraction Addiction: What Language Educators Ought to Know
about Digital Media's Effects on Human Cognition and Communication"
Different.
A lot of the tasks we do online are similar to the ones we used to do: we still read, do research, communicate, etc. However, their digital counterparts are different in many ways that affect the way that they are altering the way we think. According to Mach, "In its austerity, the typical printed page offers a vastly different interface than the visually rich, multimodal, and outwardly linked environment that we encounter when we gaze at digital screens and try to pay attention to all that they offer" (101). He also cites Nicholas Carr who observes the way that the Internet "seizes our attention only to scatter it" in his book The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to our Brains. In this way, the conventional print approach to knowledge is vastly different from the way that we must approach and understand it in the context of the Web. Evolving. These changes also affect the way that we navigate the world of knowledge and how technology puts people in a "tug of war between focusing and yearning to do everything at once [which] is now all too common and will only increase," says Zimmerman. In his article "Metatasking vs. Multitasking," he explores the various ways that we need to be mindful of these changes and incorporate these understandings into our own research, especially for educators: "We must be mindful that library research is rarely, if ever, a linear process. And, as educators, we must embrace what technology hath wrought." Thus, while we need to be aware of the negative effects of multitasking, we also must be ready to evolve with technology because it isn't going anywhere anytime soon. |
Inescapable.
As we can see, multitasking has various negative implications on human beings in a myriad of ways; however, "we're innundated with the opposite message these days: multitasking is just the way it is; technology has made it so, and Millennials love to do it" (Zimmerman). In a lot of ways, it seems like we as a digital culture cannot escape multitasking. So, Zimmerman suggests that we shouldn't try to; instead of trying to beat the Internet, he thinks we should join it. He warns, "Ignoring or even blocking access to multitasking technologies in favor of a single-task approach in information literacy classes merely tells students that we are either unaware of emerging technologies that can improve learning or that we're obstinately opposed to them." Prevalent. Several studies show that people are increasingly utilizing technology and, in turn, practicing multitasking. Martin Fishbein and Se-Hoon Jeong concluded from their study that "almost all audiences (96%) multitask with media in some way, and on average 47% of the media day involved multitasking" (365). Additionally, their study concluded that people are more likely to multitask with digital media than their print counterparts. Their work demonstrates how technology's pervasive presence in the modern individual's life is one of the reasons why multitasking is also such a prevalent practice, despite its drawbacks: technology welcomes, even encourages, multitasking, and as it increasingly becomes ingrained in the modern person's life, so too will the harmful practice of multitasking. |
"[I]n our information-gathering world, it simply makes sense for us to want to accomplish as much as we can and to use the technologies we have available to do so."
--Devin Zimmerman, "Metatasking vs. Multitasking"
--Devin Zimmerman, "Metatasking vs. Multitasking"