Keep pulling the thread on David Epstein.
Research by psychologist Gloria Mark found that by 2022, knowledge workers switched the task they were working on every 45 seconds on average, down from every 3 minutes roughly 25 years ago.
Gloria Mark's research shows that the human brain becomes accustomed to a cadence of interruption and will self-interrupt with intrusive thoughts to maintain that rhythm even when external distractors are removed.
A custom gearbox manufacturer tripled the output of its design office and reduced total delivery time from one year to two months by implementing a "stop starting and start finishing" rule based on the Theory of Constraints.
Venture capitalist Bill Gurley states that more startups fail from "indigestion" (doing too much) than from "starvation" (having too little).
The Harvard Study of Adult Development, which ran for 86 years, found that having a dense network of reciprocal obligations is a crucial factor for human thriving.
Jill Viles, a patient with two rare genetic diseases, correctly hypothesized that Olympic sprinter Priscilla Lopes-Schliep had a related condition, which was later confirmed by genetic testing.
Herbert Simon's research found that humans operate under "bounded rationality," using mental shortcuts or "satisficing" rather than adhering to the rational actor model of classical economics.
Research indicates that individuals who are "maximizers," trying to optimize every decision, are less happy with their lives and more prone to regret than "satisficers."
According to David Epstein, there is evidence that maximizing tendencies are on the rise, with a leading theory attributing this to the ease of endless comparison enabled by the internet.
International surveys suggest that since the advent of infinite scrolling on digital platforms, people have reported becoming progressively more bored.
In a 1970 lecture, Herbert Simon argued that a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention, consuming the attention of its recipients.
According to Gloria Mark's research, people in office environments check their email an average of 77 distinct times per day.