As you might expect it's a mixed bag. Some good some not so good. We aren't very good at multitasking when it comes to complex cognitive tasks. We can walk and chew gum but we can't write an essay on Plato's allegory of the cave and do our calculus assignment at the same time. We do those sorts of tasks sequentially. Trying to multitask simply means we take longer and generally end up with a lower quality result.
Rather than take the sometimes typical adult point of view that the younger generation is bound for perdition, it's in everyone's best interest to learn about technology - to understand the pros and cons of IMing, social networks like Myspace and Facebook, try some video games, download an MP3 music file. Try to see what might be good about these activities, talk to your kids, talk to each other and think about your own screen time.
It's hypocritical to bemoan kids use of computers, cell phones, IMing - all of which can be used to connect to other humans - while spending excessive amounts of time glued to the TV set yourself. It's hard to justify the "going to hell in a handbasket" point of view when you consider what we have available today versus the pre-internet days. As Steven Johnson writes, "Twenty or 30 years ago, we sat in submissive wonder soaking up the magic of Three's Company and Who's The Boss?"
It's as usual, a matter of balance. We need to be able to focus on some tasks for extended periods and other times we can do multiple things at the same time. The ability to access and list multitudes of information is not the same skill set as being able to create a meaningful essay that holds together. The ability to IM someone with short bursts of chat, or call someone on a cell phone, is not the same as taking the time to have a conversation - face to face.
It might boil down to how much effort we are willing to put into something or someone. The wired world can be easy - giving us the appearance of social connection or learning without the effort of stopping what we are doing to concentrate on anyone or anything.
If we stop at the wired world we end up with fairly shallow ideas about both socialization and learning. It's only when we take the time and make the effort to sort through the data, remix it, integrate it, form it into patterns - that we begin to learn. Regurgitation is neither learning nor an indication of knowledge - regardless of what some fans of testing, or bloggers, might think.
Now that's hypocritical...
TIME Magazine Archive Article -- The Multitasking Generation -- Mar. 27, 2006
Everything Bad Is Good for You
How Today's Popular Culture Is Actually Making Us Smarter
