Multitasking

We just don't have the capacity to process everything at once. This is a particular problem when we try to multitask. We can switch attention from one task to another and back again. But when attention is overloaded, we miss things, and the result is nearly always that we perform tasks less well than we would doing them one at a time. It's only truly possible to do two things at once if they require different sets of cognitive resources. For example, it's totally possible to read a book and listen to music at the same time, which would suggest that driving while talking on the phone is not a problem, as long as it's a hands-free phone. It's not that simple though - research has shown that while talking on the phone we have a tendency to create mental images, and this uses the same visual resources needed for driving. And if visual resources become too stretched, it's perfectly possible for a driver to look directly at a hazard but fail to see it. Not everything will make it through to conscious awareness. So multitasking makes us at best, inefficient, and at worst, downright dangerous. If you're feeling like you should be doing 17 things at once, remember, that's just not the way your brain is wired.