Task Switching & Technology: Initial Reflections and Questions

I've spent the last six weeks reading and responding to a tremendous number of studies, news stories, and Web sites relating to technology's effect on dual task performance. That being done, I need to get ready to write a composition to demonstrate the expertise I've gained. In this post, I will begin to organize and synthesize my ideas, so that when I begin writing my final essay, it will read more logically and fluently. Think of this post as a very rough, very incomplete framework into which I will insert examples, illustrations, and references when I convert it into my final paper.

From all the research and writing I've done, I have learned many things. Yet despite all my new knowledge, I have even more questions. Moreover, I have a new-found appreciation for the difference between people who possess expert-level knowledge and people who don't.

One example of my new knowledge relates to my definition of multitasking: Originally I defined it very broadly to include all sorts of activities--perceiving one's environment, thinking about those perceptions, and performing actions based on those thoughts--being performed simultaneously. Based on that crude definition, I didn't think it was possible. Moreover, I had a vague idea that "task switching" meant people perform tasks sequentially, even though they appear to perform them concurrently. My thinking was based on my personal experience and one or two news stories I had read. It showed few nuances. Now I understand that people can perform certain things simultaneously. Our minds are capable of handing multiple, concurrent sensory inputs. Our bodies are capable of performing multiple motor tasks at the same time, even while our senses are gathering more information and our minds are making decisions. However, there are certain things that I believe people cannot do; specifically, our brains cannot make multiple decisions simultaneously.

Although I believe we cannot make multiple decisions concurrently, I think there are ways of getting around that limitation. One way is to automatize behaviors so that perceiving stimuli and performing actions can proceed without the need for a decision. This can be accomplished through intense training. Another way is to "chunk" multiple decisions together so the brain treats them as one decision. Combining automatization with chunking would be even better still. Impossible? No. It just takes a lot of practice. Experts do it in a variety of fields. One specific thing that most people can relate to is reading aloud. It is a perfect example of automaticity and chunking. When reading aloud, we must think about the meaning of the words within the context of the sentences, the meaning of the sentences within the context of the surrounding paragraphs, and the meaning of the paragraphs within the context of the entire work. On top of all that, our brain must also tell our mouths how to pronounce the words, which words to stress, and so on. And that's still not all. Many components of this process occur simultaneously and automatically--but it wasn't always that way. When we first learn to read, we look at tiny parts of letters--arcs and lines and dots; eventually, we see whole letters. Then we associate those letters with sounds, and we learn to blend those sounds together. And so on. With practice, we chunk many of those thought processes together and we eventually automatize them. Reading--especially reading aloud--is an incredibly complicated act, but we can do it. That gives me hope that people can be trained to do other, equally complicated tasks with the right combination of automatization and chunking.

Another thing I've learned is that technology has the potential to be a great ally in our efforts to measure and improve our cognitive function. In fact, all of the studies I read used technology to measure subjects' cognitive abilities, to train them, or to do both. Using technology to measure one's cognitive abilities is handy because it is much more sensitive and objective than human observers are. It's efficacy is uncontroversial. Using technology as a cognitive training tool, on the other hand, is not so clear cut. There is much research that suggests it is very effective at increasing one's working memory, task switching efficiency, automaticity, and other components of multitasking ability. But there is also research that suggests otherwise. One of the biggest challenges is skill transfer. Subjects invariably get better at performing the tasks on which they are trained. What's less clear is whether they can use the skills in different contexts. It is also unclear whether those skills translate to real life success, even if we find consistent evidence that they can be transferred to different contexts. (I really need to think about these issues a lot more.)

As is often the case, the more I learn, the more questions that pop into my head. One thing I wonder is whether people can automatize and chunk enough skills to meet the demands of an unpredictable environment. Another thing I wonder is whether the dual processing model of working memory asserts that the visuospatial sketchpad and the phonological loop each have their own decision making centers, if all decisions get funneled through the central executive, or if there is some kind of hybrid process at work. I also wonder whether learning efficiency can be increased by training one to switch tasks more rapidly or if that kind of training might harm one's concentration and analytical abilities. The questions listed here are only a small portion of the things I would like to know. So many questions, so little time.

The last thing I mentioned in my introduction is that I have a new appreciation for the knowledge experts possess. The reason I mention it is because, now that I've done quite a bit of research, I can see how little I know about multitasking compared to all there is to know. Although it sounds like a small area of study, understanding it requires knowledge of a wide array of interconnected disciplines. Moreover, I can see how much effort and time it takes to develop extensive expertise in any topic, so my hat is off to anyone who has done so.