Book SummaryThe Distracted Mind, by Adam Gazzaley and Larry Rosen

1-Page Summary1-Page Book Summary of The Distracted Mind

With a vast ensemble of screens, such as smartphones, laptops, and tablets, always at our fingertips, technology has infiltrated every aspect of our lives. And although this technological boom has delivered exponentially greater access to information, this access ultimately harms our productivity and ability to fulfill our goals, according to neuroscientist Adam Gazzaley and psychologist Larry D. Rosen. In their 2017 book The Distracted Mind, Gazzaley and Rosen argue that technology has made us significantly more prone to distractions and interruptions, hampering our higher-level cognitive goals and exacerbating what they call “the distracted mind.”

Gazzaley and Rosen’s backgrounds shape different aspects of The Distracted Mind. On one hand, Gazzaley’s experience as the founder of...

The Distracted Mind Summary The Basics of the Distracted Mind

To begin, we’ll discuss the distracted mind itself to understand Gazzaley and Rosen’s later arguments about technology’s impact on it. In particular, we’ll start by analyzing Gazzaley and Rosen’s definition of the distracted mind as an ingrained vulnerability to distractions and interruptions. Afterward, we’ll discuss their thesis about the origin of this vulnerability—namely, that it arose because our higher-level goals outstripped our cognitive control, the faculties that we use to fulfill these goals.

Defining the Distracted Mind

To understand Gazzaley and Rosen’s later arguments about the distracted mind, it’ll help to understand what the distracted mind is to begin with. Put simply, they define the distracted mind as our susceptibility to interference that hinders our ability to achieve our goals.

At a broad level, Gazzaley and Rosen consider interference to be anything that disrupts your attempt to fulfill a specific goal. For example, imagine that you want to make your morning coffee, so you decide to grind some coffee beans. If, during this process, you receive an email notification that you stop to read, that would be a form of interference....

The Distracted Mind Summary Technology’s Impact on Interference

Now that we’ve covered what interference is and why we’re so vulnerable to it, we can discuss the ways that technology has exacerbated this vulnerability. More precisely, we’ll examine Gazzaley and Rosen’s argument that the Information Age increased our susceptibility to interference, their explanation for this increase, and finally, their warnings about the harmful effects of this uptick in interference.

Interference in the Information Age

Although Gazzaley and Rosen contend that our vulnerability to interference is a longstanding feature of human nature, they argue that it’s been exacerbated by modern technology. In particular, they argue that the Information Age made us more vulnerable to interference by creating information outlets that constantly vie for our attention. To show as much, they first outline how the Information Age increased potential sources of interference and then argue that this new interference has infiltrated our schools and workplaces.

The Information Age, Gazzaley and Rosen argue, began with the onset of the internet around 1990, as information previously only available via encyclopedias became much more accessible. Moreover, the authors...

The Distracted Mind Summary How to Become More Resistant to Interference

Having shown the detrimental effects of interference, Gazzaley and Rosen next turn to potential remedies. Although there are no foolproof cures, Gazzaley and Rosen contend that we can minimize our susceptibility to interference by taking steps to improve our cognitive control and minimize potential sources of interference.

Strategy #1: Improve the Brain’s Cognitive Control

In light of their earlier claim that we’re susceptible to interference because of cognitive control limitations, Gazzaley and Rosen reason that one way to improve this condition is to improve our cognitive control. Although they consider various activities to strengthen our cognitive control, we’ll focus on the four that they contend have the strongest empirical support: physical exercise, meditation, cognitive exercise, and certain video games. Of these four, they note that only physical exercise rises to the level of a prescriptive recommendation, while the other three have comparatively less empirical support.

Activity #1: Physical Exercise

To begin, Gazzaley and Rosen argue that **a wide body of research clearly supports the beneficial impact of physical exercise on cognitive...

Shortform Exercise: Change Your Environment to Combat Interference

According to Gazzaley and Rosen, reducing accessibility to technology and combating technology-induced anxiety and boredom are key to minimizing interference. In this exercise, reflect on these approaches and consider actions you can take to embrace them.

On a typical day, how much access do you have to your phone? What actions could you take to limit this access?