Distraction is the process of diverting the attention of an individual or group from a desired area of focus and thereby blocking or diminishing the reception of desired information. Distraction is caused by: the lack of ability to pay attention; lack of interest in the object of attention; or the great intensity, novelty or attractiveness of something other than the object of attention. Distractions come from both external sources, and internal sources. External distractions include factors such as visual triggers, social interactions, music, text messages, and phone calls. There are also internal distractions such as hunger, fatigue, illness, worrying, and daydreaming. Both external and internal distractions contribute to the interference of focus. [1]
Distracted driving is a dangerous threat to road safety across the world. While drunk driving rates have been on the decline since 1983, distracted driving has been increasing in recent years. Many feel this incline is due to the widespread prevalence of cell phones. While distracted driving can be attributed to anything that diverts attention away from the road, it is often the cell phone that receives the blame for distracted driving incidents. Most of the recent studies have shown that cell phone usage while driving has striking similarities to the effects of drinking while driving; Cell phones tend to take the driver's attention away from the road and onto itself. With drunk driving, drivers often experience the "looking but not seeing" phenomena. While their eyes do indeed view objects on the road, their brains do not comprehend the meaning behind the image. All levels of distraction while driving are dangerous, and potential drivers are cautioned to keep awareness of their surroundings. [2]
Many psychological studies show that switching between tasks, use of technology, and overstimulation has increased levels of distraction in the school setting. At school, distraction is often viewed as a source of poor performance and misbehavior. Distraction makes focusing on singular, assigned tasks more difficult. Digital components of learning are an emerging component to classroom distraction. Parents, teachers, students, and scholars all have opinions about how technology either benefits or harms a students' focus in an academic setting. Research studies show that neuron circuits indicate a decrease in ability to be attentive to goal relative stimulus with the addition of distracting stimuli interference. School-aged students, with developing brains, are more apt to conflicting stimuli while trying to focus. Large classroom sizes, technology use in and outside the classroom, and less natural stimuli have been seen as contributing factors to deflating test scores and classroom participation. [3]
Multitasking could also be considered as distraction in situations requiring full attention on a single object (e.g., sports, academic tests, performance). The issue of distraction in the workplace is studied in interruption science. According to Gloria Mark, a leader in interruption science, the average knowledge worker switches tasks every three minutes, and, once distracted, a worker takes nearly a half-hour to resume the original task. [4]
In works of fiction, distraction is often used as a source of comedy, whether the amusement comes from the gullibility of those distracted or the strangeness of whatever is utilized to create the distraction. Examples of comedic distraction, also called comic relief, can oftentimes be found in Shakespearean plays. In Hamlet , Shakespeare includes a scene in which two gravediggers joke around about Ophelia's death. While her death is by no means meant to be funny, a small break from the sadness helped to appease the groundlings in Shakespeare's time, as well as allow the rest of the audience to take a break from the constant "doom and gloom" of his tragedies. [5]
Rabbi Alan Lew in his book, This is Real and You are Completely Unprepared, writes, "The thoughts that carry our attention away [during prayer or meditation] are never insignificant thoughts and they never arise at random. We lose our focus precisely because these thoughts need our attention and we refuse to give it to them. This is why they keep sneaking up on our attention and stealing it away. This is how it is that we come to know ourselves as we settle deeply into the act of prayer [or meditation]". According to philosopher Damon Young, distraction is chiefly an inability to identify, attend to or attain what is valuable, even when we are hard-working or content.
Distraction was a key battle strategy in tales from the Trojan War. According to the legend, the Greeks seemed to have retreated by pretending to sail away. In their stead, they left a large wooden horse, which the Trojans then chose to bring back within their walls in order to celebrate their supposed victory. The Greeks used the Trojans' pride as a distraction, as they actually hid men within the Trojan Horse in order to let the rest of the army in during the cover of night. The Greeks then entered and destroyed the city of Troy, effectively ending the 10-year standoff that was the Trojan War. [6]
Distraction can suggest fake targets. In open field with mass military strategy, sometimes a contingent of troops distracts the enemy army to expose their flank, or to draw them away from a key point or fortification. Flares can also divert enemy soldiers' attention.
Distraction is useful in the management of pain and anxiety. Dentists, for example may intentionally hum an annoying tune or engage in small talk just to create a diversion from the dental surgery process. Topical ointments containing capsaicin, provide a superficial burning sensation that can momentarily distract a patient's attention away from the more serious pain of arthritis or muscle strain. A similar effect is made by oil of cloves, which produces a burning sensation on the gums, and distracts from toothache.
Distraction is often used as a coping mechanism for short-term emotion regulation. When presented with an unpleasant reality, humans often choose to occupy their attention with some other reality in order to remain in a positive mental state. This is referred to as 'procrastination' when the unpleasant reality is in the form of work. The natural human inclination to distract oneself was put to the test when the Department of Psychology at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (Humboldt University of Berlin) held an experiment to study distraction. The goal of the experiment was to examine whether the effects of distraction on where subjects held their attention during repeated picture processing is changed by regular emotional functions. Furthermore, they hypothesized that while distraction assists in short-term emotional regulation, it is actually harmful in the long term. In order to do so, the experimenters had subjects view 15 unpleasant pictures (Set A) and "attend" to them (meaning the subjects were asked to pay full attention to the pictures). Next, the subjects were shown 15 unpleasant pictures (Set B) and were asked to distract themselves from the pictures (meaning they were to think about anything other than the picture on the screen; their example was to think about "the way to the supermarket"). Finally, the subjects were shown 15 neutral pictures (Set C) and were asked to attend to them. After 10 minutes of rest, the subjects entered the "re-exposure phase", which repeated the experiment- this time requiring the subjects to pay attention to all of the sets, including Set B. This experiment was performed on 3 separate blocks of participants. To examine the state of the subjects' brain, the subject was to wear "Ag/AgCl-electrodes from 61 head sites using an EasyCap electrode system with an equidistant electrode montage. Additional external electrodes were placed below the left (IO1) and right eye (IO2), below T1 (ground), on the nasion, and on the neck." The subjects were also asked to rate the unpleasantness of the picture on the screen on a scale of 1-9. To test whether distraction in the first phase resulted in increased responsiveness during the re-exposure phase, experimenters "compared mean unpleasantness ratings between unpleasant pictures that were previously presented in the attend (previous attention) versus distract (previous distraction) condition using a paired t-test". The end results of the experiment were as such:
Essentially, when exposed to an unpleasant image, the subject feels initial discomfort. However, after being exposed to it once with their full attention, the subject feels much less discomfort the second time they are exposed. When the subject distracts themselves from the initial unpleasant image, the subject feels more discomfort the second time when they are required to attend to the image. The experimenters' conclusion is thus: "the obtained results suggest that distraction inhibits elaborate processing of the stimulus' meaning and adapting to it." [7]
Con artists and shoplifters sometimes create a distraction to facilitate their crimes. Armed robbers may create a distraction after their robbery, such as pulling a fire alarm, to create confusion and aid in their getaway. In a more serious case of crime, the Columbine shooters used pipe bombs to distract from the shooting. [8]
Magicians use distraction techniques to draw the audience's attention away from whichever hand is engaged in sleight of hand. Magicians can accomplish this by encouraging the audience to look elsewhere or by having an assistant do or say something to draw the audience's attention away. Sleight of hand is often used in close-up magic, performed with the audience close to the magician, usually within three or four meters, possibly in physical contact. It often makes use of everyday items as props, such as cards and coins. The guiding principle of sleight-of-hand, articulated by legendary close-up magician Dai Vernon, is "be natural". A well-performed sleight looks like an ordinary, natural and completely innocent gesture, change in hand-position or body posture.
It is commonly believed that sleight of hand works because "the hand is quicker than the eye" but this is usually not the case. In addition to manual dexterity, sleight of hand depends on the use of psychology, timing, misdirection, and natural choreography in accomplishing a magical effect. Misdirection is perhaps the most important component of the art of sleight of hand. The magician choreographs his actions so that all spectators are likely to look where he or she wants them to. More importantly, they do not look where the performer does not wish them to look. Two types of misdirection are timing and movement. Timing is simple: by allowing a small amount of time to pass after an action, events are skewed in the viewer's mind. Movement is a little more complicated. A phrase often used is "A larger action covers a smaller action". Care must be taken however to not make the larger action so big that it becomes suspicious. [9]
Propagandizing techniques of distraction are used in media manipulation. The idea is to encourage the public to focus on a topic or idea that the compliance professional feels is supportive of their cause. By focusing attention, a particular ideology can be made to seem the only reasonable choice. Oftentimes, media competition is the driving force for media bias, manipulation, and distraction. If a media company can find an audience with a united ideology, it then develops a loyal consumer base, as its consumers will be happy with the way media is presented. A so-called "conservative" media outlet would not hire a "liberal" reporter, as they would run the risk of alienating its viewership. [10]
Distraction is also important in studies of media multitasking, or the simultaneous use of multiple media at once. This behavior has emerged as increasingly common since the 1990s, especially among younger media users. [11] Studies show that while humans are predisposed to the desire to multitask, most people struggle to have legitimate productivity while multitasking. Instead of giving a task full attention, the split attention that multitasking necessitates can cause one task to be a distraction to another. [12] On the other hand, some studies show that multitasking has the potential for a high-risk high-reward situation, leading to the idea that success can arise from multitasking if one is good at the activity. [13]
Advertisers often seek to distract people and divert their attention to advertising content. This has been characterized as attention theft. [14] [15]
Attention or focus, is the concentration of awareness on some phenomenon to the exclusion of other stimuli. It is the selective concentration on discrete information, either subjectively or objectively. William James (1890) wrote that "Attention is the taking possession by the mind, in clear and vivid form, of one out of what seem several simultaneously possible objects or trains of thought. Focalization, concentration, of consciousness are of its essence." Attention has also been described as the allocation of limited cognitive processing resources. Attention is manifested by an attentional bottleneck, in terms of the amount of data the brain can process each second; for example, in human vision, less than 1% of the visual input data stream of 1MByte/sec can enter the bottleneck, leading to inattentional blindness.
Pickpocketing is a form of larceny that involves the stealing of money or other valuables from the person or a victim's pocket without them noticing the theft at the time. It may involve considerable dexterity and a knack for misdirection. A thief who works in this manner is known as a pickpocket.
Hand-waving is a pejorative label for attempting to be seen as effective – in word, reasoning, or deed – while actually doing nothing effective or substantial. It is often applied to debating techniques that involve fallacies, misdirection and the glossing over of details. It is also used academically to indicate unproven claims and skipped steps in proofs, with some specific meanings in particular fields, including literary criticism, speculative fiction, mathematics, logic, science and engineering.
Sleight of hand refers to fine motor skills when used by performing artists in different art forms to entertain or manipulate. It is closely associated with close-up magic, card magic, card flourishing and stealing. Because of its heavy use and practice by magicians, sleight of hand is often confused as a branch of magic; however, it is a separate genre of entertainment and many artists practice sleight of hand as an independent skill. Sleight of hand pioneers with worldwide acclaim include Dan and Dave, Ricky Jay, Derek DelGaudio, David Copperfield, Yann Frisch, Norbert Ferré, Dai Vernon, Cardini, Tony Slydini, Helder Guimarães and Tom Mullica.
In theatrical magic, misdirection is a form of deception in which the performer draws audience attention to one thing to distract it from another. Managing audience attention is the aim of all theater, and the foremost requirement of all magic acts. Whether the magic is of a "pocket trick" variety or a large stage production, misdirection is the central secret. The term describes either the effect or the sleight of hand or patter that creates it.
Coin magic is the manipulating of coins to entertain audiences. Because coins are small, most coin tricks are considered close-up magic or table magic, as the audience must be close to the performer to see the effects. Though stage conjurers generally do not use coin effects, coin magic is sometimes performed onstage using large coins. In a different type of performance setting, a close-up coin magician will use a large video projector so the audience can see the magic on a big screen. Coin magic is generally considered harder to master than other close-up techniques such as card magic, as it requires great skill and grace to perform convincingly, and this requires much practice to acquire.
Annoyance is an unpleasant mental state that is characterized by irritation and distraction from one's conscious thinking. It can lead to emotions such as frustration and anger. The property of being easily annoyed is called irritability.
Inattentional blindness or perceptual blindness occurs when an individual fails to perceive an unexpected stimulus in plain sight, purely as a result of a lack of attention rather than any vision defects or deficits. When it becomes impossible to attend to all the stimuli in a given situation, a temporary "blindness" effect can occur, as individuals fail to see unexpected but often salient objects or stimuli.
This is a glossary of conjuring terms used by magicians.
Directed attention fatigue (DAF) is a neuro-psychological phenomenon that results from overuse of the brain's inhibitory attention mechanisms, which handle incoming distractions while maintaining focus on a specific task. The greatest threat to a given focus of attention is competition from other stimuli that can cause a shift in focus. This is because one maintains focus on a particular thought by inhibiting all potential distractions and not by strengthening that central mental activity. Directed attention fatigue occurs when a particular part of the brain's global inhibitory system is overworked due to the suppression of increasing numbers of stimuli. This temporary condition is not a clinical illness or a personality disorder. It is rather a temporary fatigue of the inhibitory mechanisms in the brain. According to inhibition theory, it is natural for one to alternate between periods of attention and distraction. Although one's efforts may involve very different tasks, each incoming stimulus calls upon the same directed attention mechanism.
Mobile phone use while driving is common but it is dangerous due to its potential for causing distracted driving and subsequent crashes. Due to the number of crashes that are related to conducting calls on a phone and texting while driving, some jurisdictions have made the use of calling on a phone while driving illegal in an attempt to curb the practice, with varying levels of efficacy. Many jurisdictions have enacted laws making handheld mobile phone use illegal. Many jurisdictions allow use of a hands-free device. Driving while using a hands-free device has been found by some studies to provide little to no benefit versus holding the device itself and carrying on a conversation. In some cases restrictions are directed only at minors, those who are newly qualified license holders, or to drivers in school zones. In addition to voice calling, activities such as texting while driving, web browsing, playing video games, or phone use in general may also increase the risk of a crash.
Attention management refers to models and tools for supporting the management of attention at the individual or at the collective level, and at the short-term or at a longer term.
Media multitasking is the concurrent use of multiple digital media streams. Media multitasking has been associated with depressive symptoms and social anxiety by a study involving 318 participants. A 2018 review found that while the literature is sparse and inconclusive, people who do a heavy amount of media multitasking have worse performance in several cognitive domains. One of the authors commented that while the data does not "unambiguously show that media multitasking causes a change in attention and memory," media multitasking is an inefficient practice that requires "task switching" costs including "limitations in auditory and visual processing".
Human multitasking is the concept that one can split their attention on more than one task or activity at the same time, such as speaking on the phone while driving a car.
N2pc refers to an ERP component linked to selective attention. The N2pc appears over visual cortex contralateral to the location in space to which subjects are attending; if subjects pay attention to the left side of the visual field, the N2pc appears in the right hemisphere of the brain, and vice versa. This characteristic makes it a useful tool for directly measuring the general direction of a person's attention with fine-grained temporal resolution.
Distracted driving is the act of driving while engaging in other activities which distract the driver's attention away from the road. Distractions are shown to compromise the safety of the driver, passengers, pedestrians, and people in other vehicles.
Distraction-conflict is a term used in social psychology. Distraction-conflict is an alternative to the first tenet in Zajonc's theory of social facilitation. This first tenet currently seems to be more widely supported than the distraction-conflict model. Zajonc formulates that the presence of an individual generates arousal, and this arousal facilitates well-learned tasks and inhibits complex tasks. The distraction-conflict model states, "in the presence of others there is a conflict between attending to the person and attending to the task". The distraction-conflict model calls this attentional conflict, and says that it is responsible for the arousal of the subject.
Crossmodal attention refers to the distribution of attention to different senses. Attention is the cognitive process of selectively emphasizing and ignoring sensory stimuli. According to the crossmodal attention perspective, attention often occurs simultaneously through multiple sensory modalities. These modalities process information from the different sensory fields, such as: visual, auditory, spatial, and tactile. While each of these is designed to process a specific type of sensory information, there is considerable overlap between them which has led researchers to question whether attention is modality-specific or the result of shared "cross-modal" resources. Cross-modal attention is considered to be the overlap between modalities that can both enhance and limit attentional processing. The most common example given of crossmodal attention is the Cocktail Party Effect, which is when a person is able to focus and attend to one important stimulus instead of other less important stimuli. This phenomenon allows deeper levels of processing to occur for one stimulus while others are then ignored.
Perceptual load theory is a psychological theory of attention. It was presented by Nilli Lavie in the mid-nineties as a potential resolution to the early/late selection debate.
Affect labeling is an implicit emotional regulation strategy that can be simply described as "putting feelings into words". Specifically, it refers to the idea that explicitly labeling one's, typically negative, emotional state results in a reduction of the conscious experience, physiological response, and/or behavior resulting from that emotional state. For example, writing about a negative experience in one's journal may improve one's mood. Some other examples of affect labeling include discussing one's feelings with a therapist, complaining to friends about a negative experience, posting one's feelings on social media or acknowledging the scary aspects of a situation.
