(Photo: Kate Monkey)
Researchers tested the attention spans of 2,000 people in Canada. They found that their ability to focus on one thing had dropped from 12 seconds to 8 since the year 2000. As goldfish are thought to have an attention span of 9 seconds, this puts us humans a step below them.
The researchers suggested that the practice of constantly reading and using smartphones and other electronic devices has impaired this ability. But the Daily Telegraph explains that this finding more likely reflects a general trend in technological interest:
Bruce Morton, a researcher with the University of Western Ontario's Brain and Mind Institute, suggested it is the result of humans craving information.
"When we first invented the car, it was so novel," he said.
"The thought of having an entertainment device in the car was ridiculous because the car itself was the entertainment.
"After a while, travelling for eight hours at a time, you'd had enough of it. The brain is bored. You put radios in the car and video displays.
"Why? Because after the first 10 minutes of the drive I've had enough already. I understand this.
"Just because we may be allocating our attention differently as a function of the technologies we may be using, it doesn't mean that the way our attention actually can function has changed."
-via The Presurfer