E-mails 'hurt IQ more than pot'

[Karim]

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/04/22/text.iq/index.html


LONDON, England -- Workers distracted by phone calls, e-mails and text messages suffer a greater loss of IQ than a person smoking marijuana, a British study shows.

[Pyser]

thats it. im getting a job in england.

[Franklinnoble]

Fuck. All those lost brain cells, and I don't even have a good buzz to show for it...

[sterlingice]

Perhaps if they were doing their job rather than answering email, this wouldn't be an issue.

SI

[ThunderingHERD]

The buzzword IQ is completely out of place here. One's intelligence is lowered when checking messages? Obviously, if you're multitasking each task might get a little less attention, but the idea that it "lowers" your IQ is kind of silly. If anything this study reveals that people do worse on IQ tests while being constantly interrupted--which I guess is significant if your job involves taking IQ tests. Or was IQ "measured" some other way? It's a dodgy enough number when arrived at through standard methods.

[HomerJSimpson]

Read, the story...basically he was doing regular IQ testing during the day while the people were working. The test showed the people's IQ lowered by the same level as missing a night's sleep, and less than they would have if they had smoked pot. Of course, it doesn't look like he tested subjects working while smoking pot, or while working on no sleep.

I'm doing a research paper, so I'll see if I can find if this was published in a journal or not. I'd say it was a pretty flawed test, set up Hewlett Packard so they can justify cutting out all personal calls and emails while at work.

[ThunderingHERD]

Read, the story...basically he was doing regular IQ testing during the day while the people were working.

That's one of the concepts I'm having trouble with. Last time I took an IQ test, it was a rather lengthy process with multiple sections--some of which required a great amount of concentration (# and pattern memorization).

<pre>Reasearcher: Ok, now I'm going to have you repeat back to me as many numbers as you can from the list I'm about to read, ok?
Worker: Ok.
Researcher: 5, 17, 9, 2, 26, 29, 52, 4, 33, 19, 28. Repeat what you remember.
Worker: 5, 17, 9, uh... 2, twentysi--
Computer: YOU'VE GOT MAIL!
Worker: Twentysi--
Researcher: Uh, uh, uh, uh! Read the email first, you know the rules.</pre>

[Desnudo]

Perhaps if they were doing their job rather than answering email, this wouldn't be an issue.

SI

I wonder what the impact is of posting on a message board throughout the day.

[EagleFan]

Could lead to an interesting exchange:

Boss: Welcome to the company.

New Employee: Thank you sir. I have just one question. Is it okay if I check my email occasionally during down time?

Boss: Sorry, that is against company policy. Take this bag of weed instead.

[HomerJSimpson]

That's one of the concepts I'm having trouble with. Last time I took an IQ test, it was a rather lengthy process with multiple sections--some of which required a great amount of concentration (# and pattern memorization).

<pre>Reasearcher: Ok, now I'm going to have you repeat back to me as many numbers as you can from the list I'm about to read, ok?
Worker: Ok.
Researcher: 5, 17, 9, 2, 26, 29, 52, 4, 33, 19, 28. Repeat what you remember.
Worker: 5, 17, 9, uh... 2, twentysi--
Computer: YOU'VE GOT MAIL!
Worker: Twentysi--
Researcher: Uh, uh, uh, uh! Read the email first, you know the rules.</pre>


I know, that is why I also said this is most likely a biased study. It was done by a company that mostly does "market research." Most likely not a very scholarly study at all.