this post was submitted on 13 Feb 2024
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Honestly it’s annoying as fuck. Nobody asked for YouTube to become TikTok. In fact, I feel like we’d need to go in the opposite direction…
It’s sadly a fact that attention spans have gotten worse over the years. When it’s too much effort for people to watch a ten minute video or read more than a paragraph of text, we’re in serious trouble.
I’m doing my part by rewarding creators who put out actual quality content in longer videos. But I fear they’ve got a difficult time ahead if this trend continues.
Interesting to note that this isn't necessarily a fact, as at the very least there hasn't been any research to support this widely held notion.
Busting the Attention Span Myth offers a higher level overview concerning the subject.
There's also this video that covers some of that article but also digs through other sources, listed in the description.
There certainly have been studies on it, like this one:
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/490177
But you’re right in that more empirical evidence would be nice. Right now, everyone ‘knows’ that attention spans are worse. We can feel it in ourselves, and we see it in others, according to surveys.
But it’s hard to quantify how much or the exact reasons. Even research like the one above points out that it’s not just social media. It’s basically everything, all at once, which makes it hard to focus.
More evidence would certainly be good. Either we discover that it’s nothing to worry about or we discover that it’s a thing we should definitely attempt to fix before it gets worse.
Ah, thanks for the link! It's definitely a bummer that there isn't more research, especially regarding individuals (as your linked research notes, its focus was on collective attention), and what little research there is is more to do with marketing than science.