In today's world, this altered perspective has been greatly accelerated. Cell phones, e-mails, and numerous other devices compete for our attention. Because of this constant nagging, it becomes nearly impossible to utilize our capacity for sustained attention. Jackson's guest blog for the New York Times Business Section noted that the average worker switches tasks every three minutes and once interrupted takes nearly half an hour to go back to the original task. Families, friends, and lovers find it increasingly difficult to meet face-to-face and even more difficult to do so without interruption or willful multitasking. News segments bombard us with superficially simple pieces of information that people have very little time to reflect upon. We have essentially been ushered into a world of constant distraction in which reflective thinking has become exceedingly rare.

As Jackson makes clear, this is a dangerous path to follow. Analytical reasoning exams show that children and college graduates have a decreased capacity for rigorous thought and analysis. These are important skills for running businesses, making informed political decisions, and innovating new ideas--all of which are necessary components of an advanced democratic society such as our own. Parents' lack of focused attention directed toward their children often leads to a myriad of emotional and behavioral problems. Not giving loved ones our undivided attention causes relationships to disintegrate. The erosion of attention is largely equivalent to the erosion of our society. It is in this respect that Jackson warns of a possible dark age. She further points out that much like the current atmosphere, previous dark ages were marked by brilliant technological innovations coupled with a lack of widespread interest in academic pursuits. The New York Post agrees that "Distracted gives us much to fret about."

Despite the similarities between the contemporary world and previous dark ages, Jackson remains optimistic. Although she makes it clear that if we squander our powers of attention, our technological age could ultimately slip into cultural decline, she also notes that we are just as capable of igniting a renaissance of attention by strengthening our skills of focus and perception, the keys to judgment, memory, morality, and happiness. She reveals the astonishing scientific discoveries that can help us rekindle our powers of attention in a world of speed and overload. Harvard Business School professor Rosabeth Moss Kanter calls Distracted a "wake-up call to all of us to take back our lives, turn off the technology, and focus on paying attention to what makes us human and fulfilled."

Distracted is an original exposé of the multifaceted nature of attention, an engaging and often surprising portrait of postmodern life, and a compelling roadmap for cultivating sustained focus and nurturing a more enriched and literate society. More than ever, we cannot afford to let distraction become the marker of our time.