Continuous Partial Attention

by Peter O'Farrell

Cutter Business Technology Council Fellow Tim Lister's recent Council Opinion (Vol. 3, No. 8) discusses the continuous partial attention (CPA) phenomenon first described by Linda Stone (then of Microsoft) in a January 2001 New York Times article. Competition for our attention during working hours as well as away from the office makes it increasingly difficult to focus on a single task while filtering out extraneous stimuli. We surveyed our readers to find out what they think about the issue of CPA. Responses indicate that they are aware of the issue of distractions at work and at home, although, for this group, the difficulties may not be as extreme as they could be.