Thirty years ago, we used travel agents to make our airline and rail reservations, we would have asked assistance to the salespeople to find what we were looking for in shops, and we had secretaries helping busy people with their correspondence. No more! we are now doing most of those things ourselves. We are trying to keep up with our lives, our children and parents, our friends, our careers, our hobbies, and our favourite TV shows while we are doing the jobs of 5 different people. Although we think we’re become the expert of multitasking, this is in fact a powerful and diabolical illusion. Earl Miller, a neuroscientist at MIT and one of the world experts on divided attention, says that our brains are “not wired to multitask well… When people …show more content…
And every time they do, there’s a cognitive cost in doing so.” In other world, the appropriate image would be, we see ourselves like expert jugglers keeping all the balls in the air but we are more like a bad amateur plate spinner, anxiously switching from one task to another, ignoring the one that is not right in front of us but worried it will come crashing down any minute. Even though we think we’re getting a lot done, ironically, multitasking makes us less efficient. When we are Multitasking, we increase the production of the stress hormone cortisol as well as the fight-or-flight hormone adrenaline. These two hormones will overstimulate our brain and then can cause mental fog. When brain fog sets in, accomplishing even a small task such as writing a grocery list or writing a letter can seem insurmountable. Brain fog makes it difficult for us to think quickly, remember things, and in some cases even hold a conversation. Multitasking creates a dopamine-addiction feedback loop. Dopamine controls the "pleasure" systems of the brain, it makes you feel enjoyment, pleasure, and therefore motivates you to seek out certain behaviours. With the internet, twitter, and texting you now have almost instant gratification of your desire to seek. Want to talk to someone right away?