Multitasking. The art of performing multiple tasks simultaneously? Or a deceptive myth, which tricks us into believing that we can be more efficient?
If I had received
a nickel for every time I heard the phrase “You’re a woman, so you must be able
to multitask”, I wouldn’t be rich, but I would have some money. Sure, just
because I am female I can eat, cook, talk on the phone and read the newspaper
simultaneously. My answer always seem to surprise people: I have lousy multitasking abilities. For a
long time I was actually embarrassed of my incapacity of juggling many tasks
at the same time, as so many other appeared to be doing. Clearly I have some skills
jumping from one task to another, since my teaching work revolves around this
ability. However, writing a message on the white board while trying to listen to what
my students are saying to me is virtually impossible. Correcting an essay when
my colleagues are having a conversation in the same room: no can do. Talking to
someone on the phone and being interrupted by another person in the same room
wanting me to pass on a message to the person on the phone: incredibly
annoying. Attempting to chat with my guests while cooking…. well, this has been the subject of many laughs in the past.
Naturally I
can walk and talk at the same time, or read and listen to music simultaneously,
but when it comes to activities where I have to focus and deduce the meaning of
something – especially linguistically – I can only handle one task at the time.
Thankfully, I’m not as worthless as I have imagined. Recent studies suggest
that our brains are hardwired to focus at only one thing at the time. Multitasking
can be destructive and reduce our efficiency considerably. In fact, people who viewed themselves as heavy
multitaskers – and thus more efficient – were worse at multitasking than those
who preferred to do one thing at the time. Consequently, they were less
efficient, because their brains couldn’t filter out irrelevant information. And
this is where it becomes interesting.
The ability
to filter out unnecessary input, as sounds or sights, is important for most
performances that demand our undivided attention. Clearly, this is true of all
people. However, some may have a harder time filtering out irrelevant
information and might appear more comfortable with multitasking. Vice versa,
people with good filtering skills seem much more bothered when forced to
multitask. What I’ve noticed with myself is that what I lack in multitasking
skills I make up for in concentration. In other words, I have no problem focusing on something for hours, given the right circumstances.
Now I’m
curious to know what you think. Are you a good multitasker or not? What is
multitasking? What about having difficulties in filtering out irrelevant information and the ability to focus - does one thing have to exclude the other? I’m eagerly awaiting your comments. :)
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