Your Brain trying to Pay Attention while on Electronics

Here is a quick write-up of the Brains on Electronics Attention Test I did with my 8th graders.  I structure this like a science experiment write-up that my colleagues do....This type of report is not my strong suit, but I try to do a little support of the science folks' work.  (Go here to see all the work we did.)

Spoiler Alert:  Electronics may not be the problem, but lack of intentionality about paying attention may be!

As personal entertainment and information technologies proliferate, educators must consider the complicated mix of benefits and drawbacks of student use of electronic devices, both in school and out.  While the school cannot govern student conduct outside of school hours, the school day is still subject to the control of teachers and administrators.  But even here, education professionals disagree and educational institutions’ policies diverge.  This study is designed to give educators insights into the effects of electronics usage during academic task performance.

Research

Current research on brains and technology tends fairly strongly in one direction--the acknowledgment that electronics have a significant effect on the human brain, especially ones undergoing the intensive development that teenagers’ are.  For instance, some researchers are concerned that we can become addicted--both psychologically and physically--to our technologies.  In the former case, the growing prevalence of technology users who report attitudes such as “things don’t seem quite real until I’ve posted them on social media” reflects a kind of emotional over-attachment to the technologies of digital social life. In the latter case, specifically medical evidence shows that some electronics users may be physiologically addicted to their electronics, as seen in the fact that the mere ring or message chime of the cell phone stimulates a kind of Pavlovian release of dopamine--the pleasure hormone--in the brain.   Other studies find that prolonged use of electronics can stimulate mood change, or cause a decrease in the ability to recognize emotions in live humans.  Some have gone so far as to say we can develop so-called popcorn brains--the need for the “pop” of constant novel sensory stimulation.  In response to all this, many analysts suggest that we be sure to get adequate downtime--away from electronics--for our brains, and that we try to cut back on our screen time usage.

Schools, of course, are particularly concerned about electronics’ effects on academic performance, and with good reason.  Our own (small) survey indicates that students own--or have relatively unlimited access to--prodigious quantities of personal electronic devices.  Indeed, students surveyed for this study owned nearly 6 devices (cell/smart phones, to laptops, to game units) each, and acknowledged using them quite extensively while doing their homework, though not for the purpose of homework.

Given this, we set out to try to discover what we could about the relationship between brains and electronics.   While we could not test broad questions about this, we were able to do an experiment designed to address this question:  What effect, if any, will electronic usage during academic tasks have on performance of that task?

Hypothesis

While preparing this experiment, our review of other research, the consideration of historically comparable cases (the telephone) and the analysis of current electronic technology usage patterns in a sample teenage population led us to hypothesize that undertaking academic tasks requiring focused attention while allowing electronic device usage will cause a decrease in the performance of the attention task.  If testers use electronic distractions during attention tests, then test performance will decrease.

Plan of Experiment

The attention task--designed to simulate something that requires close attention--involved the tester being prompted to watch for either a LETTER or NUMBER.  This would be followed by a letter-number pair. For LETTERs, testers were to identify if the letter was a vowel or consonant; for NUMBERs, odd or even.  Then testers were to click the box indicating the correct designation.  One round of the test includes 20 prompts and answers.  Scores are based on both speed and accuracy.
Take the test!

The test was administered on computers in school.  Two baseline scores, without electronic distraction, were done first (Baseline--Best of the 2 reported below).  For later rounds of the test, students were allowed to play their personal music devices (iPods, MP3, etc.)  This portion included tests with just music devices (with iPods--both scores below), music devices plus “encouraging” text pop-ups in the test (iPods plus--best of the 2), music devices plus “discouraging” text pop-ups in the test (iPods extra--best of the 2), and music devices with a video playing on a screen in the room, with text pop-ups connected to the video (iPods plus video).  When the music devices rounds were completed, all students listened to and performed a mindfulness breathing exercise for 4 minutes, then repeated the test without any device distractions (After Breathing).

Collect and Record Data

2^nd Period Collect and Record Data

	Best Baseline	With iPods	With iPods 2	Ipods plus (best of 2)	iPods extra (best of 2)	iPods plus video (best of 2)	After Breathing
Correct	DATA	17	18	17	18	17	18
Time	DELETED	40	40	46	40	37	33
Score	Apprx 65*	61	66	60	68	65	74

3^rd Period Collect and Record Data 

	Best Baseline	With iPods	With iPods 2	Ipods plus (best of 2)	iPods extra (best of 2)	iPods plus video (best of 2)	After Breathing
Correct	18	17	18	17	18	17	18
Time	45	52	55	47	48	43	35
Score	65	62	64	59	66	64	71

5th Period Collect and Record Data

	Best Baseline	With iPods	With iPods 2	Ipods plus (best of 2)	iPods extra (best of 2)	iPods plus video (best of 2)	After Breathing
Correct	18	17	17	17	18	18	19
Time	44	47	47	47	48	43	38
Score	66	59	58	59	65	65	73

6th Period Collect and Record Data

	Best Baseline	With iPods	With iPods 2	Ipods plus (best of 2)	iPods extra (best of 2)	iPods plus video (best of 2)	After Breathing
Correct	18	17	17	17	18	DATA	18
Time	42	40	38	42	38	DELETED	32
Score	65	63	64	59	69		73

Conclusions

The hypothesis that scores would decrease because of increased electronic distraction does not appear to be confirmed by this set of tests.  While some “distracted” scores drop below the initial baseline scores, others rise above that line.  Further, the later “distracted” (i.e., more distractions) scores sometimes rise above both the baseline and the less “distracted” scores.

The one clear and consistent outcome, however, is the significant improvement in scores after completing the breathing exercise.  A t-test comparison of the highest pre-breathing test scores with the post-breathing test scores (i.e., the test outcome comparison least likely to be statistically significant) returns a two-tailed P value equal to 0.0003. By conventional criteria, this difference is considered to be extremely statistically significant.  

The difference between the pre- and post-breathing exercise scores reflects a change in the focus level of the testers.  At this point, it remains unclear how much the breathing exercise itself, rather than simply the taking of a break, for instance, caused increased performance.  Either way, specific and intentional efforts to relax and focus clearly led to improved test performance.  

This generates questions for further consideration and, possibly, study.  The most relevant to educators is related  to determining the ways that such intentional work on focusing--perhaps by way of breathing exercises--might lead to improved academic engagement and performance.