Concentration by Stefan Van der Stigchel

Author:Stefan Van der Stigchel [Van der Stigchel, Stefan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Concentration; focus; attention; working memory; phonological loop; visuo-spatial sketchpad; attention crisis; executive attention; perseveration; voluntary attention; reflexive attention; multitasking;
Publisher: MIT Press
Published: 2020-02-28T00:00:00+00:00

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The Receiver: How Can You Improve Your Concentration?

The American psychologist Burrhus Skinner (1904–1990) was convinced that concentration can be conditioned, just like you can condition a dog to start slobbering at the sound of a bell. Skinner’s work followed in the footsteps of Pavlov, and he was one of the founding fathers of behaviorism. He is most famous for inventing the “Skinner box,” an instrument used to study operant conditioning. An animal placed in a Skinner box receives an automatic reward, usually in the form of food, when it executes a certain task correctly. This allows us to study how an animal reacts to a reward and how it learns to associate a certain activity with the potential of a reward.

As well as an inventor and psychologist, Skinner was also a very productive author, publishing twenty scientific books and countless articles during his lifetime. To be able to work hard, he used techniques from behaviorism, such as operant conditioning. Every morning he would begin his daily writing session by ringing a bell in order to create an association between the sound of the bell and his concentration. It was as if Skinner wanted to teach his brain to concentrate all by itself upon hearing the tinkle of a bell.

In actual fact, Skinner engaged in a whole series of rituals early in the morning before his writing session began. He rose at the same time every day and his breakfast always consisted of a bowl of cornflakes. Every morning he read the newspaper and a few pages of the dictionary. Then, at a fixed time, he would go to his study to start his day’s work. He always kept the same books close at hand and the same lamp on his desk. Switching the lamp on also set a clock in motion that tracked the time Skinner spent working. And, as if that wasn’t enough, he also kept a record of his own productivity. When the clock struck a certain hour, he counted the number of words he had written, just like the Skinner box records the behavior of test animals.

It goes without saying that Skinner liked to measure things, and he is widely regarded as having contributed enormously to making the study of behavior more scientific. The bell was his constant companion, even towards the end his career when it would ring to summon him in the evening to his desk for another hour of writing, and it continued to ring long after he had officially retired. Skinner never stopped working, in fact, seven days a week all year round, and he never went on vacation. He died at the age of eighty-six in 1990 having published his last book only the year before.

Skinner adopted the same attitude towards his concentration as he did towards his experiments. It was almost as if he spent his entire life inside his very own Skinner box. Always that bell, always that amazing productivity. Many people have their own rituals before engaging upon an extended period of concentration.

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