{"id":132,"date":"2010-06-27T21:30:59","date_gmt":"2010-06-27T21:30:59","guid":{"rendered":"\/blog\/post\/2010\/06\/27\/Is-the-Internet-Destroying-Your-Brain-Try-This-Test.aspx"},"modified":"2010-06-27T21:30:59","modified_gmt":"2010-06-27T21:30:59","slug":"is-the-internet-destroying-your-brain-try-this-test","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thebirdfeeder.us\/blog\/2010\/06\/is-the-internet-destroying-your-brain-try-this-test\/","title":{"rendered":"Is the Internet Destroying Your Brain? Try This Test"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"image\"<\/a> 
Andrew Price Andrew Price
Occupation: Web Editor
Location: Venice Beach<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.good.is\/post\/is-the-internet-destroying-your-brain-try-this-test\/?gt1=48001<\/a><\/p>\n

Yesterday, The New York Times<\/em> published a piece<\/a> about how the constant distraction of digital media damages "creativity and deep thought, interrupting work and family life." It’s not a new worry. A few years ago, Nicholas Carr wrote a story for the Atlantic<\/em> called "Is Google Making You Stupid?<\/a>" and his new book, The Shallows<\/em>, expands on that theme<\/a>, arguing that the internet is eroding our capacity for "solitary, single-minded concentration."<\/p>\n

So is the internet actually bad for our brains? A handful of bloggers have reported feeling that it’s been bad for theirs<\/a>. But why not find out for yourself? The Times<\/em> has two interesting cognitive games you can play online that will test how easily distracted you are<\/a> and how good you are at switching between tasks<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I’m someone who spends my entire working day being distracted by online content, and then creating new chunks of online content designed to distract others. My results are below.<\/p>\n

I scored well on the first test<\/a>. I’m hard to distract. In fact, I had a perfect score when faced with the most distractions.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

On the second test<\/a>, it was a mixed bag. I didn’t make a single mistake, but I was really slow.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

My own subjective feeling is that the internet has shortened my attention span. If I sit down to read a book at night, it sometimes takes an alarmingly long time for my brain to settle into it. And I have to fight the urge to screw around on my phone on the commute home. Jonah Lehrer, contra<\/em> Carr, argues<\/a> that the neuroscientific evidence to back this up is thin.<\/p>\n

How did you do on those tests? Have your internet habits affected your mind?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Andrew Price Andrew Price Occupation: Web Editor Location: Venice Beach http:\/\/www.good.is\/post\/is-the-internet-destroying-your-brain-try-this-test\/?gt1=48001 Yesterday, The New York Times published a piece about how the constant distraction of digital media damages "creativity and deep thought, interrupting work and family life." It’s not a new worry. A few years ago, Nicholas Carr wrote a story for the Atlantic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-132","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebirdfeeder.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebirdfeeder.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebirdfeeder.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebirdfeeder.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebirdfeeder.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=132"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thebirdfeeder.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebirdfeeder.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebirdfeeder.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebirdfeeder.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}