Reading Analysis Sam Anderson book reviewer for New York magazine and writer of many articles like, In Defense of Distraction, Anderson has primarily become interested in the way culture and our habits of reading has drastically changed with technology. In the article In Defense of Distraction, Anderson explores the poor attention one has developed throughout the decades and how this attention has distracted the human mind in a way that it has centered to our cultural attention. It is an inevitable habit we seem to apply in our everyday life’s, in our yoga class one a week, the cancer slowly spreading across our body, the pretty little liars show that is shown every Tuesday that seems to not be enough. We seem to pay attention all the time …show more content…
A system that scientist have observed for example multitasking, when overload, the brain shifts from responsible for memory to responsible for tasks, this results in difficulty to learn the task or remember the action you have made. It is in fact, a possible struggle the world is suffering, some more than others, could be the poverty of attention. Anderson has taken in his own hands to explore and interact with a variety of experts, for example David Meyer, who while interacting with, is distracted with the universe daily activities, manages to respond to Andersons crisis of attention by stating, “People aren’t aware what’s happening to their mental processes”, he says, “in the same way that people years ago couldn’t look into their lungs …show more content…
It not only brings an understanding and a clear analysis in the beginning of the writing but it helps to know the different perspectives of famous intellectual experts of, interactive connections and living in a life of ‘multitasking’. It allows the readers like myself, to understand the variety of opinions and perspective of connections in the 21st century and how it differentiates throughout the centuries and the way we adapt to it. For example, the expert Merlin Mann advice towards the writer, “There is no shell, there’s no fancy pen, there’s no notebook or nap or Firefox extension or hack that’s gonna help you figure out why the fuck you’re here.” The way he precisely states this towards the writer makes it a clear connection between the reader and writer and allows one to analyze the writing and why it’s being written for the reader. In which, Mann later on continues mentioning, “Where you allow your attention to go ultimately says more about you as human being than anything that you put in your mission statement… “If you allow that to be squandered by other people who are as bored as you are, it’s gonna say a lot about who you are as a person.” With this quote I finish my understanding of the writer and its purpose towards the audience making it clear
Driving Us to Distraction Summary-Response Paper The essay, ‘Driving us to Distraction’ by Gilbert Cruz is about the dangers of hands-free technology while driving. The author argues that while driving and talking on a cell phone is deadly, using hands-free technology is not that much better of a choice. He supports his argument by citing a 2003 National Highway Traffic Safety Administration study that found cellphone use to be a serious hazard on the road and by mentioning a series of simulator tests conducted in 2007 by a psychology professor at the University of Utah named David Strayer.
In the article “Addicted to Distraction” by Tony Schwartz, he argues that the internet has a relentless pull on humans. He goes into detail on how the internet interrupts all daily activity. Schwartz also explains how he is also a victim to the internet and how he is overcoming the overuse of it. The internet does have a grasp on the attention of humans. People willingly give up their primary focus and activities just to check their devices. People are imprisoned to the internet and don’t even realize that it is leading to a deterioration of their learning ability.
Tony Schwartz wrote an article called “ Addicted to Distraction” on November 28, 2016 to inform the readers about how the internet is a distraction and how distractions can affect your life. One of the main points in this article is that people use the internet for non important things. Another point is stated in paragraph 14, “ The problem is that we humans have a very limited reservoir of will and discipline.” Through out the article, Shwartz did not only write the article to only talk about his own addiction, he also wrote it to where the readers can relate to it and to compare it to their very own distraction.
Lauren Shinozuka wrote “The Dangers of Digital Distractedness” for a class assignment. She is a college student that lives in the world of technology and internet. Her idea to address how dependent the world has become on technology without even realizing it. Lead her to her own evaluation of her life and how technology has changed how she deals and interacts with people.
In the essay “Multitasking can make you lose … Um … Focus” Alina Tugend exams why multitasking can make you lose focus. Tugend explains what multitasking is in the first section she also explains why it is bad. She then brings in a professor to explain how multitasking works in a scientific way. Alina Tugend then uses case studies to show how multitasking can cause loss of focus and impairment in motor activities. She then shows how multitasking can actually delay your progress on completing projects by constantly switching to different tasks. Tugend then sums it all up by trying to teach us how to better ourselves and to not multitask.
T.S. Elliot once wrote, “Distracted from distraction by distraction.” This line comes from Eliot’s “Burnt Norton,” Four Quartets. This quote means that we are letting the distraction of the internet distract us, or today’s teens, from the distraction of our daily lives. I challenge the decision to allow teenagers excessive access to social media and texting. These media outlets are doing more than just distracting today’s youth: it’s affecting their health, social life, and school career.
Matt Richtel, another journalist agrees that focusing has become harder with the increase in the use of technology. He suggests the reason is because of how we obtain the information. “Scientists say juggling email, phone calls and other incoming information can change how people think and behave. They say out ability to focus is being undermined by bursts of information. These play to a primitive impulse to respond to immediate
Students may easily lose their attention and concentration with easy access to such incredibly rich store of information. With such new technologies as television, internet and social networks, people nowadays tend to multitask more often as they have easy access to large amount of information. However, such easy access may sometimes be a distraction. Study report “Your Brain on Computers” shows that heavy multitaskers perform up to 20% worse on most tests compared to performance of light multitaskers. Working efficiency of people, who multitask, are claimed to be significantly lower. The same is with concentration. As a result, they are not engaged in working process. Students tend to be easily distracted with this situation. For example, combining doing homework with operating on Twitter, phone or YouTube results in poor engagement of a student into deep thinking process, according to Winifred Gallagher, who is the author of Rapt. He also points out that nowadays high school and college students have decreased capacity of serious thinking because of multitasking and distraction. Moreover, Tyler Cowen, economist and famous blogger, claims that nowadays information tends to come in shorter and smaller portions and that explains why our generation encourages short reading. Since online information is always presented in short written passages, the web prevents user from concentration and contemplation. As an illustration, Nicholas Carr, the speaker at MIT and Harvard,
Communication with our society and the aptitude for reading has been transformed by the Internet as we, no matter who we are or what we use, adapt to the mechanism of technology and become a less intelligent, shallow community. Due to the many hours we spend on our electronic devices and the fast-paced reading we’ve adjusted to, our brains have become psychologically less perceptive of how the Internet is affecting our everyday lives. We need to make note of our daily habits and how much time we spend online, for the Internet will continue to affect generation after
In the essay “Reading and Thought”, Dwight MacDonlad talked about the kind of poor reading people are attached to in modern society. MacDonald believed reading materials such as Times and New York Times are too overwhelming for the readers. Readers tend to skim through the reading materials because most of the reading do not have any connections with their daily lives. Moreover, MacDoanld claimed that the readings people do these days are not thoughtful. The readings are rather irrelevant toward the readers. It is because the journalists to produce dull pieces of readings which are meant to be skimmed through without having too much thoughts involved. As the journalists do not have much consideration of the materials they produced. To the journalists the readings they produce are just a series of news that should be read driftly and left behind with no thoughful idea needed to be informed. These effects caused modern society to have a poor reading habits because people do not reflect and give time to think about the readings they did. Readers casually accept the readings even though they do not have provide any resourceful information for the readers.
Carr’s premise is that the Web is interfering with our ability to focus on lengthy material. On the contrary, the internet is actually aiding our ability to focus on reading. This holds true for younger children, who are known as the digital natives in our generation. In a research conducted by The National Center for Education shows that “by altering the mode of reading material from traditional paper-based reading to online reading,” the interest of elementary school children increased (Wright 367). Because children of the 21st century are surrounded by technology, they are more likely to gear towards digital media for their mode of learning. Contrary to Carr’s view that the internet “is chipping away [the] capacity for concentration and contemplation,” these children are more likely to read and focus as a result of
Carr discusses the effects that the Internet has on our minds and the way we think, as well as the way media has changed. Our minds no longer focus. When in conversation with people we are constantly distracted by the technological advances our era has brought. Text messages, emails, pop culture drama has all taken
Using the internet for so long has made us addicted, and we constantly rely on it. If you are doing a simple task, such as reading a book, it is a lot harder to concentrate because of the distraction that comes with the Net. Carr’s take on this is
(Attention Getter) Reading is a hobby that many of us can or already do enjoy, but what if I told you that the benefits of reading can stretch far beyond a little ease-of-mind? (Thesis): Some claim that readers will be able to enjoy a notably longer life than those who do not read. (Relevance): Out of the lazing pastimes that we occupy our little free-time with, very few of them have such a considerable, long-term effects as these claims
Cell phones and technology in general has advanced a lot over the last ten years. Allowing students to be able to take their phones or devices wherever they want in today’s society. Thus bringing forward the issue of cell phone distraction in the classroom.