The Rules Of Distraction
By Hayley Birch
A psychologist at University College London has developed a measure of distractedness. Sorry, what?A measure of distractedness. Ah, yes.
Oh, and - according to Professor Lavie - people who are more easily distracted are more at risk of having accidents. (news story)
Now far be it from me to criticise the work of a leading scientist, but… keep up! We know distractions are bad; we like it like that. It makes life more interesting. Why do you think we have meetings and coffee and MySpace?
Only this morning I stumbled across a Facebook group dedicated to work avoidance among students: The “only need 40% to pass” society. “Please post all good time wasting habits so the rest of us can benefit.”
But Lavie claims employee distraction can lead to fatal errors, especially in occupations calling for unwavering levels of concentration, such as driving.
The distractedness measure is based on a computerised test which asks participants to find the odd-one-out among displays of letters. At the same time, other letters flash up elsewhere on the screen as distractions. Lavie found that when the odd-one-out was more difficult to see, for instance, an X among Zs rather than among Os, candidates were less distracted.
So how many people took this test? 61. Well, that must have kept the entire psychology department amused for the afternoon.
And while the rest of the world is busily organising itself around the premise that more distractions equals less hard graft, Professor Lavie, I assume, pretends that coming up with a measure of distractedness is what she’s supposed to be doing.
If you need a few more distractions then try these links:
- Strange - Love at first fright
- Wit & Wisdom - Who goes to conferences?
- Strange - Mozart in the workplace
Image: Betty Miller
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