Information
overload
Teach your brain
new habits
These slides provide insight
into what recent science
says about focus in the age
of information overload.
Entefy | Information overload 2
This presentation was curated by
Entefy, the company building the first
universal communicator—an AI-
powered communication platform that
seamlessly connects the people, services,
conversations, contacts, files, apps, and
smart things in your digital universe.
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introduction
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When we’re born,
every sensation is
overwhelming and
difficult to process
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Over time we teach
ourselves to filter out
extraneous information
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This filtering process
is important because
the brain does not like
being overworked
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The Internet makes us
like newborns again:
information overload
at every click
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Focus is a finite
resource, and
deciding where to
direct it is a challenge
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attention overload
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The “Invisible Gorilla” test
demonstrates the limits of
focus and attention
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Lesson:
Too many demands
on our attention
blind us to
everything else
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In order to remember,
information must
survive the memory’s
filtering processes
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Cramming in too
much information
limits processing
and storage
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People write as much
online in a day as
the content of all the
books in the Library
of Congress
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Yet the brain’s
natural ability to
remember is limited
to 7 (plus or minus 2)
items at a time
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MORE
INFORMATION ISN’T
ALWAYS BETTER
INFORMATION
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There are 47 billion
web pages and
more than 3.5 billion
Internet users
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People spend an hour
more online each day
than we did a year ago
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Google went down
for a few minutes in
2013 and took 40% of
Internet traffic with it
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What happens to
our memories when
people conduct 58,000
searches per minute?
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The good news:
Storing information
externally reduces
cognitive load
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The bad news:
The more we outsource
our memories to the
Internet, the stronger
that habit becomes
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Access to limitless
information can lead
to “analysis paralysis”
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One study documented
this effect:
A selection of jams was
offered to shoppers
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When there were
24 jams on display,
only 3% of shoppers
made a purchase
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When just 6 jams were on
display, 30% of shoppers
made a purchase
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Lesson:
With more choices
comes a greater decline
in the quality of decisions
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Psychologists
refer to this effect
as information
fatigue
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Example:
Judges were
more likely to
grant parole
after a break Entefy | Information overload 30
Example:
Favorable rulings
dropped from 65% to
nearly zero, then returned
to 65% after rest
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Lesson:
Too many decisions
lead to mental fatigue
and lower-quality
evaluation
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Example:
In one survey, 62% of
professionals said the quality
of their work suffered because
of information overload
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Lesson:
Trying to tackle too much
information limits our ability
to process the information
effectively
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Then there’s “fake
news” impeding our
ability to discern fact
from fiction
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CONCLUSION
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Develop better reading habits:
Compartmentalize. One source for
entertainment, another for business, etc.
Focus. Don’t hop from topic to topic
Trust. Only follow sources you trust
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Unleash your inner critic:
Practice evaluating what you’re
reading as you read
Purposefully investigate different
perspectives and sources
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Produce more than you consume:
Generate your own answer
before you search
Summarize what you read in
your own words
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Take breaks:
Fatigue inhibits the ability to make
connections between facts
Sleeping improves recall…
…and allows for ah-ha moments
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Gaining knowledge
isn’t only about
consuming more
information
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Knowledge grows from
sustained focus and
making connections with
what you already know
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Filtering what’s
important from what’s
not is how you defeat
information overload
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About Entefy
Entefy’s universal communicator is an intelligent
communication platform that seamlessly connects the
people, services, conversations, contacts, files, apps,
and smart things in your digital life.
©2017 Entefy Inc. All rights reserved. contact@entefy.com | entefy.com
