Multitasking trend: how it affects health

by time news

2024-03-20 15:55:47

According to experts, It is not possible to do two things at the same time, unless we can do one without thinking too much. “Usually, when people think they are multitasking, they are actually shifting their attention from one task to another,” he clarified. a The New York Times Gloria Markcomputer science professor at the University of California, Irvine and author of “Regaining Your Attention Span.”

Anthony Wagner, a Stanford psychology professor and deputy director of the university’s Wu Tsai Neuroscience Institute, said: “From the moment you decide what to prepare, different regions of the brain, collectively called cognitive control network, they collaborate to make it a reality. This network includes areas of the brain involved in executive function, that is, the ability to plan and carry out goal-oriented behaviors. Together they create a mental model of the work that needs to be done and what is needed to carry it out.”

“But every time you shift your attention to a new task, your brain has to reorient itself”Wagner explained and noted: “The more effort each task requires, the more your brain has to do to organize the competing information and the different objectives. When we change tasks, we have a ‘switching cost. “We are going to be slower and less precise than we would have been if we had stayed on one task.”

The neuropsychologist Nicole Byersspecialized in the treatment of people with work burnout o burnout, warned: “Multitasking is more cognitively demanding, even when we do things that are pleasant or easy for us. When we do several things at the same time, we can test our working memory, that is, our ability to retain and manage information in our mind.”

Studies have found that multitasking can speed up our heart rate, raise blood pressure, trigger anxiety, lower our mood, and negatively affect our perception of work. “The more we overload that system and the more information we try to retain in the brain at once, the more mental fatigue occurs,” Byers explained.

To avoid these symptoms that arise from multitasking, specialist Gloria Mark offered the following recommendations: “Start by observing yourself throughout the day and noticing when and how you change tasks. From there, the advice is simple, but difficult: you will have to practice lonely, or do just one thing at a time, to gradually retrain your concentration and increase your tolerance. This varies from person to person, but they found that most people’s ability to cope with a demanding job peaked mid-morning and mid-afternoon.”

The same expert suggested changing breakpoints, places in the workflow where it will be “easy to resume without having to do redundant work.” Also use multitasking when it is really useful. In other words, accumulating habits, especially combining activities that are enjoyable with others that are not, can give the brain more positive reinforcement than monotasking alone.

by RN

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