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MT: This is Maura Thomas from RegainYourTime.com. Thanks for listening to the fifth and final part of my interview with Dr. John Dovidio, psychology professor at Yale University.  You can see the previous posts by clicking the link at the top of this page and prior pages.  And if you’re interested in reading up on the current research, please visit the “Research and Resources” page of this website.

What do you think about the danger that ah…I’ve read some…some research is suggesting that there is a real benefit in the…the quiet moments that we used to have, the time in between things…waiting in line, or even sitting at a red light, or…you know, just the moments in between other things that we…we used to have an opportunity for our mind to just wander and that time was…our brains sometimes used to process what we had heard, and to create connections among things and really where the learning happens.  And now there is some fear that we don’t have those moments of quiet anymore because in every moment of stillness, we whip out our iPhone and check our email, or check our Facebook status, or jump on the internet, or play a game on our phone.  And now that we have all this…this stimulation in our pocket, do you think that there’s a danger to losing those moments of..of “mind wandering” that we used to have?

JD: There is a lot of evidence that suggests that ah…part of learning is taking the time to consolidate, to reflect upon things, to make sure that what we know just has to reverberate enough in our head for it to stay there.  That’s a simple way of saying it.  There’s a lot of work that also shows that there are these times that we develop insights by ah…this kind of…not actively thinking about something, but different pieces, or different elements to the solution of a problem just appear to us through insight, and not in a logical fashion. And this insight comes usually during those periods following a period of consolidation and reflection, where you basically have to see, you have to sort of become inwardly focused to start thinking about the thoughts, and then those thoughts can become, can come to coalesce in some unique, synthetic way that becomes a creative insight.  And if we’re always focused outward, we’re not going to do as much of that…we’re going to rely on creativity coming from the outside rather than from the inside.  On the other hand, to give you the balance of it, is that the other thing about humans is that when we begin to feel we’ve reached a limit, we almost reflexively back off to gain at least enough solitude to be able to regroup, consolidate, and move forward.  So the question becomes, not that we’re not going to have those moments of solitude, we just may have fewer and fewer of them as we go on. But if people need time to think, it’s not like we can’t turn off the machines.  It’s not that we don’t go into a shower, where we don’t have our, our cell phone on and our computer on.  Maybe when we start losing those private moments we’re in more trouble (laughing).  But people will probably structure their day so that they’ll have those private moments at different times.

MT: Do you think that we’ll continue to recognize that we need those moments, and take them?  I have people tell me all the time that their best ideas come to them in the shower, just for the exact reason that you just said.  And one client even told me that he…he got some crayons…water soluble crayons, so he could write on the shower tiles because that’s when he has his best ideas and that’s what I told him, it’s because it’s the only time that you’re not interrupted. So..but…but that was a surprise to him.  You know when I said that, he hadn’t thought about it.  “Wow, you’re right,” he said.  “Those are the only moments of quiet that I ever get.”  So to me that..that raises a concern that…especially children who are constantly exposed to all the stimulation…while they may be capable of…of stepping back and taking those moments, they might not recognize that they need them.

JD: Yeah, I mean that’s…the biggest problem is with kids.  I mean part of…of growing up has to do with seeking new stimulations and new information. And so kids tend not to be as reflective anyway.  They…they tend not to…even if you give them that free time, doesn’t mean that they’re doing it…using the same kind of consolidation that an adult would…the way an adult would handle that.  If in fact you…you don’t even allow them that time, then they’re going to be less likely to be able to do that when they become adults because they won’t know what to do with it.  And so I think…again, the issue is probably…it’s not having all the media available.  It has to do with things like, training people when to use it, when not to use it, having, you know…I think as adults enforcing a quiet time, a non-electronic time, is not a bad thing. Kids will resent it.  Part of what we need to teach kids anyway is a little bit of self-control.  “You can’t do what you want, when you want, all the time.”  But part of being a kid is wanting to do what you want, whenever you want, as soon as you want.

MT: Right.

JD: So, I mean that’s the age-old challenge we have and now it’s just, the electronic media, which is more seductive, just makes it a little bit more complicated and much more difficult to do.

MT: Hmmm, great point.  Well I want to be respectful of your time so while I feel like I could discuss this with you forever I will…I will call it here and say thank you very much for taking the time to speak with me.  Dr. John Dovidio from Yale University, thank you very much.

JD:  Well thank you!

MT:  And thank you, for visiting, and be sure to check this space again for future interviews with researchers in the fields of attention, multitasking, productivity, and technology.  This is Maura Thomas with RegainYourTime.com.