“The Stolen Attention” is the title of a book by British investigative journalist Johann Hari, in which he addresses the issue of the increasing inability to concentrate and focus, a problem affecting a growing number of people in contemporary civilization. Inspired by personal experience, Hari converses with numerous scientists and researchers from various social science and medical fields, attempting to identify the causes of modern distractions and the consequences this phenomenon has on people’s lives.
Attention is the tool of our consciousness; what we do not pay attention to remains unnoticed and does not become part of our experience. When we walk down the street, people pass by, cars drive by, shops surround us, life unfolds around us, but we are not aware of any of it if we don’t direct our attention. This simple example can be applied to various life situations in which we have the opportunity to gain important life experiences. The quality of our attention determines whether we will notice and seize these opportunities, and which experiences we will become conscious of. you, how much we will understand and adopt them.
Multiple studies confirm that our attention is weakening. The modern way of life has made us live faster and we are less able to dedicate ourselves carefully to a certain topic. Research on social media has shown that users’ engagement with a topic is getting shorter because information is coming faster, too fast to deeply engage with any individual one. In general, we are overwhelmed with information, and the more information there is, the shorter we can focus on one and think deeply about it. The result is superficiality because deeper thinking requires concentration, time, connecting with previous experiences, intelligent differentiation between true and false. Superficiality opens the possibility of manipulation, making it very easy to implant an idea into people’s consciousness that suits someone’s ideological, political, or economic interests. People simply do not have enough concentration to evaluate the strength of arguments and the truthfulness of information.
With With the loss of attention, we also lose the ability to solve problems because every problem requires focused attention that allows us to be aware of different aspects of the problem and find possible solutions. Research has shown that due to weak attention, we are more prone to simplifying problems and relying on authoritarian solutions. Today’s world is facing numerous serious crises that require prolonged focus on solving them, deeper thinking, and a change in behavior not only from political elites but from every individual. If the attention of an increasing number of people is weakening, there is no awareness of the seriousness of the crises or of one’s own responsibility and the need for behavior change. Attention is focused on the consequences of crises rather than on their causes and possible solutions.
One of the main causes of the decreasing ability to concentrate is the accelerated technological development and numerous inventions that were supposed to make our daily lives easier but have made us live in a more unnatural and superficial way. The virtual world has become more attractive than the real world. Oh, social networks have replaced direct social contacts and gatherings, and fake news has become more important than seeking the truth. The internet, various applications, and social networks have become the masters of our attention, and therefore our consciousness and experiences on which we build our image of the world and ourselves.
Some employees of technology companies and application developers have stated that companies deliberately manipulate the attention of their users to keep them on a page or application for as long as possible. The longer we stare at the mobile phone screen, surf the internet, and spend time on social networks, the more money companies make. That is why websites and applications are designed to constantly offer us new links on a topic that initially interested us, so that we endlessly switch from one to another and stay glued to the screen for as long as possible. We do not concentrate on any of them because our attention is immediately drawn to the next one. If we think we are free and choose what we watch on the screen of our own free will Well, we should really think about whether it is really like that and how consciously we decide what we will focus our attention on.
One of the ways in which technology companies manipulate attention is through the so-called likes and hearts that users receive on their posts. It is based on the research of psychologist Frederick Skinner who described the process of behavior shaping called “instrumental conditioning” in the mid-20th century. Through a system of rewards and punishments, he taught rats to behave in a specific way: for each desirable behavior, the rat would receive a reward, while the absence of behavior meant the absence of a reward. Creators of social media platforms have used the results of these studies to condition the behavior of their users and keep them on their pages for longer. Likes reward and communicate “I see you, you are important, I like you,” while the absence of likes conveys the opposite message, “you are invisible, you are not important.” That’s why we need to be present on these pages, constantly posting and constantly checking if we have been liked. gima. No matter how much we don’t want to hear it, likes and hearts have the same effect on social media users as rewards for Skinner’s rats; they condition and shape user behavior.
A special problem arises from the phenomenon of the so-called negativity bias of the average person. Psychological research has shown that negative and disturbing content holds attention longer than positive content. It has been shown that posts expressing disagreement, condemnation, and moral outrage receive twice as many likes and are shared much more than expressions of compassion and understanding. Therefore, it is in the interest of companies to offer content that evokes anger, fear, and negative emotions. As Tristan Harris, a former Google engineer, said, if a large portion of people spend a significant amount of time in anger, it begins to change culture and “turn hatred into a habit.”
The problem of weakening concentration abilities due to screen addiction particularly affects children and young people. Children no longer spend time in parks, playgrounds, or socializing with each other, but On mobile phones and computers, in the virtual world of games, in checking likes and messages. How harmful this is to mental development has been shown during the time of the coronavirus and forced isolation. The possibility of distance learning via the internet proved to be a practical solution, but negative effects were quickly noticed. Research has shown that this form of education reduces concentration and generally has a negative impact on children’s cognitive development. That is why more and more countries are banning the use of mobile phones, tablets, and similar devices in schools. However, the consequences are not only seen in poorer academic performance. This form of communication does not satisfy the basic need of young people for socializing and close contacts with friends and peers, which is a condition for mental health. Today, more and more young people suffer from anxiety, depression, exhibit violent behavior, or socially isolate themselves. As a consequence of weakened attention, one of the effects is losing interest in reading books. One professor from Harvard noted He complained that he no longer gives his students any shorter texts or books for literature because they don’t have the patience to read them. Instead, he gives them links on YouTube. Numerous studies have confirmed the existence of a phenomenon called “screen inferiority”: people understand and remember less of what they read on a screen compared to what they read in a book. Reading books requires time and prolonged concentration on a specific topic, which enables better understanding of what is read. Reading from a screen is similar to scanning newspaper headlines; there is a greater likelihood that we will just skim over the text superficially. However, there is yet another, perhaps more serious consequence of losing interest in books. When we read a story or a novel, we immerse ourselves in the plot, in other people’s emotional and mental states and life situations; a whole new world opens up to us, enriching our experiences. This is how imagination, empathy, understanding of other people’s feelings and thoughts develop, taking us beyond the confines of our own perspective and interpretation. Advice with someone else’s eyes. Without books, we impoverish our mental world, we become superficial and empty, confined in our own world.
In addition to technological development and its negative effect on concentration, Johann Hari also mentions a number of other causes that harm concentration ability, from poor nutrition, pollution, to stress and exhaustion. As Hari says, “We live in a system that pours acid on attention every day.” So, the problem is much deeper and points to an increasingly unnatural way of life for modern humans.
What can we do? Should we reject mobile phones, give up the internet and social media, escape to a deserted island and forget that modern civilization exists? Of course, that is not the solution. It doesn’t matter what we possess, but how we use what we possess, and even escaping civilization will not help us because, as Socrates said, we still carry ourselves along the way. The problem lies within the individual, so the solution lies within the individual. Unlike all other living beings, humans have volitional attent Ah, the ability to consciously and willfully direct attention to what one deems valuable and important. We should question why we don’t use it and instead passively surrender to external influences that manipulate our attention and make us empty and superficial.
So, the solution lies within us. Johann Hari calls it cruel optimism in his book, as it is cruel to shift responsibility onto the individual and overoptimistic to expect that major social problems will be solved through individual efforts. But a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Changing the world starts with changing each individual, each one of us. So, instead of staring at a screen tonight, we can pick up a good book and start reading it.