A two week wrap-up of Group C

#communication #lola #hyper connectivity #mute #senior aspects #sensitivity #brain performance #human computer interaction #slow motion #cognition

We’ve learned a lot in those two weeks. But due to our tight schedule with a big workload there was hardly any time left to improve on our teach/study environment in the portal. In Trondheim we got a handover from group B on how to deal with LOLA. Our task was then to reinstall the LOLA system, but with some important extra package that was missing. Somebody outside MCT did the job for us in Trondheim in our absence, which was very practical since we could focus almost entirely on the mediated content during class. At the same time it was also somewhat of a pity, cause we are supposed to know how the communication infrastructures are working and ideally should put them up by ourselves.

Thanks for the job anyways, unknown person AKA ghost in the machine.

We then got some time to reflect though on the workflow in general, studying and keeping the Portal alive at the same time can become a very challenging task with tight schedules.

How to maintain concentration and focused work within a hyper connected study/work environment

Being in the portal means working between several screens. Here in Trondheim there are two portal screens, as well as those of our own devices, a laptop screen and a mobile phone screen. As banal as it may sound, for many different tasks, duties and activities we actually use only two electronic devices and maybe externalize them with monitor speakers or on other bigger screens. (Except when making music we might need more). So what? Well in doing that, we’re constantly redirecting our attention between different duties but are not very much aware of it since we don’t move too much. Other reasons could be that we’re mostly looking in the same direction or doing the same micro finger bendings.

When somebody in Oslo has a technical problem which might be caused through the setup in Trondheim and nobody but you seems to hear it, you have to act. That means shifting your focus from the thing you were actually doing, like listening to the lecture or working on a time sensitive prototype - into another world. This is an almost every day scenario in the Portal. If you’re sitting far away enough from the mixer to have responsibility for it, you can just take the opportunity to write FB/emails etc. while somebody is taking care of it, being present on one ear, maybe working in collaborative documents, just quickly answering instant messages from your group or checking the next assignments.

While we think of it as simply multitasking between several audiovisual inputs mediated through different channels, we’re actually constantly switching our attention between these tasks, and doing so we’re not really acting in favour for our cognitive abilities and performance, as several researchers say. Indeed, after an eight hour day of studying in the portal this way, we hardly remember what our names are, and to continue studying by ourselves in the evening is almost impossible. If this should become a future-proof setup, there is a long way before us.

A future-proof setup?

That might sound really old fashioned, but it is proven that heavy multitasking with media lowers the concentration and cognitive abilities up to 40%. We should be aware of that. Since the technical setup of the portal can take sometimes up to 30 minutes it is not so easy to switch off the system for the sake of a brain break. But we have to, and should either include extra time for it or design healthier environments if we’re exposed to dense technical media equipment. Hopefully some of these issues are going to be solved in our brand new Portal, which we will introduce soon.

References:

https://www.verywellmind.com/multitasking-2795003

https://news.stanford.edu/2018/10/25/decade-data-reveals-heavy-multitaskers-reduced-memory-psychologist-says/