Multitasking

"People who are regularly bombarded with several streams of electronic information do not pay attention, control their memory or switch from one job to another as well as those who prefer to complete one task at a time, a group of Stanford researchers has found." - Stanford University News (Aug 2009)

"a comparison of studies that examined background music compared to no music indicates that background music disturbs the reading process, has some small detrimental effects on memory, but has a positive impact on emotional reactions and improves achievements in sports." - SAGE (Nov 2010)

"A new body of research has found that multi-tasking makes people less efficient and reduces the level of brainpower used for each task. Also, people who overburden their minds with too many tasks at once can have problems with short-term memory. " - Psychology Today (Dec 2010)

"The 20 sixth grade students in this study averaged 7.1 ( 7th grade, 1st month) reading level with the television and radio off. These same 20 students averaged only 5.1 (5th grade 1st month) reading level with the radio on. The radio caused them to be more than 2 years BEHIND what they could perform normally. The same 20 students averaged 3.7 (3rd grade 7th month) reading level with the television on. The television caused them to be more than 4 years BEHIND what they could perform." - Oklahoma Academy of Science (April 1996)

"Subjects completed a cued-recall test of the content of an expository prose passage read under quiet conditions or concurrently with the presence of one of two types of television content (prime-time drama versus commercials). Effects on immediate versus delayed recall were examined. Overall, significant deleterious effects of background television were found, controlling for prior abilities and motivation. Deleterious effects were stronger and more consistent when testing occurred immediately after reading, rather than after a five-minute filled delay. Background commercials resulted in more consistently negative effects than did TV drama." - Taylor & Francis Online (June 2009)

"A recent article published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) by three Stanford University researchers offers perhaps the most surprising result: those who consider themselves to be great multitaskers are in fact the worst multitaskers. Those who rated themselves as chronic multitaskers made more mistakes, could remember fewer items, and took longer to complete a variety of focusing tasks analogous to multitasking than those self-rated as infrequent multitaskers." - Psychology Today (March 2011)

"Multitasking may be a necessity in today's fast-paced world, but new research shows distractions affect the way people learn, making the knowledge they gain harder to use later on." - USA Today (July 2006)

"One group was allowed to be online during a lecture and the other group was not. It turns out that the online group did check out some information related to the lecture content, but they also checked email, tuned into Facebook, and watched videos - all typical online activities. The second group had to listen to the lecture unplugged. The unplugged students performed significantly better on measures of memory and comprehension following the lecture. Similar studies have produced the same results. Frequent interruptions scatter our thoughts and erode our memories."  -  Psychology Today (July 2011)