Attention spans are dropping, research shows: Heres how to help keep focused

Feel like you can’t focus? Like you’ll never finish a book again? Like the only way to keep your mind and hands busy is to scroll on social media for hours?You’re far from alone.One body of decades-long research found the average person’s attention span for a single screen is 47 seconds, down from 2.5 minutes in 2004.

The 24/7 news cycle, uncertainty about the state of the world and countless hours of screen time don’t help, experts say.“When my patients talk to me about this stuff there is often a feeling of helplessness or powerlessness,” said Dr.Michael Ziffra, a psychiatrist at Northwestern Medicine.

“But you can change these behaviors.You can improve your attention span.”Here are ways to start that process.

As you read, challenge yourself to set a 2.5 minute timer and stay on this article without looking at another device or clicking away.A shifting attention is an evolutionary feature, not a bug.Our brains are hardwired to quickly filter information and hone in on potential threats or changes in what’s happening around us.What’s grabbing our attentions has changed.

For our ancestors, it might have been a rustle in the bushes putting us on guard for a lurking tiger.Today, it could be a rash of breaking news alerts and phone notifications.The COVID-19 pandemic warped many people’s sense of time and increased their screen usage like never before, said Stacey Nye, a clinical psychologist at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.Technology isn’t the only thing that influences our attention, experts say, but the effects of those pinging notifications or hours scrolling through 30-second long videos can build up over time.“Our attention span has really been trained to only focus in those little, small blips and it interrupts our natural focus cycles,” she said.Experts say “active” breaks are among the best way to retrain your mind and your attention.

They only take about 30 minutes, Nye said, and can be as simple as taking a...