October 1st, 2009
Those darned kids and their multitasking
Apparently, multitasking is a bad idea. Or so a media frenzy told us a month ago. Young people especially flip between tasks in what appears to be a completely natural way and seem able to take in multiple streams of information with aplomb. “Of course!” you say. “They’re ‘Digital Natives’,” making little finger quotes as you say it.
But if multitaskers are bad at it, have we bred an entire generation of people without the ability to process information in a society on the edge of information overload? As one of the researchers in the multitasking study pointed out,
The results [of further investigation] could be profound…potentially suggesting new means of teaching and even reporting news for those given to a multi-media feed of information.
I would certainly put myself in the category of “multitasker.” Frankly, if I spend too long on any one thing (with the possible exception of serious coding in jobs long past or a writing when I can find the time to really dig into one of my book projects), I get bored. My job on many days requires that I balance long-term projects with nearly constant interruptions. I get paid to multitask. Even blogging, my “other job,” requires multitasking: it’s not often that I get to sit down and write a lengthy feature. This blog is much more about taking in information, relating it to my experiences, and quickly firing off a couple posts a day, particularly if something interesting percolates up through those countless sources of media and information.
Of course, it was only recently that I realized I’d been self-medicating for ADD since a very early age. When I’d accompany my mom to work in the Seattle coffee and tea store that she ran, I always picked out the coffee to sample. At the age of 5, I discovered Kona and have been feeding a serious caffeine addiction ever since. No wonder I’d sit so quietly reading with a cup of coffee in the back of the store each day: the caffeine let me focus.
My love of the bean aside, I decided to watch my oldest son for a month and see how that multitasking was working out for him. Not exactly scientific, but I was curious to really observe how he dealt with all of the streams of electronic data in which he immersed himself every day after school. He’s a pretty solid student and isn’t much of a video game or TV fanatic. He does, however, use all 17″ of his laptop screen and consumes a lot of media. It’s not uncommon for him to have a video playing on Hulu (I don’t think he even bothers with the television anymore, even with a DVR), several conversations going on Meebo, be sending messages through various social media sites, and watch a muted video or two on YouTube, largely at the same time.
He even fits in homework.
He also doesn’t drink coffee, or Red Bull, or whatever. No ADHD. It’s just the way he works. While it’s quite likely that he could finish his homework more quickly if he just worked on homework, his engagement with a variety of media is remarkably common for his peers. It’s just the way they work, too. So while the research suggested that multitaskers struggled significantly areas of recall, I’d argue that those who spend a lot of time working on lots of things and simultaneously consuming lots of media may be really adapted to seeing “the big picture.”
We need detail-oriented people. My wife hates to multitask (aside from the natural way in which many women tend to balance a lot of activity better than men); when she’s paying bills, she only wants to work on the budget. Family photo albums? That’s it - no interruptions. She only reads one book at a time. Without her, however, my house would be in utter chaos, since I’m one of those big-picture people. I read 6 books at once and can’t recall details all the time, but always know what’s going on and enjoy the story. I couldn’t balance our budget if you paid me, but I can make a multi-course meal without
The same applies to a lot of young people, as far as this armchair psychologist is concerned. These Digital Natives have learned to toss out useless details and grab the important ideas from their multitasked existence. Our job as educators? Make sure they know the difference between the two and find ways to exploit this natural ability so they walk away from our lessons with genuine understanding.
Follow Chris Dawson on Twitter! Christopher Dawson is the technology director for the Athol-Royalston School District in northern Massachusetts and a member of the Internet Press Guild. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations, but always keep in mind that the opinions expressed here are his own and not those of his daytime employer, even if he talks incessantly about his day job.
Subscribe to ZDNet Education via Email alerts or RSS.
