Research conducted by Clifford Nass and his associates at Stanford University was based on two assumptions:

o That multitaskers are superhumans, capable peak performance, while completing several tasks simultaneously

o That multitaskers have a highly developed ability to switch attention from one task to another in an orderly way

What in fact did the research reveal?

“We all bet that multitaskers were going to be stars at something, We were absolutely shocked. We lost all our bets. It turns out that multitaskers are terrible at every aspect of multitasking. They’re terrible at ignoring irrelevant information; they’re terrible at keeping information in their head nicely and neatly organized; and they’re terrible at switching from one task to another.”

In The Organized Mind: Thinking Straight in the Age of Information Overload, Daniel J. Levitin has this to say:

“We all want to believe that we can do many things at once and that our attention is infinite, but this is a persistent myth. What we really do is shift our attention rapidly from task to task. Two bad things happen as a result: We don’t devote enough attention to any one thing, and we decease the quality of attention applied to any task. When we do one thing — uni-task — there are beneficial changes in the brain’s daydreaming network and increased connectivity…You’d think people would realize that they’re bad at multitasking and would quit. But a cognitive illusion sets in, fueled in part by a dopamine-adrenaline feedback loop, which multitaskers [begin italics] think [end italics] they are doing great.”

When multitasking, we don’t get more work done. We get less work done and of a much lower quality. Now you know.

* * *

To read the complete report, Cognitive Control in Media Multitaskers, please click here.

Tragically, Clifford Nass died November 2, 2013, at Stanford Sierra Camp near South Lake Tahoe, after collapsing at the end of a hike. He was only 55.

Clifford Nass earned a B.A. cum laude in mathematics (1981) and a Ph.D. in sociology (1986), both from Princeton University. Before attending graduate school, Nass worked as a computer scientist at Intel Corporation. Nass focused on experimental studies of social-psychological aspects of human-computer interaction. He directed the Communication between Humans and Interactive Media (CHIMe) Lab. The four foci of the CHIMe Lab are: 1) Communication in and between Automobiles: Research on Safety, Information Technology, and Enjoyment (CARSITE); 2) Social and Psychological Aspects of Computing Environments (SPACE), which focuses on mobile and ubiquitous technology; 3) Abilities of People: Personalization, Emotion, Embodiment, Adaptation, Language, and Speech (APPEEALS); and 4) human-robot interaction. He is also co-Director of the Kozmetsky Global Collaboratory, which focuses on developing countries.

To learn more about him and his important work, please click here.

Daniel J. Levitin is the James McGill Professor of Psychology and Music at McGill University, Montreal, where he also holds appointments in the Program in Behavioural Neuroscience, The School of Computer Science, and the Faculty of Education. An award-winning teacher, he now adds best-selling author to his list of accomplishments as “This Is Your Brain on Music” and “The World in Six Songs” were both Top 10 best-sellers, and have been translated into 16 languages. Before becoming a neuroscientist, he worked as a session musician, sound engineer, and record producer working with artists such as Stevie Wonder and Blue Oyster Cult. He has published extensively in scientific journals as well as music magazines such as Grammy and Billboard. Recent musical performances include playing guitar and saxophone with Sting, Bobby McFerrin, Rosanne Cash, David Byrne, and Rodney Crowell.