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Attention Residue:
The Toll of Switching Costs

Imagine this: You’re taking a deep dive into a new product proposal from one of your engineers. Just as you’re getting into the groove – ding! – your phone goes off. It’s a simple request from a direct report and the task only takes 30 seconds. But suddenly, you’ve completely lost track of what you were doing.

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If you find yourself constantly interrupted, you’re not just losing 30 seconds here or there. Those small interruptions can eat up a huge portion of your working day.

According to psychologist Gerald Weinberg, each extra task switch or context switch eats up 20–80% of your overall productivity. This phenomenon is known as “attention residue.”

FACTS:

  • Focusing on one task at a time = 100% of your productive time available.

  • Task switching between two tasks at a time = 40% of your productive time for each and 20% lost to context switching.

  • Task switching between three tasks at a time = 20% of your productive time for each and 40% lost to context switching.

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Dr. Sophie Leroy, a professor at the University of Washington, who coined the term "attention residue" and led many studies on it. She found that a part of the brain tends to ruminate on an interrupting task for an average of 23 minutes and 15 seconds. An fMRI scan during a cognitively demanding task shows that even a quick glance at an email subject results in a loss of focus, which goes unnoticed by the study subject. The same is true for interruptions, including self-interruptions.

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To prevent this, control when and how you’re interrupted. Turn off email and text alerts, and put on some headphones. Just make sure people have a way to reach you in a genuine emergency.

Solutions:

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Minimize attention hijackers by turning off alerts, closing your email program, putting on your headphones, or closing your door, etc.

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Keep a notebook handy to jot down any “mental popups” that appear. This helps prevent self-interruptions.

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Create a 60-second-or-less Ready-to-Resume Plan to give the brain a way to refocus when interrupted.

“Even though a quick peek at your inbox or social feed only takes a second, the duration of those checks does not correlate to the magnitude of the distraction.”

 – Cal Newport, PhD

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