Lecotrial one had us look at sections of an article by N. Katherine Hayles (‘Hyper and Deep Attention: The Generational Divide in Cognitive Modes’, Profession, 2007. pp 187-199) which proved rather interesting. I had never really thought consciously much about the difference generationally with attention to media as learning resources. It’s hard to  get away from my phone, Facebook, or even music while trying to do something like study, which can really affect the time it takes to get things done. It’s not as if I’m attempting to multi-task in order to be more efficient, I’m simply getting distracted by the constant influx and availability of the media content around me. I can say that the time I’ve spent actually writing this is far longer than it needs to be as I lose my thought pattern every time my phone flashes it’s little blue LED, seducing me into engaging in another session of useless scrolling.

So I completely understand the concept of hyper attention and deep attention, and I can really feel the difference between them. I remember while studying in year 12, 2013, being able to push out a 1500 word essay in around two hours, read long chapters and excerpts and sit for more than an hour or two solving maths problems. After a gap year where the only concentration I ever had to do what making Big-Macs for 8 hours a day, I’ve lost (temporarily, I hope) the ability to focus on one stimulus for an extended period of time. This lack of engagement in deep-attention over the last 16 months has really shown me how much hyper-attention can be a disadvantage to me in regards to my learning.