WE all know people who think they are good at multi-tasking. But
the truth may be that they simply find it hard to do one thing
at a time. Researchers say that multi-taskers end up juggling
activities not because they are good at it, but because they are
easily distracted and cannot concentrate on the job at hand. By
contrast, the most efficient multi-tasker is the person least
likely to do so because they can focusing on one thing at a
time. A team from the University of Utah subjected volunteers to
tests to measure their actual multi-tasking ability against
their imagined ability. "The people who are most likely to
multi-task harbour the illusion they are better than average at
it, when in fact they are often worse," said Professor David
Strayer, senior author of the study. "If you have people multi-
tasking a lot, you might come to the conclusion that they are
good at multi-tasking. In fact, the more likely they are to do
it, the more likely they are to be bad at it." The paper,
published in the Public Libr