Research Sources: Media-Related Multitasking

 

For project two, I am exploring four common places on campus where students utilize media and/or electronic devices in addition to attempting another task.

It interests me because; I feel that for the first time in my life I am fully exposed to a large majority of students utilizing media as a form of multitasking.  My high school environment didn’t allow the use of computers in class, or headphones.  My friends usually didn’t use these things during study hall because we were so focused on accomplishing our tasks. Today I am on campus of 55,000 people and many questions relating to multitasking are surfacing.  It’s a strange situation for me, not only do I have to navigate through large crowds on my bike, but I have to maneuver around people who are walking/biking/skateboarding AND listening to music.  I’ve seen many kids wipe out on skateboards or run into bikers because of their inattention. I've seen kids tryign to do hoemwork with music and 4 different tabs running on Google Chrome.  Most college kids listen to music while exercising.  And eating lunch is usually accompanied by listening to music, or checking social networking sites.  

I am really starting to wonder if using media while trying to do something else, is an appropriate use of multitasking. 

           Criteria I will use:

·         The use of media--either one or more--while trying to accomplish a primary task

·         The primary tasks could either include the human body in a form of transit, relating to homeostasis, done while exercising, or cognitive processes.

·         Is the full attention partially compromised during this bout of ‘multitasking?’

·         How it interferes with others on the ASU campus; and if it interferes at all

·         If multitasking is generally a good thing, or a bad thing.

Sources I will use:

Amy Jarmon, “Multitasking:  Is it Helpful or Harmful?” Student Lawyer.  4pages. I found this to be most helpful on the topic of students using music and social networking.  She explains a lot of ways ‘why’ students do this. It would apply to my ‘motive’ criteria. 

Fenella Saunders, “Multitasking to Distraction.” American Scientist.  622 words.  This is a study that includes the heightened distraction levels students experience while multitasking.  Fenella shows that abilities can fall short when the student is switching between multiple tasks while trying to work on one thing. 

William O. Lesitaokana, “An Exploratory Study of Youth and their Use of MP3 Devices in Mass Transit Spaces in Boston.” NmediaC:  The Journal of New Media and Culture. About 25 paragraphs.  This contains field study information that will be important to my annotations on students who use media in transit.  It also lists reasons for why students use media:  personal identity, social status, youth experiences with/without MP3 devices, user behavior and how it affects the people around them. 

Craig S. Watkins, “Young and the Digital : What the Migration to Social Network Sites, Games, and Anytime, Anywhere Media Means for Our Future.”  Print. 271 pages. This explores the general ‘instant gratification’ that a lot of students seek out in the form of multitasking. This would help my annotations on eating, and studying.  

 David Barney; Anita Gust; Gary Liguori “College Students' Usage of Personal Music Players (PMP) during Exercise.” ICHPER-SD Journal of Research. 4 pages. This is an article specializing on the use of music during exercise.  It explains motive and also has statistics that affect performance.  I would use this in my annotation of exercise.

Evaluation: Sherlock

Source:  IMDB

Sherlock is a critically-acclaimed British television crime drama that provides a 21^st century version of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes detective stories.  Sherlock started airing in 2010 and contains six episode installments.  The newest season is expected to air in 2013.  British actors Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman play Sherlock Holmes and John Watson.

Sherlock Holmes in essence is a character that has transcended decades and caters to audiences who love mystery, intrigue, and peculiarity. He is an understatement himself, for he embodies peculiar.  He possesses superior analyzing methods, and brilliant deduction skills bordering on Savant-like qualities.  Sherlock comes off as brutish, direct, and extravagant in the way he interacts with people. He finds people extremely boring, predictable, and easy to read. He thinks that the general populations of people never use their brain to their fullest potential and are inferior to him.  Emotions are useless to him, and he finds a way to get around them while questioning suspects.  During these situations, propriety and interpersonal skills are cast to the side.  It is humorous to see how flustered and confused characters become when they interact with Sherlock, as he always seems to have the upper hand while blatantly analyzing them.

John Watson is the complement to Sherlock. He provides the human element in the show and insight to Sherlock. He is a former army doctor and Sherlock’s flat mate.  They live together and John Watson is the closest thing as a friend to Holmes.  Holmes relies on Watson’s advice because Watson possesses the ‘normal human skills’ that he has been so accustomed to avoiding.  John Watson is incredibly loyal to Sherlock—though sometimes reluctant—and always seems to have his moral compass pointing north.

London’s police frequently consult Sherlock as a detective for murder investigations.  This is another reason to love Sherlock; he likes to allude to the fact that the police never know what they’re doing and ask for his skills all the time.  Other characters in the show who are easily miffed by his antics describe him as a ‘psychopath.’  One of the characters Sgt. Sally Donovan tries to warn John Watson in the first episode, “He gets off on it, you know…. One day we'll be standing around a body and Sherlock Holmes will be the one that put it there.”  The story never alludes to the fact of Sherlock’s capacity to cross over from good side to bad.  Yet, that possibility keeps the show exciting. 

The transition from the old-world Sherlock Holmes to modern day is seamless and hardly noticeable.  Taking a familiar character and placing him in a new environment is exciting for avid Sherlock fans.  The general makeups of the characters remain the same, and any new additions are brought about in such a commendable way, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle would be proud if he were here today.

The genre of the story draws people in because it centers on an incomplete mystery and later completes it. Mysteries would be nothing more than prolonged if the show was a documentation of the process of an unsolved case. In Sherlock, each case is solved at the end with a definite perpetrator. Although, sometimes the episodes end in a cliffhanger or introduce a new concept for the next season, this is usually alluded to or introduced in the middle of the episode and later develops. 

The show enthralls the audience in a variety of ways. The essence of a well-developed character supplemented by incredible acting gives people the ability to enter into the story.  Someone who is extraordinarily bizarre and brilliant transcends decades and culture barriers.  Sherlock shows that reasoning and intellect never go out of style, and as long as there are unsolvable cases, there will be Sherlock Holmes.