{"id":1851,"date":"2019-10-10T12:19:30","date_gmt":"2019-10-10T01:19:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bprworld.com\/?p=1851"},"modified":"2019-10-10T12:19:30","modified_gmt":"2019-10-10T01:19:30","slug":"its-official-our-attention-span-is-now-worse-than-a-goldfish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/bprworld.com\/de\/news\/its-official-our-attention-span-is-now-worse-than-a-goldfish\/","title":{"rendered":"It\u2019s Official\u2026 Our Attention Span is Now Worse Than a Goldfish\u2019!"},"content":{"rendered":"

By David Kidd, BPR<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

According to a study a few years ago by Microsoft, the\u00a0average human\u00a0being now has an\u00a0attention span\u00a0of eight seconds. This is a sharp decrease from the\u00a0average attention span\u00a0of 12 seconds in the year 2000.<\/p>\n

Since then, a number of American radio consultants wrote articles based on the declining attention span and its impact on radio programming.<\/p>\n

However, as the BBC uncovered fairly quickly, that figure did not actually come from Microsoft’s research. It appears in the report, but with a citation for another source called Statistic Brain. The BBC\u2019s due diligence uncovered no research whatsoever to back up the figure of eight seconds.<\/p>\n

Which is encouraging for the human race, as the attention span of a goldfish is supposed to be<\/em> nine<\/u> seconds!<\/p>\n

The truth? This \u2018goldfish fact\u2019 is also a bit of a myth.<\/p>\n

Apparently, there are hundreds of studies on goldfish learning. According to Professor Felicity Huntingford at the University of Glasgow\u2026. goldfish are \u201ca model system for studying the process of memory formation, exactly because they have a memory\u201d.<\/p>\n

Perhaps we all wanted to believe goldfish have no memories in order to get over the guilt of putting them in tiny glass bowls to watch them swim in endless circles. Therefore, we can reassure ourselves we are good people and go about our day.<\/p>\n

We want to believe certain things more than others. Things that put us in a good light, vindicate our decisions, etc. \u201cThat\u2019s why I can\u2019t concentrate. It\u2019s not that I\u2019m distracted by the countless options of modern media, it\u2019s that my attention span has been eroded to less than that of a goldfish.\u201d <\/em><\/p>\n

The Reality Check\u2026\u2026scientists don\u2019t really recognise the idea of an \u201cattention span\u201d. How much attention we apply to something is task-dependent. If our attention spans were really getting shorter be very concerned the next time you go under the surgeon\u2019s knife!<\/p>\n

We are bombarded every day with so much information posing as \u201dfacts\u201d that we often don\u2019t get to test the validity of these \u201cfacts\u201d.<\/p>\n

A few years ago, I asked a group of program directors and music directors about the programming rule that \u201cyou can\u2019t schedule two female artists back to back\u201d. <\/em><\/p>\n

Yes, they all knew about it\u2026.and\u2026 yes, they all abided by it. Rigidly.<\/p>\n

I asked them if they knew how this \u201crule\u201d became part of programming philosophy. No one could tell me. They just blindly obeyed the rule without asking\u2026.. \u201cwhy\u201d?<\/em><\/p>\n

The truth behind the rule? It came about during a period in the 60\u2019s when there were a lot of all-girl groups in the charts and many songs sounded the same with very similar production values.<\/p>\n

Made sense then\u2026\u2026. doesn\u2019t now; unless you\u2019re programing an all 60s oldies station!<\/p>\n

There are a lot of myths disguised as facts\u2026\u2026\u2026especially in radio programming. Always check the veracity of these \u201cfacts\u201d.<\/p>\n

And next time someone says to you, \u201cthat\u2019s the way we\u2019ve always done it\u201d\u2026\u2026.ask them \u201cwhy?\u201d.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By David Kidd, BPR According to a study a few years ago by Microsoft, the\u00a0average […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1843,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1851","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorised"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/bprworld.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/animal-animal-photography-aquarium-128756.jpg?fit=6000%2C4000","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/bprworld.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/bprworld.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/bprworld.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bprworld.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bprworld.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1851"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/bprworld.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1851\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1854,"href":"http:\/\/bprworld.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1851\/revisions\/1854"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bprworld.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1843"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/bprworld.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bprworld.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bprworld.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}