Smartphones have changed students' attention, even when students don't use them

EdSurge connected with Turner to learn about this new world of fragmented attention and what educators can do to reach these increasingly distracted students.

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Cloudy, Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts, or use the player on this page. Or read a partial transcript, edited for clarity, below.

EdSurge: I was struck by what you say in your book that we are never far from our smartphones, even when we try to put them away. What do you mean by that?

Jeanine Turner: Some researchers have said, “Just turn off your phone and that's it.” But the problem is that it doesn't solve it because of this asynchronous nature of messaging where we can accumulate emails. We may have texts that we need to respond to. And the capacity for that means that, in many ways, we can never be fully present in a conversation, because you're always thinking about a conversation that you're supposed to be in, or an expectation of someone else who's behind it. of your mind. Or you're talking to me about something and it reminds me, 'Oh, I forgot.' I was supposed to email him back or get back to this other person. And so it's really complicated all of our communication.

So it's not even an individual decision anymore, because I can decide individually that I want to talk to you right now, but maybe my boss, maybe a coworker, maybe a team member, maybe a family member, needs communicate with me. and wants to have me available to them at this time. And then I have to make decisions about it. So we can't really think about how we operate in a silo.

For this he uses a phrase called “budgeted care.” What does that mean?

It's if we think about our attention as a resource and then try to think, 'Okay, so where do we devote that attention to make the most of the relationships that really matter to us?' It really helps us focus and understand this social presence resource and how we should approach it.

When we have these technologies, we're basically in this default state most of the time where we have our phones available, or we may be on Zoom, but we're also looking to see if any other messages are coming in. We feel like we can really do this and be in all these conversations at the same time. But what we have to recognize is that we are actually devoting part of our attention to one thing and part to another. And our brains can't really multitask like that, not do something as complex as managing my relationship with you and my relationship with someone else.

That's why I use this budget metaphor. Not only is it difficult to create priorities in our lives around our social presence. But we also have to be strategic and intentional if we want to use our social presence in the best way for our relationships.

I'm curious about the idea that we are bad at multitasking. But I admit I did that thing where I was in a Zoom meeting but also checking my email. Can't we do both?

So we do it, but something is lost, qualitatively, in terms of relationships.

If it's a routine message and I've discussed this topic with you 15 times, I might think I can check my email at the same time. But if you think I'm not paying attention to you, that will have an impact on that relationship. They see that you are not paying attention to them. Research says that even if you have your phone face up or face down, that has an impact on what people say to you (about how much they decide to connect and talk) because they (say less) if they don't think they're getting attention.

What happens is that we are devaluing listening.

How has this developed in your classrooms? You have taught at Georgetown for over 20 years and wrote that you used to walk into class and everyone would be chatting, but nowadays everyone is on their phones or laptops instead of talking to each other.

What tended to happen was a lot of off-the-cuff, casual questions among students like, 'Hey? What are you interested in? What have you been doing? What is happening? Are you going to the game this weekend? All of that.

Now the students have stopped doing it. In fact, some students have told me that there is a two-week period at the beginning of college when it's okay to say, 'Hi, my name is Jeanine.' I'm from here, where are you from?' But after that, you're no longer supposed to interrupt people in a class and make someone get off the phone and talk.

You come to university. You are in a completely new place. You don't know anyone. But you have all these relationships with your high school friends, so you keep talking to them on your device (on Instagram or Snapchat) and you don't even have to make new friends in person.

And it's very difficult to make new friends in person and (students) don't know how to do it now. And in a classroom everyone is silent and no one interacts or participates at first. So unless the teacher is creating these get-to-know-you activities in every class (which I don't think teachers are used to doing, but it's necessary), then you're not really creating these opportunities for relationships.

Let's talk about solutions. What are some things institutions and instructors can do?

You are in what I call “competitive presence” in a classroom. I need to persuade you about something. So I really need to think: 'Why do you care about this issue? Why do you need to know about this topic? What do you care? How can I make it completely relevant to you?'

It's like, 'How do I sell this?' I know teachers don't want to think of themselves as salespeople, but either you're selling in the classroom or you're trying to figure out, 'How can I create a space for dialogue?' And that has to be intentional.

For example, I will be teaching my first class on Wednesday and I will be teaching college students. And I'm really thinking, 'What am I going to do on Wednesday to create norms for dialogue in that class?' And it's not something I alone can create. I'm going to ask all the students, 'What kind of class do you want to have over the course of the semester?' 'Think about what your favorite class was, what was the dynamic like in that class? How did people talk in that class? How did you meet other people in that class? What kinds of things can we do in this class to make that happen?

I will not be the one to impose those rules. We have to create those rules together and it seems like a very strange thing. Why is that even part of a class? But if you want to create an inviting space, a space that says that people feel comfortable speaking, that their opinion is valued, and that they feel free to participate and express themselves, it has to be a collaborative conversation about how that will happen.

I guess teachers have always had to convince students to pay attention, but are you saying it's different now?

I absolutely believe that every teacher, every presenter in a business situation, if you want people to pay attention to you, you have to know that you are competing for that person's attention with that phone, and that phone is going to be ringing all the time. throughout your conversation, and if people don't think they need to pay attention to you instead of what they're doing on their phone, either you keep saying the same thing over and over, or you haven't given them enough incentive to Why You Should Listen to Me , then people will choose something else.

The audience has more agency, more options than ever before in the history of presentations. Now, thanks to that device, at every moment they choose whether to pay attention to you or to pay attention to that device. And so you never have this kind of idea of ​​a captive audience. You are always competing.

In your book, you note that people believe they can multitask in meetings, but they often leave out information, especially when the information is challenging or when the person speaking is someone they disagree with. How does this affect class discussions?

I did this study with this colleague from Georgetown, where the subjects had to listen to this NPR story and at the same time manage this inbox activity. And what we found was that when we tested them later on the NPR story, if a question was about a specific part of that story that happened at the same time a message came in, they didn't answer the question. So the challenge is that we don't really know what's important, but we're already self-selecting out of that.

I believe that the university and the classroom really are a space for learning. And learning is difficult. And I may have access to information that makes me uncomfortable or uncomfortable. But there should be a safe space here, to be able to better understand where another person is coming from.

We talk a lot about diversity, equity and inclusion, and we think it's very easy to put those three words together. But if you value diversity and you value inclusion, then you have to value conflict. Because if I have a different opinion, but I feel included in sharing it, that means that you, who have a different opinion, are not going to be happy with that opinion that I shared. And you have to feel included to share your opinion. That means diversity and inclusion requires conflict and requires creating a safe space for us to learn. Otherwise, all we have are diverse environments where no one speaks and no one feels included. And that is a tragedy.

And if that happens in our universities, if that happens in our K-12 schools, if that help happens in our educational environments that are supposed to be spaces for learning, then we will have failed.