Drunk Multi-Tasking

~ Laura

So, I took the New York Times' focus test, which is intended to show that high level multi-taskers can't focus on important details. Although I'm certainly a gold medal multi-tasker, I outscored everyone. I'm going to have another beer and see if I can improve my score.

My favorite episode of WKRP in Cincinnati:

http://www.hulu.com/embed/IueBedHKnjE80r3JbNlayA/803/922

Published by Laura

11 thoughts on “Drunk Multi-Tasking”

  1. I did well on the focus test. I got 100% right with two distractions and 92% right with six distractions. I did very bad on the Juggle test. I’m not sure if this means I multi-task to much and have fried my brain or that I’m not very good at multi-tasking.
    Anyway, I hate multi-tasking. I have a couple of co-workers who think that being active on eight different things at once shows they are hard working, dedicated, and brilliant. Since actually paying attention to eight different things at once is difficult or impossible, much of the activity consists of “touching base” with people who rather not be interrupted while working.

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  4. 100 and 100. Wasn’t expecting that. I was sure I got some wrong. I think the key is that if I *know* I need to focus I can. The hard part comes when I don’t really need to focus or if the task I’m doing isn’t that exciting.

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  5. I managed to get them all correct on both the juggle and the focus test. So does that mean I’m a horrid multi-tasker? Or just that I spend too much time taking internet quizzes?

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  6. I got 100% but I found a trick – remember the relative orientation of the two red ones (e.g. 90deg or 135deg), then it is easy to see if one changes.

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  7. 100 and 100. Not a multitasker, clearly. Nor are you, is my guess, Laura, you just focus on things separately in short bursts.
    ah — yes, I did the same. The point is, if you were distractable you wouldn’t have found the trick.
    I was sober. But I’ve never not been. I did not have the usual toddler trying to destroy my computer while I did it, though.

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  8. It’s probably a bad sign that I got so bored with the test that I couldn’t bear to finish…

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  9. 100 and 100 on the focus. Less successful on the juggling, but I tried it again using the keyboard instead of the mouse and my reaction time improved substantially. I don’t think it was just due to learning – my times at the start of the second run appeared to be much better than the times at the end of the first run, and they remained level throughout the second run. Of course, I don’t consider myself a super-multi-tasker. Two or three things at a time I can bounce between, but I prefer to focus on one thing at a time.

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  11. 83/100 — which makes my dependence on the number of distractors different from both groups.
    Totally bombed n the other task. But I’m not sure how that frequent task switching (usually a test of executive function) corresponds to multi-tasking.
    The paper is available, at PNAS, to the public.

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