Hyper Attention vs. Deep Attention

Wayfinding: Spotlights > Companion Screens > Hyper Attention vs. Deep Attention

Media audiences may struggle with hyper attention while engaging with a show, which is why companion screens are increasingly common; however, deep attention is still possible while using multiple devices at the same time. What are these concepts of hyper attention versus deep attention? in attention with the increasing presence of digital devices in our lives in her essay, ‘Hyper and Deep Attention: The Generational Divide in Cognitive Modes’. Her thesis suggests that a ‘generational shift’ in cognition has occurred because of ‘networked and programmable media’ including online media.

deep attention as a skill predominantly in the humanities, and ‘is characterized by concentrating on a single object for long period’ – for instance, reading a novel. In contrast, hyper attention is ‘switching focus rapidly among different tasks, preferring multiple information streams, seeking a high level of stimulation, and having a low tolerance for boredom’. Though corporations may prize ‘multitasking’, learning and critical thinking may require more rumination on one subject with less distraction, but less distracting environments no longer exist when global entertainment is constantly accessible through a pocket-sized device that follows us everywhere. : ‘The fourth element, specific limits of time and space, seems to be subjected to great pressure in this time of ubiquitous computing. It is, on the contrary, the illimitability of the mobile phone for example that seems to be the defining and at the same time the liberating and the restraining characteristic of today’s media culture’.

Though Hayles is critical of media’s intrusion into young people’s time – she quotes a Kaiser Family Foundation investigation that found up to 6.5 hours per day are spent on the nebulous ‘media’ – hyper attention also impacts one’s ability to focus on said intrusive media, too. the impact of hyper attention on media engagement with the central question: ‘If attention is an inherent part of the theatrical contract, and digital browsing invites multitasking, then what sort of engagements do digitally informed performances invite?’ While examining pre-pandemic digital performances, Nedelkopolou suggests that the concept of the attention economy, in which capitalist enterprises increasingly demand user attention (typically to gather data to sell to advertisers), is becoming a subconscious dramaturgical consideration among performance makers when they choose to include digital devices or platforms in their work. This inclusion might be to increase audience engagement, even interaction, but might also involve re-directing audience attention back the performance, and even cause audiences to reflect on their device use through the nature of the show’s interaction.