‘Since 2000 our attention spans have dropped by four seconds, from 12 seconds to eight. The attention span of a goldfish is nine seconds’
A t the turn of the century, just half of all adults in the UK said they had a mobile phone. Fast-forward 15 years, and that figure stands at over 93 per cent of all adults. The rise of the mobile phone has been a marked one, and the fact that the increased capabilities and ownership of mobile phones has had profound impacts on how we live our lives has not gone unnoticed, particularly with regards to the realms of social media. Many would argue that the rapid rise and influence of mobile phones and similar devices has been for the good: the flood of support for free speech following the attacks in Paris earlier this year, characterised by the hashtag #JeSuisCharlie is a good example of this. Others have claimed that the 61 per cent increase in the take-up of smartphones by Britons since 2000 – numbers replicated in developed countries across the globe – is destroying sociability in the true sense of the word, and reducing our attention spans drastically. As an experiment, I am writing with my phone next to me, to see how frequently it is possible to be distracted by social media, text messages and other instant alerts. I normally don’t work with my phone next to me – which is perhaps in itself testament to the distracting power of smartphones – so am interested to see how frequently messages pop up. On my phone, notifications are permitted from my school email, my Gmail account, Facebook, Messenger, Whatsapp, Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram and Sky Sports Score Centre, as well as the default text message and phone call alerts. An area where the impact of these huge technological advances has not been acknowledged quite so keenly is in the world of education, although it would seem that this won’t be the case for much longer. While mobile phones have traditionally been seen as a nuisance in the classroom (I remember being told only five years ago that we weren’t allowed to use our phones anywhere on campus at Dulwich), increasingly they are being tolerated more and more, with teachers permitting their use for taking photos Received: Snapchats : 2 Received: Whatsapp message :
of the board instead of taking notes, using them to note down homework and, following the introductions of how to install it onto an iPhone in the past 12 months, the use of school email to forward work or explain absences. The embracing of technology by various departments in the school in recent months and years is also testament to the increasing view of teachers that technology has a beneficial impact in education. We now have SMARTboard systems in every classroom in the school; a course of lessons on the use of Photoshop by the Art Department for Lower School students; the encouragement of the recording of staged work to improve performance in the Drama Department and in the Music School; and the appointment this year of Mr Recknell, Head of Music Technology.
DIGITAL DISTRACTION? A R E WE B E I N G D R I V E N T O
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This apparent change in mindset can also be seen in provisional plans at the College to roll out Wi-Fi across the campus. In many other schools across the country, the iPad is becoming a ubiquitous sight, with increased support for ‘Bring Your Own Device’ or the implementation of their use in the classroom. In 2013, Apple stated that they had sold 8 million iPads globally for educational purposes. Whether the increased use of technologies such as phones and tablets in schools is a good idea, however, is still open to debate. A report published last year, citing its sources as the National Center for Biotechnology Information, the US National Library of Medicine and The Associated Press, found that since 2000 – a period during which the number of people with mobile phones has doubled – our attention spans have dropped by four seconds, from 12 seconds to eight. To put this into perspective, the attention span of a goldfish is nine seconds. This shockingly large drop-off has been attributed largely to this technological renaissance, where the amount of information and data that is available to, and consumed by, us has risen exponentially.
Illustration by Khalil Gbla (Year 11)
Digital devices – phones, tablets, ‘phablets’, laptops, even smartwatches – are ever more prevalent. Meanwhile, the internet and social media have become central to the way we find information and communicate. In the first of two articles exploring the ways in which digital technology is affecting the lives of boys at Dulwich, Ollie Norton-Smith (Year 13) lives out the pros and cons of being constantly connected in the classroom
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