Tests by the London School of Economics: habits and routines are shifting to laptops

Placing your smartphone just out of reach at work is not enough to reduce disruption and procrastination or improve concentration. This has been discovered by researchers at the London School of Economics (https://www.lse.ac.uk ) led by Maxi Heitmayer.

Shifted problem

‘The problem is not the device itself, but the habits and routines we have developed with our devices,’ says Heitmayer. For the study, the experts asked 22 people to work in a private, soundproof room for two days. They brought with them the devices that they normally have at work. These were at least a laptop and a smartphone.

At first, the smartphone was placed on the table where the participants were working. Later, it was placed on another table at a distance of 1.5 metres. The restricted access led to a reduced use of the, but also to a shift in attention to the laptops. Overall, the participants did not spend less time on leisure activities, according to the scientists.

Apps are the problem

According to the experts, it was shown that mobile phones were preferred for distractions. This is not surprising to Heitmayer, as they are the link to family, the navigation system, the alarm clock, the music player and the source of information. Although computers fulfil almost the same functions as mobile phones, according to the expert, they are less pleasant to the touch, not as handy and not as portable.

With his research, the expert wants to move the discourse beyond the device-centred debates. ‘The mobile phone itself is not the problem. The problem is what we do with it. And, to be honest, it is the apps that create and reinforce these habits,’ emphasises Heitmayer. The research results have been published in ‘Frontiers in Computer Science’.