The Age of Information Overload: How you can navigate your way through it!

Are you feeling the impact of information overload? If you struggle with brain fog or switching off you aren’t alone. Did you know that the average person consumes around 74 gigabytes? This is equivalent to nine DVDs worth of data every day! But what is the impact of this and how can you cope with information overload?

The conscious mind cannot actively focus on many things at once. Despite subtle differences between individuals, the average person can focus on no more than three things at once. In the age of the internet, we have become accustomed to juggling many things at once. Whether you are trying to actively focus or not, it can be difficult to cut through the constant buzzing of background information. With never-ending streams of emails, pop-up adverts, and flicking between many tabs, it is undeniable that we are surrounded by streams of information. These streams of information are potentially unavoidable, as they are a large part of modern life, but we can control how we react to them. But how can we cope in an era of information overload?

Changing your online behaviour can seem very difficult. The dopamine hit that you receive from patterns of online behaviour, of posting or searching for information, can be very addictive. As we have become accustomed to having an excess of information available at our fingertips, it sets up behaviours of constantly searching, reading and scrolling. One of the most common negative effects of information overload is brain fog and decision fatigue. Decision fatigue means you may experience difficulty in making a decision, even a small daily decision such as what to wear may prove to be too much whilst you’re fatigued. You may find yourself taking an “auto-pilot” approach to various daily tasks, which causes you to struggle to live in the present moment and to make decisions, it can cause you to be stuck in a rut, or make you feel confused or distracted. However it manifests, the impacts of information overload can be frustrating.

Being conscious of your online behaviour is a key first step. If you are reflective on your use of social media or search engines, and how different platforms make you feel, it can be easier to limit your use of them. Avoiding information overload doesn’t mean that you should avoid the internet altogether – but rather that you should be intentional about your use of it. A good place to start is limiting the information that might float around in your email inboxes, such as adverts or spam emails. Often, the smaller and more insignificant pieces of information that circulate your network can have the biggest impact.