Let this article be your practice.
Try reading till the end without skimming, without doing something else on the side, and giving your full attention to what you’re reading- not the thoughts that will storm your head when you start reading the content below.
While practicing for my upcoming mock exam a few days ago, I found myself unable to focus while reading the passages. My mind would drift off to various things like “How much will I get on this test?” “What does my future hold for me?” and “What is on my to-do list today?” I was frustrated because I just couldn’t concentrate on the five texts for even one hour straight, especially when my grades were at stake.
One day, while practicing at home, I found myself reading the passages and solving the questions while walking around the house. Surprisingly, the results of the test were better when I answered it while walking than sitting. Walking. The action that helped distract my brain from thinking any other thought than what was in the text. I found this really alarming because I can’t solve while walking on test day, and what drove me to panic even more is how much something as small as scrolling and social media has affected me. I guess it’s not really something small.
Now that you’re here, you’ll probably expect a list of things to do so you can magically stop the useless, waste-of-time scrolling you do in your daily life. But that is the first thing that the social media short content installed in our brains. Getting our answers quickly and briefly. And this is just wrong. Because nothing in life comes this quickly or requires this minimal effort.
I have purposely kept this article with little variations in the text so that while reading you can practice your concentration without the stimuli you get from the different text fonts and forms.
Your attention span is like a muscle, the more you practice it, the stronger it will get.
If you’ve wondered about your ineffective working habits or have seen the drastic drop of your attention span, I hope you’ve now realized the culprit: Social Media.
Short forms of media, specifically. Like Tiktoks, Instagram stories and Reels, and Youtube Shorts. These forms of media are highly addictive and are made to make your brain accustomed to getting information through short, quick, and easy videos or spaced out prose.
In a study conducted by Microsoft, the average attention span of an adult has dropped from 12 seconds long in 2000 to 8 seconds now. The drop in the human attention span in this short period of time, is and should be alarming, because where are we headed to as a society if we can focus for merely 8 seconds at a time (considering it doesn’t drop more in the coming years)?
Moreover, a study by the National Center for Biotechnology Information found that the attention span of a goldfish is 9 seconds. Longer than the average human attention span with one second…
While this statistics should be sufficient reason to why everyone should try to maintain and strengthen their attention and focus, there are many reasons why everyone should try that. Generally because low attention span affects your life, negatively.
Some of the ways it does so is characterized by the following: poor academic and work performance, difficulty to retain information over a long period of time, struggling to connect different ideas together into a cohesive understanding and missing crucial details and information.
Now that we know the statistics and the dire consequences of our decreasing attention span, what can we do to bring back our focus and stop scrolling?
Here are some tips and things to do to put your attention muscle to practice.
But remember: practice.
1- If you clicked on it, watch/ read it till the end: If you clicked on a video to watch, watch it till the end, no skips, no distractions. You need to give your undivided attention to the normal speed video you clicked on(Yes don’t play it on 2X speed either). This applies to reading articles or blogs as well. Many don’t read them nowadays, but if you do (since you’re here, I assume you do), read the full article, without skimming and engaging yourself in an activity while doing so.
2- Limit your social media intake: I would say cut off social media, but the commitment would be too big for a society like ours that makes a habit of scrolling their lives away(the truth is bitter). You can cut off or limit the Reels, TikToks and Shorts you watch though. This can be by deactivating the account, setting a specific time for scrolling (if its beneficial and if you can manage to strictly follow your time frame) and/or keeping your phone away so that whenever your brain is not stimulated you are not tempted to open it and scroll. If you have any social media accounts logged in on your laptop, I suggest you delete them so that your workspace doesn’t have any distractions either.
3- Replace your phone by a notebook: I’m not saying you should lock your phone in a safe (it is a good idea though) or never take it out with you, what i’m saying is, instead of having it beside you as you work(or do anything really), put a notebook there. So that a) you are not distracted by the notifications and b) you can reach out for the notebook to write or draw whenever you feel the need to scroll.
4- Contemplating: Try going to a near by park, looking out the window, or even sitting down with your thoughts without any distractions and allow yourself to think and contemplate things around you. You might be bored out of your mind doing so but it is an important practice for your attention, and there is a lot in the intricacies of nature that you can appreciate and think about. Additionally, for Muslims, you get to practice your focus 5 times a day when praying, so in the next prayer be mindful of every step and don’t let your thoughts stir you and your focus away.
5- Stop multitasking: While it may seem good and effective, studies have shown that multi-tasking decreases productivity by 40% and it takes 50% longer for a multitasker to finish one task (APA,2006). You should focus on one thing at a time, even if it is watching a movie without checking your notifications or looking at your social media accounts (or doing anything other than watching really) while watching. Doing one thing at a time is important to strengthen your attention span and sharpen your focus. When studying for example, try to study without listening to something in the background whether its music or a podcast, because both keep your brain stimulated, and with time you’ll find yourself unable to focus on work without them.
Keep going to the mental gym and practicing, and your attention span will gradually increase.
In our fast-paced, digitally-driven world, maintaining focus and minimizing distractions is not just a personal challenge — it’s a global obligation. As we’ve explored, simple (though not always easy at first) strategies such as watching videos from start to finish, reducing social media use, and valuing moments of contemplation can significantly enhance our attention spans. Let’s make it our goal to implement one or two of these tips and see if we can strengthen our attention muscles. By doing so, we may find that our productivity and daily life can greatly benefit.
If you’ve made it this far into the article with little to no skimming then you took the first step in increasing your focus and attention span, great job! I hope you’ve learned a thing or two and you’ve taken mental notes on some things you want to implement to increase your attention span.
