Download or read book The Distraction Addiction written by Alex Soojung-Kim Pang and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2013-08-20 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The question of our time: can we reclaim our lives in an age that feels busier and more distracting by the day? We've all found ourselves checking email at the dinner table, holding our breath while waiting for Outlook to load, or sitting hunched in front of a screen for an hour longer than we intended. Mobile devices and the web have invaded our lives, and this is a big idea book that addresses one of the biggest questions of our age: can we stay connected without diminishing our intelligence, attention spans, and ability to really live? Can we have it all? Alex Soojung-Kim Pang, a renowned Stanford technology guru, says yes. The Distraction Addiction is packed with fascinating studies, compelling research, and crucial takeaways. Whether it's breathing while Facebook refreshes, or finding creative ways to take a few hours away from the digital crush, this book is about the ways to tune in without tuning out.

Download or read book Dependent Distracted Bored written by Susanna Paasonen and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2021-04-20 with total page 205 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A new approach to understanding the culture of ubiquitous connectivity, arguing that our dependence on networked infrastructure does not equal addiction. In this book, Susanna Paasonen takes on a dominant narrative repeated in journalistic and academic accounts for more than a decade: that we are addicted to devices, apps, and sites designed to distract us, that drive us to boredom, with detrimental effect on our capacities to focus, relate, remember, and be. Paasonen argues instead that network connectivity is a matter of infrastructure and necessary for the operations of the everyday. Dependencies on it do not equal addiction but speak to the networks within which our agency can take shape.

Download or read book The Distraction Addiction written by Alex Soojung-Kim Pang and published by Little, Brown. This book was released on 2013-08-20 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The question of our time: can we reclaim our lives in an age that feels busier and more distracting by the day? We've all found ourselves checking email at the dinner table, holding our breath while waiting for Outlook to load, or sitting hunched in front of a screen for an hour longer than we intended. Mobile devices and the web have invaded our lives, and this is a big idea book that addresses one of the biggest questions of our age: can we stay connected without diminishing our intelligence, attention spans, and ability to really live? Can we have it all? Alex Soojung-Kim Pang, a renowned Stanford technology guru, says yes. The Distraction Addiction is packed with fascinating studies, compelling research, and crucial takeaways. Whether it's breathing while Facebook refreshes, or finding creative ways to take a few hours away from the digital crush, this book is about the ways to tune in without tuning out.

Download or read book Addicted to Distraction written by Bruce Charlton and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Media just grows and grows, and progressively takes-over control of all the functionally useful social systems from politics to religion, from education to the arts. Yet the Mass Media is a system like no other - it has no function of its own, so it can just keep growing. It has no positive aim for society, and regards all knowledge just a matter of opinion. Therefore the Mass Media subverts all that is useful, and everything that gives meaning and purpose to life. Since the Media works like a drug, the first step is withdrawal, and a 'detox' program. Having escaped addiction, we may become free of the lies and lunacies of life in the Media bubble, and return to the realities of direct personal knowledge, actual experience and common sense.

Download or read book The Distracted Mind written by Adam Gazzaley and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2016-09-16 with total page 303 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A “brilliant and practical” study of why our brains aren’t built for media multitasking—and how we can learn to live with technology in a more balanced way (Jack Kornfield, author of The Wise Heart) Most of us will freely admit that we are obsessed with our devices. We pride ourselves on our ability to multitask—read work email, reply to a text, check Facebook, watch a video clip. Talk on the phone, send a text, drive a car. Enjoy family dinner with a glowing smartphone next to our plates. We can do it all, 24/7! Never mind the errors in the email, the near-miss on the road, and the unheard conversation at the table. In The Distracted Mind, Adam Gazzaley and Larry Rosen—a neuroscientist and a psychologist—explain why our brains aren't built for multitasking, and suggest better ways to live in a high-tech world without giving up our modern technology. The authors explain that our brains are limited in their ability to pay attention. We don't really multitask but rather switch rapidly between tasks. Distractions and interruptions, often technology-related—referred to by the authors as “interference”—collide with our goal-setting abilities. We want to finish this paper/spreadsheet/sentence, but our phone signals an incoming message and we drop everything. Even without an alert, we decide that we “must” check in on social media immediately. Gazzaley and Rosen offer practical strategies, backed by science, to fight distraction. We can change our brains with meditation, video games, and physical exercise; we can change our behavior by planning our accessibility and recognizing our anxiety about being out of touch even briefly. They don't suggest that we give up our devices, but that we use them in a more balanced way.

Download or read book Distracted written by Terri R. Kurtzberg and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2017-04-06 with total page 156 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What are the benefits and negative consequences of our increased connectivity at school, at work, and at home? Is being constantly distracted now a worldwide problem? This book examines how new technologies and social pressures have changed the way we use our attention, and the extent to which they drive us to distraction, by interpreting hundreds of scientific studies from the literatures in cognitive and social psychology, sociology, communication, management, and decision making. While distraction is ever-present in daily life, staying connected in an efficient way is the goal for one and all. To accomplish that, some amount of fine-tuning of typical interactions with technology is in order. Nearly everyone recognizes the addictive nature of constant connectivity—and its destructive effect on productivity and quality of work. But the availability of technology also promotes better engagement, control, and flexibility in both professional and personal settings. An in-depth analysis of these tradeoffs can lead to smarter choices about when and how to be connected throughout the day and across settings. The ultimate objective is to have technology enhance our lives without serving as a source of constant distraction. Distracted: Staying Connected without Losing Focus explains the nuances of what this addiction stems from—considering both societal and technological factors—and identifies both the invaluable opportunities and the counterproductive consequences of living in our technology-enabled, instant-access-to-everything world. The chapters examine a wide swath of scientific research to expose how technology use affects our attention and the extent to which it causes distraction. Authors Terri Kurtzberg and Jennifer Gibbs apply the science of human attention to reveal how specific areas of our lives are significantly changed with the advent of "continuous connectedness," including in the workplace, in personal relationships, in childhood development, and with regard to education and learning. Readers will clearly understand why multitasking fails us, what the consequences are—to ourselves and those around us—of being focused on a screen for much of the day, and how each of us can adjust our use of technology in order to improve our lives.

Download or read book The Craving Mind written by Judson Brewer and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2017-03-07 with total page 227 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A leading neuroscientist and pioneer in the study of mindfulness explains why addictions are so tenacious and how we can learn to conquer them We are all vulnerable to addiction. Whether it’s a compulsion to constantly check social media, binge eating, smoking, excessive drinking, or any other behaviors, we may find ourselves uncontrollably repeating. Why are bad habits so hard to overcome? Is there a key to conquering the cravings we know are unhealthy for us? This book provides groundbreaking answers to the most important questions about addiction. Dr. Judson Brewer, a psychiatrist and neuroscientist who has studied the science of addictions for twenty years, reveals how we can tap into the very processes that encourage addictive behaviors in order to step out of them. He describes the mechanisms of habit and addiction formation, then explains how the practice of mindfulness can interrupt these habits. Weaving together patient stories, his own experience with mindfulness practice, and current scientific findings from his own lab and others, Dr. Brewer offers a path for moving beyond our cravings, reducing stress, and ultimately living a fuller life.

Download or read book Driven to Distraction at Work written by Ned Hallowell and published by Harvard Business Review Press. This book was released on 2014-11-18 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Are you driven to distraction at work? Bestselling author Edward M. Hallowell, MD, the world’s leading expert on ADD and ADHD, has set his sights on a new goal: helping people feel more in control and productive at work. You know the feeling: you can’t focus; you feel increasingly overwhelmed by a mix of nonstop demands and technology that seems to be moving at the speed of light; and you’re frustrated just trying to get everything done well—and on time. Not only is this taking a toll on performance, it’s impacting your sense of well-being outside the office. It’s time to reclaim control. Dr. Hallowell now identifies the underlying reasons why people lose their ability to focus at work. He explains why commonly offered solutions like “learn to manage your time better” or “make a to-do list” don’t work because they ignore the deeper issues that are the true causes of mental distraction. Based on his years of helping clients develop constructive ways to deal with distraction, Dr. Hallowell provides a set of practical and reliable techniques to show how to sustain a productive mental state. In Part 1 of the book, he identifies the six most common ways people lose the ability to focus at work—what he calls “screen sucking” (internet/social media addiction), multitasking, idea hopping (never finishing what you start), worrying, playing the hero, and dropping the ball—and he explains the underlying psychological and emotional dynamics driving each behavior. Part 2 of the book provides advice for “training” your attention overall, so that you are less susceptible to surrendering it, in any situation. The result is a book that will empower you to combat each one of these common syndromes—and clear a path for you to achieve your highest personal and professional goals.

Download or read book Drinking to Distraction written by Jenna Hollenstein and published by Lulu.com. This book was released on 2013-12 with total page 98 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: She never drove or worked drunk, never injured herself or someone else, never woke up next to a strange man, was fired, went bankrupt, or became homeless because of her drinking. But for years Jenna Hollenstein worried that she was using alcohol for the wrong reasons. Though it didn't cause her to spiral out of control, drinking seemed to be detracting from her life in subtler ways: missed opportunities, unaddressed fears, challenges not taken, relationships not cherished, and creativity unexplored. Rather than a series of dramatic events often associated with alcoholism, her decision to stop drinking was based on years of introspection, pros and cons lists, and conversations with friends, family, and a wise therapist. Though she never "hit bottom," Hollenstein eventually realized that drinking was not enhancing her life: it was distracting her from it.

Download or read book The Distraction Trap written by Frances Booth and published by Pearson UK. This book was released on 2013-04-29 with total page 154 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: If you're worried that you're losing the power to concentrate The Distraction Trap can help. Learn how you can easily release your life from the steely grip of modern technology where you're always available and always connected. Discover how you can radically boost your productivity by keeping your whole brain and both eyes on the task in hand. You may think you can do ten things at once, with a scattered thinking approach and expect to do everything well and on time. Well, you can't. The Distraction Trap will empower you to focus and prioritise, switch off your email, say 'no' to social media ruling your life and help you rediscover your lost powers of concentration. Your campaign to reclaim your life starts here and now!

Download or read book The Gospel According to David Foster Wallace written by Adam S. Miller and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2016-02-25 with total page 137 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Gospel According to David Foster Wallace is the first book to explore key religious themes - from boredom to addiction, and distraction – in the work of one of America's most celebrated contemporary novelists. In a series of short, topic-focussed chapters, the book joins a selection of key scenes from Wallace's novels Infinite Jest and The Pale King with clear explanations of how they contribute to his overall account of what it means to be a human being in the 21st century. Adam Miller explores how Wallace's work masterfully investigates the nature of first-world boredom and shows, in the process, how easy it is to get addicted to distraction (chemical, electronic, or otherwise). Implicitly critiquing, excising, and repurposing elements of AA's Twelve Step program, Wallace suggests that the practice of prayer (regardless of belief in God), the patient application of attention to things that seem ordinary and boring, and the internalization of clichés may be the antidote to much of what ails us in the 21st century.

Download or read book The Urge written by Carl Erik Fisher and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2022-01-25 with total page 393 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Named a Best Book of the Year by The New Yorker and The Boston Globe An authoritative, illuminating, and deeply humane history of addiction—a phenomenon that remains baffling and deeply misunderstood despite having touched countless lives—by an addiction psychiatrist striving to understand his own family and himself “Carl Erik Fisher’s The Urge is the best-written and most incisive book I’ve read on the history of addiction. In the midst of an overdose crisis that grows worse by the hour and has vexed America for centuries, Fisher has given us the best prescription of all: understanding. He seamlessly blends a gripping historical narrative with memoir that doesn’t self-aggrandize; the result is a full-throated argument against blaming people with substance use disorder. The Urge is a propulsive tour de force that is as healing as it is enjoyable to read.” —Beth Macy, author of Dopesick Even after a decades-long opioid overdose crisis, intense controversy still rages over the fundamental nature of addiction and the best way to treat it. With uncommon empathy and erudition, Carl Erik Fisher draws on his own experience as a clinician, researcher, and alcoholic in recovery as he traces the history of a phenomenon that, centuries on, we hardly appear closer to understanding—let alone addressing effectively. As a psychiatrist-in-training fresh from medical school, Fisher was soon face-to-face with his own addiction crisis, one that nearly cost him everything. Desperate to make sense of the condition that had plagued his family for generations, he turned to the history of addiction, learning that the current quagmire is only the latest iteration of a centuries-old story: humans have struggled to define, treat, and control addictive behavior for most of recorded history, including well before the advent of modern science and medicine. A rich, sweeping account that probes not only medicine and science but also literature, religion, philosophy, and public policy, The Urge illuminates the extent to which the story of addiction has persistently reflected broader questions of what it means to be human and care for one another. Fisher introduces us to the people who have endeavored to address this complex condition through the ages: physicians and politicians, activists and artists, researchers and writers, and of course the legions of people who have struggled with their own addictions. He also examines the treatments and strategies that have produced hope and relief for many people with addiction, himself included. Only by reckoning with our history of addiction, he argues—our successes and our failures—can we light the way forward for those whose lives remain threatened by its hold. The Urge is at once an eye-opening history of ideas, a riveting personal story of addiction and recovery, and a clinician’s urgent call for a more expansive, nuanced, and compassionate view of one of society’s most intractable challenges.

Download or read book Internet and Smartphone Use Related Addiction Health Problems written by Olatz Lopez-Fernandez and published by MDPI. This book was released on 2021-08-31 with total page 614 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This Special Issue presents some of the main emerging research on technological topics of health and education approaches to Internet use-related problems, before and during the beginning of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). The objective is to provide an overview to facilitate a comprehensive and practical approach to these new trends to promote research, interventions, education, and prevention. It contains 40 papers, four reviews and thirty-five empirical papers and an editorial introducing everything in a rapid review format. Overall, the empirical ones are of a relational type, associating specific behavioral addictive problems with individual factors, and a few with contextual factors, generally in adult populations. Many have adapted scales to measure these problems, and a few cover experiments and mixed methods studies. The reviews tend to be about the concepts and measures of these problems, intervention options, and prevention. In summary, it seems that these are a global culture trend impacting health and educational domains. Internet use-related addiction problems have emerged in almost all societies, and strategies to cope with them are under development to offer solutions to these contemporary challenges, especially during the pandemic situation that has highlighted the global health problems that we have, and how to holistically tackle them.

Download or read book Tired as F ck written by Caroline Dooner and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2022-02-08 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Blending memoir and blistering social observations, the author of The F*ck It Diet looks back at her desperate attempts to heal her hunger, anxiety, and imperfections through extreme diets, culty self-help methods, and melodramatic bargains with the universe. Offering a frank and funny critique of the cultural forces that are driving us mad, Caroline Dooner examines how treating ourselves like never ending self-improvement projects is a recipe for burnout. We have become unknowingly complicit in perpetuating our own exhaustion because we are treating ourselves like machines. But even phones need to f*cking recharge. Caroline takes a good hard look at the dark side of self-help, and explains how she eventually used a radical period of rest to push back against cultural expectations and reclaim some peace. Tired As F*ck empowers us to say no to the things that exhaust us. It inspires us to carve out time to slow down, feel okay about doing less, and honor our humanity. This is not a self-help book, it’s a cautionary tale. It’s an honest look at the dogma of wellness and spiritual self-improvement culture and revels in the healing power of rest and letting shit go.

Download or read book ADHD 2 0 written by Edward M. Hallowell, M.D. and published by Ballantine Books. This book was released on 2021-01-12 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A revolutionary new approach to ADD/ADHD featuring cutting-edge research and strategies to help readers thrive, by the bestselling authors of the seminal books Driven to Distraction and Delivered from Distraction “An inspired road map for living with a distractible brain . . . If you or your child suffer from ADHD, this book should be on your shelf. It will give you courage and hope.”—Michael Thompson, Ph.D., New York Times bestselling co-author of Raising Cain World-renowned authors Dr. Edward M. Hallowell and Dr. John J. Ratey literally “wrote the book” on ADD/ADHD more than two decades ago. Their bestseller, Driven to Distraction, largely introduced this diagnosis to the public and sold more than a million copies along the way. Now, most people have heard of ADHD and know someone who may have it. But lost in the discussion of both childhood and adult diagnosis of ADHD is the potential upside: Many hugely successful entrepreneurs and highly creative people attribute their achievements to ADHD. Also unknown to most are the recent research developments, including innovations that give a clearer understanding of the ADHD brain in action. In ADHD 2.0, Drs. Hallowell and Ratey, both of whom have this “variable attention trait,” draw on the latest science to provide both parents and adults with ADHD a plan for minimizing the downside and maximizing the benefits of ADHD at any age. They offer an arsenal of new strategies and lifestyle hacks for thriving with ADHD, including • Find the right kind of difficult. Use these behavior assessments to discover the work, activity, or creative outlet best suited to an individual’s unique strengths. • Reimagine environment. What specific elements to look for—at home, at school, or in the workplace—to enhance the creativity and entrepreneurial spirit inherent in the ADHD mind. • Embrace innate neurological tendencies. Take advantage of new findings about the brain’s default mode network and cerebellum, which confer major benefits for people with ADHD. • Tap into the healing power of connection. Tips for establishing and maintaining positive connection “the other Vitamind C” and the best antidote to the negativity that plagues so many people with ADHD. • Consider medication. Gets the facts about the underlying chemistry, side effects, and proven benefits of all the pharmaceutical options. As inspiring as it is practical, ADHD 2.0 will help you tap into the power of this mercurial condition and find the key that unlocks potential.

Download or read book Dopamine Nation written by Dr. Anna Lembke and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2023-01-03 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES and LOS ANGELES TIMES BESTSELLER “Brilliant . . . riveting, scary, cogent, and cleverly argued.”—Beth Macy, author of Dopesick, as heard on Fresh Air This book is about pleasure. It’s also about pain. Most important, it’s about how to find the delicate balance between the two, and why now more than ever finding balance is essential. We’re living in a time of unprecedented access to high-reward, high-dopamine stimuli: drugs, food, news, gambling, shopping, gaming, texting, sexting, Facebooking, Instagramming, YouTubing, tweeting . . . The increased numbers, variety, and potency is staggering. The smartphone is the modern-day hypodermic needle, delivering digital dopamine 24/7 for a wired generation. As such we’ve all become vulnerable to compulsive overconsumption. In Dopamine Nation, Dr. Anna Lembke, psychiatrist and author, explores the exciting new scientific discoveries that explain why the relentless pursuit of pleasure leads to pain . . . and what to do about it. Condensing complex neuroscience into easy-to-understand metaphors, Lembke illustrates how finding contentment and connectedness means keeping dopamine in check. The lived experiences of her patients are the gripping fabric of her narrative. Their riveting stories of suffering and redemption give us all hope for managing our consumption and transforming our lives. In essence, Dopamine Nation shows that the secret to finding balance is combining the science of desire with the wisdom of recovery.

Download or read book The World Beyond Your Head written by Matthew B. Crawford and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2015-03-31 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In his bestselling book Shop Class as Soulcraft, Matthew B. Crawford explored the ethical and practical importance of manual competence, as expressed through mastery of our physical environment. In his brilliant follow-up, The World Beyond Your Head, Crawford investigates the challenge of mastering one's own mind. We often complain about our fractured mental lives and feel beset by outside forces that destroy our focus and disrupt our peace of mind. Any defense against this, Crawford argues, requires that we reckon with the way attention sculpts the self. Crawford investigates the intense focus of ice hockey players and short-order chefs, the quasi-autistic behavior of gambling addicts, the familiar hassles of daily life, and the deep, slow craft of building pipe organs. He shows that our current crisis of attention is only superficially the result of digital technology, and becomes more comprehensible when understood as the coming to fruition of certain assumptions at the root of Western culture that are profoundly at odds with human nature. The World Beyond Your Head makes sense of an astonishing array of common experience, from the frustrations of airport security to the rise of the hipster. With implications for the way we raise our children, the design of public spaces, and democracy itself, this is a book of urgent relevance to contemporary life.