![]() ![]() ![]() Similarly, the attention of a smartphone user is often divided between the app or website currently used and a TV show or another external stimulus. The presentation of results for queries to Siri on the iPhone required users to split their attention between their task and information on the screen. For example, even the simple and common task of asking for directions may require the driver to divide her attention between the output of the assistant and the road. One common complaint was that Siri or Google Assistant displayed results on the phone’s screen instead of reading them out loud. In our recent studies on voice assistants, we found that people often used phone-based assistants while driving, when their hands and eyes were busy. Often, designers ignore the many different stimuli users need to pay attention to at any moment while using their systems and can inadvertently create designs that require too much attention than users can realistically offer. Sites and apps are designed to send frequent and often unnecessary notifications to boost engagement.This design forces users to watch the full advertisement before returning to the game that they were playing.Īn advertisement on a mobile game did not display a Close icon for 15 seconds, effectively forcing the user to pay attention to the ad. The close icon does not appear on the advertisement until the ad has displayed for a certain length of time. Some free games offered on the iPhone’s GameCenter include advertisements. Advertising campaigns that entice or force users to dedicate their attention to the ad.Two automatically playing videos are visible above the page fold - one in the top right corner and one in the bottom left corner of the screen Headlines and images compete for attention on the ABC News homepage. Busy, crowded designs where a large amount of information is shown at once in hopes that one of the many images or phrases will attract users’ notice.Eye-catching animations to call attention to a piece of content.The hope of attracting attention has led to the popularity of many different design trends (that mainly degrade the user experience) such as: Designers who create sites and apps understand that their products vie for the limited resource of users’ attention in a highly competitive market. Today, the dynamics of the attention economy incentivize companies to draw users in to spend more and more time on apps and sites. In the attention economy, attention is not only a resource but a currency: users pay for a service with their attention. Many services online are offered for free. Goldhaber wrote that the global economy is shifting from a material-based economy to one based on the capacity of human attention. This resource is also valued by businesses, political campaigns, nonprofits, and countless other organizations that try to entice us to spend money or volunteer our time. The Market for Our AttentionĪttention is a valuable resource to us as individuals. Yes, people may have their phone out while they watch television, but if they divert attention to, say, a social media stream, they will miss some of what happened in the show. The conceit of multitasking is a canard: people can’t attend fully to multiple things simultaneously. He also noted that “a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention.” Simon described attention as a “bottleneck” in human thought. Theories of human attention all agree that it is limited in capacity. When we “pay” attention to one thing, we deplete our budget of mental resources so that we have less attention available to spend elsewhere. In ordinary conversation, we often say “pay attention.” This expression implies two important characteristics of attention: that it is limited and that it is valuable. The formal psychological definition of attention and the way most people think of the concept overlap.Īttention: a selective focus on some of the stimuli that we are currently perceiving while ignoring other stimuli from the environment What Is Attention?īefore diving into a discussion of the attention economy, let’s clarify the definition of attention. Today attention, not information, is the limiting factor. The number of minutes has also stayed exactly the same in every day. We are presented with a wealth of information, but we have the same amount of mental processing power as we have always had. Facts, literature, and art are available (often for free) to anyone with an internet connection. Today we have access to information on a massive scale. Centuries ago many people could not read and education was a luxury. For most of human history, access to information was limited. Attention is one of the most valuable resources of the digital age.
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