So I’ve heard a lot of various “experts” saying that the American public’s attention span is shrinking; which sounds suspiciously like a veiled insult and just another way of saying that we’re getting dumber.
Even though I don’t consider myself an expert in whatever field would allow them to make such a bold statement I am part of the American public and therefore I believe that entitles me to weigh in on this subject.
There used to be a time before cable, satellite, hulu, etc that the TV viewing masses had an infinitesimal amount of channels to choose from if they wanted their TV fix. So you were stuck watching every feminine hygiene, toilet paper, or car dealership commercial they threw at you if you wanted to watch Kwai Chang Caine’s search for his elusive half brother. When the commercials came on you quickly had to decide between clicking over to one of the other limited viewing options, doing something productive or not so much, or sitting on your thumbs and waiting the commercials out. Well since we didn’t have any way to view the highly anticipated fight scene we might have missed while running out to get the mail, going to the bathroom, getting a soda or whatever generally I think most people just waited the commercials out. This quite possibly gave the industry “experts” the illusion that we were actually interested in being mountain fresh or not squeezing the toilet paper.
Jump forward a few years and we now have a multitude of options at our finger tips to deal with these annoying commercial distractions from our shows. If you have a decent DVR you can simply get up and go do something else then when you’re done come back and rewind to right after the commercials, you can click record and just walk away, you could jump on the laptop and check out the latest news, etc.
Generally for myself I prefer to preselect the shows I want to watch and preset them to record on the DVR so when I have the time and interest in watching the show I can sit down at my own leisure and enjoy my show with the added perk of being able to fast forward through the commercials.
I believe that this act alone disproves the so called experts that we the American viewing audience are losing our attention span. To take the time to setup a DVR to record a series or show and then specifically take the time out of your day to sit down with the full intention of watching that particular show I believe reflects a more refined attention span not a reduced one.
I don’t think we’re losing our attention span as a people I believe that our attention spans are becoming well honed by the massive amount of information available at our fingertips and our different options for viewing that information. I would suggest if anything we are becoming less tolerant of advertisers interferences between ourselves and the information we wish to see. -HD
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