What is wrong with teenagers these days?
Rebecka Price Dollieslager English 111 3/29/15
Children between 13 and 18 years old, on average, use six types of media simultaneously, when they are not in school. This leads to something known as paying “continuous partial attention”. According to Sarah Sparks' article in Education Week, “continuous partial attention” affects the ability to retain the information one needs. As a result, they tend to miss things entirely. The brain cannot “be in two places at once”, for it cannot process two tasks at once. Trying to do two tasks at once only makes the tasks take longer than doing them one at a time. The tasks will eventually hit a “bottleneck” situation and the brain will decide which has higher priority. Making a choice means that there is a higher value in one task over the other. Therefore, they can’t be done simultaneously. People that multitask more, perform poorly on memory and attention tests when compared to those that do one thing at a time. Test takers that stop and answer texts during a test have not only lost time, they also lose their train of thought that would probably be beneficial to them passing. One study shows that this loss of thought can cost about an entire letter grade lower, in terms of score. The interruptions of texts, phone calls, emails, and the like while reading makes readers lose their place. So they go from simple eye movements to scanning entire pages looking for where they left off. The original “Marshmallow Test” shows that children who can hold off on their impulses tend to do better in their lives than those who cannot. In reality, there’s no such thing as legitimate multitasking, except in a computer. The act of simultaneously doing two things at once is impossible for the human brain. However one can learn to know when to switch from one task to another, which is a valuable ability that should be taught. It should be taught because it teaches impulse control, time management and many things that often lead to success later in life (Sparks).
Works Cited Sparks, Sarah. "Studies on Multitasking Highlight Value of Self-Control." Education Week. 15 <http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2012/05/16/31multitasking_ep.h31.html?tkn=PTWFGpBwR5o7bKrnCvQZswL8Vr+lUoJB+62c&cmp=clp-edweek>.