Are you constantly checking your phone when you should be working? Do you look dead in the eyes of your spouse during a conversation, as your mind wanders to an entirely different topic? Maybe you walk into the kitchen to do one thing, only to end up forgetting what that was and find yourself doing something else?
If you’ve ever wondered about how long (or short) your attention span is, or perhaps even worried that there’s something seriously wrong with your ability to pay attention – you’re not alone.
Leanne, a guest on this episode of Insight, became concerned about her attention span when she caught up with an old friend over lunch, but couldn’t stop checking her phone and thinking about what else she could be doing – like scrolling through her Facebook.
At home, she said she gets distracted by something as trivial as a bad smell, or the noise of someone mowing the lawn. It can take her off task and take up her attention for the entire day.
Some of this week's Insight guests. Source: Insight
“Do other people struggle to sit and apply themselves to a particular task for more than five or 10 minutes at a time? Am I normal?” she said.
Brain training
Insight guest host Janice Petersen asked the “five billion dollar question” (as neuroscientist Paul Dux put it): can we train and increase our attention spans? And how?
Yebin Yoo, 18, is a professional violinist and can practice for eight hours a day if she is preparing for a big performance. She recently completed a course at a prestigious performing arts school in New York.
Yebin knows her attention span is already exceptional but hopes to further improve it.
“That extreme level of concentration where everyone's watching you, every movement, every second and even just one movement wrong, just one millimetre more, can affect the pitch and everything that you're doing,” Yebin told Insight.
Yebin is not alone, a brain surgeon, an elite athlete and an air traffic controller all shared with Insight the tips and tricks they use to focus on something intently for hours on end, and what can happen if you lose focus.
