function hide_user_promo_bubble_second_stage() { var bubble = $("user_promo_bubble"); bubble.style.display = "none"; } function hide_user_promo_bubble() { var bubble = $("user_promo_bubble"); var myAnim = new YAHOO.util.Anim(bubble, { opacity: { to: 0 } }, 1, YAHOO.util.Easing.easeOut); myAnim.animate(); setTimeout("hide_user_promo_bubble_second_stage()", 1100); } function handle_promo_username(params) { var bubble = $("user_promo_bubble"); var img = $("user_promo_bubble_image"); var anchor = $("user_promo_bubble_link"); if (params.has_photo == "true") { img.src = "http://images.huffingtonpost.com/profiles/" + params.user_id + "-tiny.png"; } else { img.style.display = "none"; Dom.addClass(anchor, "wide"); } anchor.innerHTML = "Shared by " + params.user_name; anchor.href = "http://www.huffingtonpost.com/social/" + params.user_name; bubble.style.display = "block"; var myAnim = new YAHOO.util.Anim(bubble, { opacity: { to: 1 } }, 2, YAHOO.util.Easing.easeOut); myAnim.animate(); } if (HuffPoUtil.getUrlVar("user_promo")) { YAHOO.util.Event.onDOMReady(function() { var parts = document.location.hash.split(","), shared_by = "", badge = "", i; if (parts.length < 2) return; for (i = 0; i < parts.length; i++) { if (parts[i].indexOf("sb=") !== -1) { shared_by = parts[i]; } if (parts[i].indexOf("b=") !== -1) { badge = parts[i]; } } if (shared_by == "" || badge == "") return; var bubble = $("user_promo_bubble"); if (!bubble) return; var entry_id = HuffPoUtil.GetEntryID(); if (!entry_id) return; var user_id = parseInt(shared_by.substr(shared_by.indexOf("sb=") + 3)); if (!user_id) return; var badge_type = badge.substr(badge.indexOf("b=") + 2); if (!badge_type) return; script = document.createElement("script"); script.setAttribute("type", "text/javascript"); bubble.appendChild(script); script.setAttribute("src", "/include/share_track.php?a=view&eid=" + entry_id + "&uid=" + user_id + "&b=" + badge_type + "&cb=handle_promo_username"); }); } Overloaded: 7 Things You Should Know About Your Internet-Interrupted Brain (PHOTOS)

Information is physical. Nicholas Carr's excellent new book The Shallows looks at what happens if we spend eight or more hours a day jockeying with the internet, video games and cell phones. Turns out, it changes the brain. A lot. Here are the ways in which information-overload negatively affects cognitive functioning, plus some ways to regain your brain.

Broken Attention

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When engaged in any task all the human brain really has is attention, our ability to focus and respond. And our attention only functions inside the shell of what cognitive psychologists call working memory.

Too many interruptions, as Carr points out, and you lose your ability to move information from working into long term memory, where we can retrieve, contemplate and re-enact it -- in other words, think. Long term memories are for many of us our brain's "savings." They're what we will depend on in life to work and survive. We need such memories for learning, for pleasure and for creativity, and happen far less if we ceaselessly multitask through multimedia.

The new ways we use our brains also provokes hyper-arousal, the nervous, keyed up feeling that comes from doing so many things all at once. Too much arousal and your buzzing brain can't think straight. Without good long term memory and the thoughtful, deeper learning it provides, youngsters may never fully accomplish what they might. They run the risk of spending their lives as flunkies, rather than getting their chance to be the boss.

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So it's time to take your brain back. Use it. Enjoy it. Challenge it. Walk in a park -- you'll grow new brain cells. On your walk back from work, sing a song and move to the music. Read a book -- from cover to cover. Cook a meal with the kids.

Don't worry. Your computer, cell phone, iPad, and video consoles will do just fine without you.
They won't miss you at all.

 

Comments

[MaryBethC3]

This is a very good arti

[eedee]

I really like this article. It's so nice and very good. :) And the comments are the best of good comments. Peace!!

[zygion]

No, information is not physical. That is as far as I got. I haven't the attention span to read the whole thing.

[BetteB]

Except for information is NOT physical, because information is MEANING given to symbols or other data interpreted by a Consciousness. The medium the information is transferred or encoded ON or IN may be or seem physical, but information itself, again is meaning. Information is nonphysical, digital, a nonphysical digital information system called Consciousness.

The symbols you are interpreting right now, these letters creating these words in this language with all the complexity of meanings that we each, uniquely have built upon the specific symbols in these specific patterns is nothing until one person interprets it for meaning which is information.

This article has no information until interpreted by a Consciousness for meaning, and the meaning is going to be slightly or greatly different for each individual because we have all had slightly, or greatly different experiences with which meanings are built from, in the manner posited by Les Vygotsky.

As long as we thing we have to keep up the speed of human interaction with the speed of our technology we will continue to experience society wide mass mental dis-ease. We need time to really understanding what the other person is saying, to reflectively listen so that mistakes can be avoided, and efficiency can actually begins to happen again. People can't be expected to live at the speed of our technology, it is hurting us as a society.
Love
Bette S Baysinger

[Eraser]

Bleh, this is just more of the same "video games will rot your brain and all our electronics are destroying communication" garbage I've seen all my life from people who can't "work" their cell phones.

Video games aren't going to hurt your children's minds at all, and certainly not turn them drug addicts. I'm a shining example of it. Been playing such games constantly since I was a small child. Back in school, I was always years ahead of others in reading and vocabulary, and critical thinking. Modifying them for fun even gave me the skill I now need to get a business of the ground.

[Bambang Sugiharto]

Brain needs gudance by The Creator of it. He is Allah.

[Mario Trujillo]

Whatever

[mccord82]

No he's not.

[Zeastofeden]

8 - Can't manage complete thoughts.

[KrautMan]

Like our muscle tissue, our bones, our internal organs or our senses, the brain reconfigures itself for what it is used most. Our environment challenges us with tasks which require other skills and our brains rewire accordingly. Not necessarily a bad thing. Oh, look, a new facebook notificati....

[mlaiuppa]

The last two are throwaways so six. Four out of six were on attention.

[Louise Holmes]

Your advice that we should be Paying Attention to Attention sounds exactly like Dr. Les Fehmi's work. His book, "The Open Focus Brain: Harnessing the Power of Attention" teaches you about the types of attention, how to move between the different types, and how to deploy them all at once in "Open Focus Attention". His extensive research shows that most of us spend too much of our time stuck in one mode, with the result that we suffer anxiety, we get mentally stuck and creatively blocked, we have physical symptoms, all of which can go away when you do the simple brain exercises to develop your Attentional Flexibility.

[johnsopinion]

When I begin reading an article that starts with "Information is physical", I know right away this author is in trouble.

Then:
"Here are the ways in which information-overload negatively affects cognitive functioning, plus some ways to regain your brain."

And between those two phrases the author pays his dues to his "betters" in hopes of joining their circle. He accepts their premise without question and convolutes his reasoning abilities to make them work. [ A mind is a terrible thing to waste.]

To the "... ways to regain your brain" at the end, I agree.
Everything else? Naaah.

[DirkJohanson]

hey, watch what you are saying about one of my shrinks! If they truly are his "betters," it probably is largely because he is unfortunately situated himself in the intellectually dead humidity-laced environs of Sarasota, Florida.

[angrymanspokane]

I didn't even have the attention span to finish the entire article...

[Yinka Daniel - Elebute]

The brain has been made to perform multifaceted functions that it can manipulate successfully, but with focused attention to get the best out of its use; ultimate brain performances is predicated on focusing on an issue that is of critical importance i.e. intellectual pursuits, thinking patterns, working on new projects or solving problems etc to get the best results. When concentration is diverse and not stable, thinking outputs are warped or unsteady and seen as unfocused with unreliable results. That is why multitasking so prevalent presently is gradually eroding genuine creativity among the populace and what we see is a society that is generally unfocused with little output of successful performances, because of divided attention.

[calmandpresent]

You say, "ultimate brain performances is predicated on focusing on an issue that is of critical importance". Then what about effect of meditation, yoga, and simply being still on our brain performance. Ultimate brain performance from focusing on nothing, except the breath perhaps. After periods of rest, calm, and rejuvenation the body is able to be more intently focused on one thing. So the key is from going to rest (sleep, mediation, relaxation) to concentration. Brain performance is based on doing one thing at a time yes, but I think if society was more mindful and actually took moments to relax (no tv, little noise, etc) then divided attention would be less of a problem. So instead of focusing on one thing, how about focusing on nothing first. Clear the mind and start anew. Nice post though. Thank you for the insightful comment.

[EvitaLuisa]

False dichotomy -- who ever said that thinking about "nothing" in a supremely focused way is not thinking? I think you're missing the post's point with: "Then what about [the] effect of meditation, yoga, and simply being still on our brain performance [?]"

[SisterAnn]

I have the TV blaring and am blogging on Huffington Post.

Life is good.

Don't even think about making me feel bad about it.

[SisterAnn]

I read the writings of an old philospher who was worried about people reading the weekly newspaper. He felt it would take too much of their mental energy.

[Cookie Monsta]

I agree. I push back against a lot of this thought school as curmudgeon condemnation of the new generation and it's new fangled connectedness. The only thing I generally agree with is, Turn off the TV. It's mostly a waste of time ad should never be on for 'background sound'. Also, people wandered dazed through their days not paying attention long before we had social networking and iPhones. Not paying attention is a bad idea but it's not new.