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I’m Thinking. Please. Be Quiet.

nytimes.com

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Re: I’m Thinking. Please. Be Quiet.

#11

Post by ssharp »

cup wrote: post #4
SeanDav wrote: post #2

I see a lot of developers using earphones and listening to music while doing their stuff. As someone that prefers relative quiet I have always wondered if this makes them more, or less productive. This article would tend to indicate the latter but of course there is a big difference (generally) between music and noise.

Have you tried grey/pink noise or any of those derivatives?

I found noise generators to be very helpful when I was studying or reading in places prone to distracting noise. I did find that either the noise or the presence of the headphones started to get annoying after an hour or two

I find music or even some banal sports talk (almost functioning as noise) to be helpful in allowing me to accomplish tasks that require some thought, but nothing deep. Anything requiring deeper thought, I need quiet.

Re: I’m Thinking. Please. Be Quiet.

#12

Post by wissler »

HCIdivision17 wrote: post #9

I'll bite. From my biased viewpoint, based on who complains most, people prefer the quiet more as they get older. Kids don't seem to care, middle aged prefer some separation, and my elders can be derailed by a greeting. I've always assumed it was the skill to tune out, but perhaps theirs are weightier thoughts. Personally, I need some mindless noise in the background, but nothing with any meaningful signal. The noise…

As we age it appears that it's harder to filter out distractions:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/11/081125181035.ht...

Re: I’m Thinking. Please. Be Quiet.

#14

Post by burntsushi »

SeanDav wrote: post #2

I see a lot of developers using earphones and listening to music while doing their stuff. As someone that prefers relative quiet I have always wondered if this makes them more, or less productive. This article would tend to indicate the latter but of course there is a big difference (generally) between music and noise.

For me personally, I only listen to music when doing menial tasks. But if I'm writing code or trying to design my plan of attack, music noticeably hampers my ability to focus and think creatively.

When I want quiet, I try to just use my over-ear headphones without any music. They typically dull surrounding sounds enough for it to be tolerable. But if I'm still having trouble, I use my less comfortable earmuffs[1] to block out almost everything.

[1] - http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00009LI4K/ref=oh_details_o...

Re: I’m Thinking. Please. Be Quiet.

#15

Post by jtreminio »

I tell every developer buddy I have that they should get a pair of Fuck Off Headphones [0]. They need to be big enough that people can't try to say, "Oh, I didn't see you had headphones on".

I work from home now, and they work just as well for keeping my family at bay as they did for chatty coworkers when I had to be in an office.

[0] http://www.amazon.com/Logitech-Wireless-Gaming-Headset-Surro...

Re: I’m Thinking. Please. Be Quiet.

#16

Post by hcarvalhoalves »

HCIdivision17 wrote: post #9

I'll bite. From my biased viewpoint, based on who complains most, people prefer the quiet more as they get older. Kids don't seem to care, middle aged prefer some separation, and my elders can be derailed by a greeting. I've always assumed it was the skill to tune out, but perhaps theirs are weightier thoughts. Personally, I need some mindless noise in the background, but nothing with any meaningful signal. The noise…

> I'll bite. From my biased viewpoint, based on who complains most, people prefer the quiet more as they get older. Kids don't seem to care, middle aged prefer some separation, and my elders can be derailed by a greeting.

Or maybe, older people complain more about noise because they actually know what sane conditions are and how life was back when ADD wasn't a thing yet.

Re: I’m Thinking. Please. Be Quiet.

#17

Post by doorhammer »

[deleted] wrote: post #10

[deleted]

There's a lot of waxing poetic and conjecture in the write up but the most interesting take away for me was the HYENA article which (at first glance of the abstract and conclusions) seems to say that the presence of certain kinds of noise will have underlying physiological impact, raising levels of cortisol, that you're not consciously aware of.

While not every study ever published is automatically granted validity just by putting "abstract" and "conclusion" at the top, I do prefer the part where someone tried to measure something.

As it stands, I think your response and the article are equal parts conjecture based on anecdotal evidence except for the one linked study that the article seems to over generalize. That doesn't make either useless, but it does make me interested in other physiological effects that might be occurring without my conscious ability to recognize them.

Re: I’m Thinking. Please. Be Quiet.

#18

Post by agumonkey »

HCIdivision17 wrote: post #9

I'll bite. From my biased viewpoint, based on who complains most, people prefer the quiet more as they get older. Kids don't seem to care, middle aged prefer some separation, and my elders can be derailed by a greeting. I've always assumed it was the skill to tune out, but perhaps theirs are weightier thoughts. Personally, I need some mindless noise in the background, but nothing with any meaningful signal. The noise…

In the noise/age relation lies a little frequency thing, when you don't have regular event of mind-flow, you care about not disrupting them.

A dev I know and I experienced another strong disrupting setup: having unsimilarly thinking person near you (colleagues, parents). Their mere presence shuts you down even if they make no sound. As soon as they left, your mind fills the room.

Comparing airport (place) with train (vehicle) is not fair. With large enough seats and no AC a plane is as nice as a train. Engine sound filtering through ~= rain sound. I stumbled upon laptop fan recordings, the low freq air flow has the same texture and effect as an engine. Guess fest explanation : pre-birth frequencies heard through the mother's body.

Re: I’m Thinking. Please. Be Quiet.

#19

Post by msluyter »

I'm extremely sensitive to sound, and I've been hoping that the the powers that be will eventually come to the realization that open seating plans are highly suboptimal (http://www.infoq.com/news/2011/08/open-office-layout, for example).

I've used a decibel meter on occasion and have observed that my current office sometimes averages 75-80 db. Which, were I in a coffee shop, I could tolerate for some reason[1] much better than at the office.

In any event, I'm now highly dependent on noise canceling headphones (these I highly recommend: http://www.bose.com/controller?url=/shop_online/headphones/n...)

[1] My guesses are a) local conversations at work capture my attention in ways that anonymous ones at a coffee shop don't, b) coffee shops play music and tend to have other noise that create a generalized din that actually works a bit like white noise.

Re: I’m Thinking. Please. Be Quiet.

#20

Post by adamzerner »

1) Sound isn't necessarily distracting. Sometimes it could be helpful. Focus@Will (https://www.focusatwill.com/science/science-primer/) is based on this.

2) You can usually find quiet if you want to rather easily.

3) If you're going to argue that society (or parts of society) should be more quiet, you have to be specific about what parts, and about why restricting sound outweighs the costs. The costs of restricting sound weren't addressed at all.

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