Lab experiment · 2015
The attentional cost of receiving a cell phone notification
Stothart C, Mitchum A, Yehnert C
What it found
Just receiving a notification hurt performance on a task that needed attention, even when people did not touch their phone. The size of the drop was similar to that of actually using a phone for a call or a text. The authors link it to the notification setting off thoughts unrelated to the task.
Where the evidence stops
A lab task, measured over minutes. It shows a cost in the moment, not over a working day.
How it shapes Pursue
Pursue
The reason Pursue treats its own signal as a cost: every alert it sends spends some of the attention it is trying to protect.
A design input, not evidence that Pursue works.
Cited in
- 01Do phone notifications hurt focus, even if I don't check them?Yes. In a 2015 Florida State University experiment, simply receiving a notification hurt performance on an attention-demanding task about as much as calling or texting, even when people never touched the phone. In a field experiment with 221 adults (Kushlev et al., 2016), people reported more inattention in the week their alerts were on.Interruptions and attention
- 02When is it better for an AI assistant to say nothing?Whenever speaking would cost more attention than it gives back: when the person can't take it in, the evidence is thin, or nothing needs to change. The 2018 framework for just-in-time support (Nahum-Shani et al.) counts giving nothing as a designed option, and declining uncertain cases makes a system's other answers more reliable (Geifman and El-Yaniv, 2017).Timing and receptivity