The Attention Economy Explained: 8 Ways to Improve Your Focus
Do you have a hard time focusing on a single task? Do you find yourself scanning articles and switching between tabs quickly? If you find yourself refreshing your phone screen constantly throughout the day or feeling glued to your devices, it's not just you. Research suggests people look at their phones dozens of times each day. In this post, I'll explain how the attention economy is affecting you, and how to reclaim your focus!
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Recently, I read the book Extremely Online by Taylor Lorenz.
It's a short history of social media and internet culture. As I was reading, I had the realization that with each new wave of social media, content becomes easier to digest, more scrollable, and gives quicker dopamine hits.
As Lorenz outlines in her book, internet culture started with blogging through traditional blogs, Myspace, and Tumblr. Then came YouTube, Facebook, Vine, and Twitter. Now we have Instagram and TikTok.
If you map it out, the progression looks something like this:
- Long articles
- Shorter captions
- Image-focused
- Sentence-long captions
- Longer videos
- Short videos
This is a bit of a simplified history of media consumption, but it's no wonder it feels harder to focus for longer periods of time. The overarching trend to notice is that we keep consuming quicker forms of content. Print newspapers used to be the short-form content!
In this post, we're going to look at what the attention economy is, and how you can improve your focus.
What is the Attention Economy?
Many social media apps are free. Have you ever considered how the companies make enough money to stay in business?
The majority of people create content on these apps for free, and then that content is used to get people to stay on these apps for longer so more ads can be served to them.
In a nutshell, the attention economy is a whole economic ecosystem built around how long companies can keep your attention.
As long as a company has your eyeballs on their app, they can make more money.
When you get down to thinking about it, knowing that companies are trying to control the most important asset you have (your time) doesn't feel great.
Many apps are designed so you'll spend increasing amounts of time on them, but with a few tweaks of your own, you can make them feel less compelling, so you're more in control of your time.
Today, more people (myself included) are moving towards digital minimalism as a way to feel more in control of their time and attention again!
Now that we've covered what the attention economy is and why it matters, let's get into how you can improve your focus and reclaim your attention.
The Attention Economy Explained: 8 Ways to Improve Your Focus
1. Assess Your Current Attention Habits
As with changing any habit, a good place to start is by assessing where you currently are.
Personally, my focus is a lot worse on some days than others. Right now, I'm trying to work on checking my emails less when I'm working.
Your focus could be affected by a variety of things on a daily basis, such as how stressed you are, how well rested you feel, how hungry you feel, or how interested you are in what you are working on. Your media habits will also play a part in this.
Here are some things to think about as you assess your attention habits.
- Do you mainly consume long or short-form content?
- What are your attention traps? (When you spend much longer doing something than you want to)
- How often do you feel distracted?
- What do you find yourself wanting to "just check" multiple times daily?
- How in control do you feel of your time/attention?
- Do you want to change your attention habits and what are your goals?
No matter how good your attention habits currently are, there is always room for improvement! In the past couple of years, I've gotten my social media usage under control, and now I'm checking my emails and becoming distracted more often than I want to.
Making changes to your attention habits is a constant practice.
2. Work Toward Shifting to Consuming Longer + Slower Content
Once you know your starting place, you can slowly shift your consumption towards longer-form content.
If you mainly watch TikToks and Reels, then you can gradually switch to watching longer videos. From there you can switch to reading blog posts and news articles. Finally, you can switch to eBooks and then to paperback books if you want to.
If you mainly watch short YouTube videos, you may switch to watching longer videos such as documentaries or movies.
But of course, the type of content you consume will change depending on what your goals are. Reading blogs or watching longer videos may be your end goal.
You don't need to give up all of your short-form entertainment unless you want to! This is more about adding in longer-form content to help improve your focus, and short-form content can be an occasional dessert.
3. Avoid Consuming Multiple Forms of Content at Once (Multitasking)
At the height of my social media usage during my sophomore year of college, I'd find myself scrolling on social media while watching YouTube videos.
Now, I think back on it and go, "Yikes!"
As a consumer when you do this, not only are you atrophying your attention by trying to split your focus between two things, but you are also letting two companies buy your time.
I'm sure by now you've heard that multitasking isn't real, and yes, you are simply switching back and forth between focusing on both forms of content.
If you currently have this habit, it's not too late, and it's a pretty simple fix. All you have to do is focus on consuming one form of content at once. No more consuming one form of content with another one playing in the background!
4. Remove Distractions from Your Environment
Removing distractions from your environment is so much easier said than done, especially when it comes to devices. I have to work on my laptop!
Currently, I'm doing a 30-day experiment where I have all of my notifications turned off on my smartphone and my smartwatch. Even though I'm not getting physical cues to check apps, I still have impulses to go check apps throughout the day.
Removing distractions from your environment can look like a lot of things, such as not doing homework (or working) where you sleep or eat, putting your phone in a different room, or having a minimalist desk.
Some people even buy devices they can lock their smartphones in.
For me, I think it would be a little too far to disconnect from the internet while I'm working because it would be a hassle, but I'm working on not following distracting thoughts and impulses to check things right when I have them.
This leads me to my next point.
5. Make Note of Distracting Thoughts + Impulses
According to Healthline, people have more than 6,000 thoughts per day, so it's not surprising that at least a few of them would be distracting.
You don't need to put in a lot of extra effort to just recognize when you are having distracting thoughts.
If you are working on a task, and a thought pops into your head to check something else, you can ask yourself why you have the impulse to do it.
Depending on how long it's going to take you to do your current task, you may choose to wait until you are done with what you are currently working on, or you may choose to wait 10-15 minutes before acting on that impulse.
Sometimes, if you wait, you may even forget that you wanted to check because you were just bored in the moment.
If you want a more involved method of avoiding distractions, you can write down your distracting thoughts, especially if they are things you want or need to do later. I want to try this out, so if I do, I'll let you know how it goes!
6. Set Aside Time to Intentionally Let Your Mind Wander
Yesterday, I finished reading the book Stolen Focus by Johann Hari, and he mentioned this idea. It made me realize that I already intentionally let my mind wander sometimes.
I sometimes go running without a podcast and I clean without listening to anything. I look off into the distance when I'm walking between my classes.
Even though I love trying to fit as much learning into my day as possible, those quiet moments allow me to actually think about and process all the information I'm taking into my brain.
Sometimes, I do want to listen to things while I'm working, but I do regularly choose to go without, so I can just think.
Letting your mind wander will help you reflect and think of new things you want to try. Plus, sometimes it can be kind of relaxing!
7. Practice Being Bored
I feel kind of bored just thinking about this because I'm always surrounded by so many quick forms of entertainment.
When I think back to being a child though, whenever I was bored, I had to think of something fun to do, so that's what I did. It usually led to some exciting pastime after the initial boredom. I made a lot of craft projects!
I think I didn't start using the internet regularly until I was 11, and I'm glad that my parents had me wait because it allowed me to be more creative.
In our current day, I think one of the best ways to be bored is to just turn off your devices and to stop using social media as a daily form of entertainment. When I did this, I started reading again.
If you already have a good relationship with technology, you may consider meditation. I've tried doing meditation before, but I've never stuck with it for long. I think I just need to find a way of practicing meditation that works for me, and I'm not there yet!
8. Practice Single-Tasking
Finally, to lessen the impact the attention economy is having on you, I'd recommend practicing single-tasking.
Your focus is like a muscle, so when you exercise it, you'll be able to focus for longer.
Personally, I think the easiest way to measure this is by using time tracking. You'll be able to see how much time you actually spend on tasks, and whenever you do something else, you have to pause your timer.
Another method you might try is the Pomodoro technique. For this, you would work for 25 minutes on a single task and then take a break.
If focusing for an hour sounds like too much, this is a good place to start because you know how long you have to focus for and you can always adjust how long your work period lasts for. If 25 minutes is too long, you can start with 10 or 15 minutes!
Final Notes on the Attention Economy Explained: 8 Ways to Improve Your Focus
The attention economy isn't going to disappear any time soon, but with some simple lifestyle changes, you can learn to feel more in control of your attention. With practice, you can learn to focus for longer periods of time.
Since I started moving towards consuming more long-form content such as books and longer videos, I've felt like I'm spending my time in more meaningful ways.
Pick one thing you can do to improve your focus and try to figure out how you can naturally incorporate it into your routine.
In a nutshell, here are some ways to improve your focus.
- Assess your current attention habits
- Work toward shifting to consuming longer and slower content
- Avoid consuming multiple forms of content at once (multitasking)
- Remove distractions from your environment
- Make note of distracting thoughts and impulses
- Set aside time to intentionally let your mind wander
- Practice being bored
- Practice single-tasking
If you enjoyed reading this post about the attention economy, you may also enjoy reading these posts!
- How to Become a Lifelong Learner: Create a Personal Learning System That Lasts
- What is Decision Fatigue? Ways to Make Everyday Choices Feel Less Exhausting
- A Realistic Guide to Digital Minimalism for Beginners
- Level 10 Life Assessment: My Favorite Annual Life Audit
I hope you enjoyed learning about the attention economy! What are you doing to improve your focus?
Don't forget to share or save this post about the attention economy and improving your focus! Thanks! :)
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