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It's an opinion piece, so it's sort of anecdotal and hazy by nature, I guess (ymmv). I'm not going to complain too viscerally about it. The problem I have, th

It's an opinion piece, so it's sort of anecdotal and hazy by nature, I guess (ymmv). I'm not going to complain too viscerally about it. The problem I have, though, is that the entire piece basically says "noise kills productivity" but the only linked research is saying that "exposure to aircraft noise increases morning saliva cortisol levels in women, which could be of relevance for noise-related cardiovascular effects." [0] So I basically have an article saying "noise is bad for productivity and concentration" and a research article saying "loud noise at night might raise stress levels in women, even if it doesn't wake them up." To me, the former is meaningless. I wouldn't even start to make an argument about it based on the provided material without bringing other sources to bat. It would just be anecdote v anecdote. However, I find the latter interesting, and makes me want to do a little more reading on that particular subject. I happen to be male, but the idea that extra noise might inherently increase levels of a stress hormone in the human body is just as interesting and important to me as whether or not I'm more or less productive in a quiet room. tl;dr = The article content is fluffy, but the linked research is kind of interesting (albeit saying something almost totally unrelated) [0] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2801169/#__ffn_sectitle http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2801169/#__ffn_s...

superuser2 13y ago
"Noise is bad for concentration" isn't exactly an extraordinary claim. What makes you skeptical?
- auggierose 13y ago
  Because it is not scientific to accept something because it sounds plausible. For example, I can work without problems at quite a high level of noise if it is regular, like traffic noise.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - precisioncoder 13y ago
    I can also work with regular noise that's why I drown out voices with Russian or Japanese heavy metal, or electronic music. If I'm working on heavy concentration work I always have earbuds in.
- doorhammer 13y ago
  My saying "meaningless" might have been a bit hyperbolic, but stands for the type of meaning I prefer. I doubt I would have thought twice about it if there wasn't a research article dropped into the middle of the piece that didn't really seem to justify anything that was being put forward. I would have just gone through the article, nodded, and read something else. Once I skimmed the research article I was in a "research journal" frame of mind. I don't necessarily think that "noise is bad for concentration" is an extraordinary claim, but it's an imprecise claim, and at the point where it's serious enough to start citing research sources, I want more meat. I'd like to know what we're defining as noise. How loud is it? What's the duration? What kind of content does the noise have? How are we defining concentration? If it's about productivity, how are we defining productivity? Since we're talking about stress hormones, what are the short and long term impacts of stress on our definition of productivity? How large is the impact? Does the type of work being done change the impact? Does is change across cultural boundaries? Does is change across age groups? Can one be conditioned to be more resistant to noise? That might all be a bit pedantic and overwrought for the type of article this is, but that's the path I went down
  - wslh 13y ago
    Sorry I think you are being too extreme in your rigorous quest: imagine that answering all your questions about noise and concentration could take 50 years. Will you wait for 50 years to take a decision for your own life or take an action before? "Sadly" scientific studies are an infinitesimal part of the reality.
    - doorhammer 13y ago
      No, I agree, which is why I said I was being hyperbolic, pedantic and overwrought. I think my tl;dr sums it up. The article wasn't particularly bad, and it was an opinion piece, but the linked research was more interesting, yet didn't support the claims at all, so why even link to it? I didn't mean to imply that you have to answer all of those questions in a piece of research, but that trying to answer any one of those pieces would be more useful and interesting than the speculation. Even absent rigorous research, when I have a conversation about this kind of thing with friends, we pretty quickly try to hone in on some reasonably precise definitions of what we're talking about. Defining the question is half the fun of the discourse for me a lot of the time. edit: and besides.. listing all those criteria made me look super smart ;)
- precisioncoder 13y ago
  While not extraordinary by quantifying and studying it we can learn to understand the mechanisms behind it. If we understand concentration and thought better we can start implementing habits to maximize those values. Seems like a pretty decent goal to me.

superuser2 13y ago

"Noise is bad for concentration" isn't exactly an extraordinary claim. What makes you skeptical?

auggierose 13y ago
Because it is not scientific to accept something because it sounds plausible. For example, I can work without problems at quite a high level of noise if it is regular, like traffic noise.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- precisioncoder 13y ago
  I can also work with regular noise that's why I drown out voices with Russian or Japanese heavy metal, or electronic music. If I'm working on heavy concentration work I always have earbuds in.
doorhammer 13y ago
My saying "meaningless" might have been a bit hyperbolic, but stands for the type of meaning I prefer. I doubt I would have thought twice about it if there wasn't a research article dropped into the middle of the piece that didn't really seem to justify anything that was being put forward. I would have just gone through the article, nodded, and read something else. Once I skimmed the research article I was in a "research journal" frame of mind. I don't necessarily think that "noise is bad for concentration" is an extraordinary claim, but it's an imprecise claim, and at the point where it's serious enough to start citing research sources, I want more meat. I'd like to know what we're defining as noise. How loud is it? What's the duration? What kind of content does the noise have? How are we defining concentration? If it's about productivity, how are we defining productivity? Since we're talking about stress hormones, what are the short and long term impacts of stress on our definition of productivity? How large is the impact? Does the type of work being done change the impact? Does is change across cultural boundaries? Does is change across age groups? Can one be conditioned to be more resistant to noise? That might all be a bit pedantic and overwrought for the type of article this is, but that's the path I went down
- wslh 13y ago
  Sorry I think you are being too extreme in your rigorous quest: imagine that answering all your questions about noise and concentration could take 50 years. Will you wait for 50 years to take a decision for your own life or take an action before? "Sadly" scientific studies are an infinitesimal part of the reality.
  - doorhammer 13y ago
    No, I agree, which is why I said I was being hyperbolic, pedantic and overwrought. I think my tl;dr sums it up. The article wasn't particularly bad, and it was an opinion piece, but the linked research was more interesting, yet didn't support the claims at all, so why even link to it? I didn't mean to imply that you have to answer all of those questions in a piece of research, but that trying to answer any one of those pieces would be more useful and interesting than the speculation. Even absent rigorous research, when I have a conversation about this kind of thing with friends, we pretty quickly try to hone in on some reasonably precise definitions of what we're talking about. Defining the question is half the fun of the discourse for me a lot of the time. edit: and besides.. listing all those criteria made me look super smart ;)
precisioncoder 13y ago
While not extraordinary by quantifying and studying it we can learn to understand the mechanisms behind it. If we understand concentration and thought better we can start implementing habits to maximize those values. Seems like a pretty decent goal to me.