2x content rate, but 1/2 the focus rate

Why more and faster does not mean more to comprehend

For the recent exams, I referred to a playlist on YouTube to learn from. It was 114 videos long but covered every bit of my syllabus. I decided to utilize this resource but it seemed impractical to watch all of this a week before the exam.

So I decided to watch it at 2x speed, a provision YouTube has to speed up and digest the content faster. This seemed quite useful too, considering the fact that I was still able to comprehend what the speaker spoke of.

Photo by Christian Wiediger on Unsplash

I even went on to install an extension to the platform that enables me to watch at an even faster rate (up to 16x !!) so now my average watch speed is 2.5x and it worked really well! I was able to finish all the episodes and understood as well.

I started using this strategy at many other videos. I started listening to songs, motivational talks, presentations and much more at a faster rate. It felt good knowing that I was digesting in more information than I normally could. It felt really good

But then a problem occurred on the day of the exam — I was not able to remember certain facts. I was certain I had gone through it and it was there somewhere in my mind but when I needed it, it just seemed to have disappeared.

I returned back home and started thinking about what went wrong. I realized a few points:

1. I started giving more attention to number of videos completed rather than number of videos I understood.
2. I became restless and impatient when it came to learning and that took a major impact. I was not focused — I was only listening.
3. My mind eventually gave up the process of understanding as now it was tasked to momentarily make sense of the information coming in.

When I had increased the speed, I stopped caring about what I was listening to and started focusing on how much I listened.

I made the mistake of giving more attention to quantity rather than quality and this took a blow in my performance during the exams.

When put in some more thinking, I realized this is a problem beyond just video rate. Every social media platform existent out there depends upon user interaction time with the device and so they give short term quick rewards (faster completion rate) to bring them back. We in turn keep digesting more content and tend to pay less attention to having effective online time.

Again, quantity outweighed quality.

These days it is becoming more hard to discern where do we stand in the equation — are we the pray to the system or are we in charge? With reward mechanisms such as a retweet it gives a sense of accomplishment yet we tend to seek more ways to get it rather than determining for one self if it is deserving.

We all have been there — thinking it is too slow and put the speed faster in the hopes of covering more ground. But then the objective for the mind gets tricked into believing it is about covering more rather than understanding more. We pay less attention on the lessons — instead look at the metrics to determine completion rate.

So how do we ensure quantity < quality when you interact with the digital media? It is simple — just ask yourself are you in control. Think about it. If you are, then it will not be hard to determine what is worth indulging in and what can be avoided.

So let us try to fix this problem together by ensuring everyone is in control of their time and energy. It is better to be slow and attentive rather than hasty and short-sighted. Ensure you are on the right side of the equation.