Concentration? I don't know her

Our attention spans have been hijacked by alerts, scrolling, and messages. Can we break free from the bad habits holding us back?

- Kimberley Bond

I have a confession—it has taken me around 20 minutes to write this sentence. This is not because I am an agonising perfectionist who ponders over every single word. It is because I'm increasingly distracted by literally anything that isn't the task at hand. The moment I'm at my laptop, fingers hovering over the keys as if to start typing; my brain refuses to engage. Maybe I should do the washing-up from lunch? Did I reply to that message on Hinge? I think I'll go and make a cup of tea before I start tackling these emails. Before I know it, I am woefully behind (sorry, boss).

We're living in the era of distraction. There was once a time when I could read a whole book in one sitting, lazing on the sofa, completely engulfed in a fictional narrative world. I could watch three-hour films without getting up once and tell you in (boring) detail which scenes I loved and why. I could sit and have a tasting menu with my best friends without checking if I had a match on Hinge. Now, I can't even make it through one 30-minute episode of Peep Show without scrolling through Instagram for no reason other than to stare mindlessly at people I hardly know. And the sad thing is, it is not even unusual—we have accepted this state of constant distraction. A study from King's College London's Centre for Attention Studies found that 49 per cent of adults felt their attention span was shorter than it used to be, and a similar number (47 per cent) agreed that 'deep thinking' was a thing of the past. Is the incessant pinging of social media, endless news blasts, and instant messaging entirely to blame? Or is something else going on?

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