<story><title>Context switching costs more than we give it credit for</title><url>https://thinkingthrough.substack.com/p/context-switching-cost-more-than</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>Jaygles</author><text>For me it depends on if the music has lyrics or vocals in it. Someone speaking or singing is the factor for whether my brain expends cognitive effort in listening. I just can&amp;#x27;t help but try and pick up on words and discern what the meaning of them are.</text></item><item><author>saurik</author><text>There was a semi-famous study (one that I feel every developer should have at least considered) that gave software developers a problem to code in the form of some convoluted set of steps, and they were either assigned to listen to music or not to listen to music. There was (usefully) no difference in the correctness of the implementations, but people who listed to music reported more subjective happiness &amp;#x2F; less boredom doing the task... only... they were also much less likely than the people who did the task in silence to notice that all of those steps collapsed down to &amp;quot;return a constant number&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;I personally feel like there are different components of my brain and some of them just want to do something, and if I don&amp;#x27;t &amp;quot;distract&amp;quot; them then they do something arbitrary and maybe in turn distract me... but if I need them, and they are busy deciding some music I am listening to, I lose out on the maybe-even-often subconscious processing they do that gives me valuable insight. I thereby find some (mostly useless) tasks easier if I am seriously even playing a video game with a targeted skill while doing them (people hate me in meetings sometimes ;P), or &lt;i&gt;maybe&lt;/i&gt; listening to music, but if I am doing the hard coding work I &amp;quot;should be doing&amp;quot; I just can&amp;#x27;t :(.</text></item><item><author>axxl</author><text>&amp;gt; Trying to code and listening to music falls under cognitive functions. Naming a variable while listening to your favorite songs&amp;#x27; lyrics may result in cognitive overload. You are more likely to name a variable after the singers&amp;#x2F;songs name than what the variable is supposed to reflect (true story).&lt;p&gt;This point in the article lost me pretty quickly. My flow state is drastically improved by music, and I have never ever named a variable after the song name or song artist I&amp;#x27;m listening to in my life.&lt;p&gt;Edit: Nor have I ever seen a variable named after a song name or artist.&lt;p&gt;Edit2: NotoriousViewController. TheWeekndTimer. RedHotChiliPointers. Now I &lt;i&gt;want&lt;/i&gt; to name my variables like this.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>FullMtlGtar412</author><text>I actually have to get even more specific than this (at least prior to being diagnosed with ADHD in 2020 and getting Vyvanse for it).&lt;p&gt;If I need a mood boost or something to get my body &amp;quot;moving&amp;quot; in my seat and keep me from mentally wandering, I&amp;#x27;ll throw on stuff I really know and love. Usually I&amp;#x27;m doing menial tasks or simple coding.&lt;p&gt;If I&amp;#x27;m having a hard time focusing and need a distraction for some parts of my brain but not all of it, I have a &amp;quot;deathcore&amp;quot; (really more like melodic (tech) death metal) playlist where most of the songs sound very similar and you can&amp;#x27;t understand a thing the vox are saying.&lt;p&gt;Typically if I&amp;#x27;m super tired AND need to block out the outside world but even hard to understand screaming won&amp;#x27;t cut it, I have to resort to either instrumental metal or LoFi hip hop beats to study to.&lt;p&gt;If I&amp;#x27;m currently listening to music, I really only do a full stop&amp;#x2F;pause to focus if I notice I&amp;#x27;ve run a breakpoint three times and have no idea what I&amp;#x27;ve been stepping thru, or if I&amp;#x27;m trying to refactor or write a fresh, new logic flow and just can&amp;#x27;t get my brain focused enough to &amp;quot;check it&amp;quot; for all possible paths. That&amp;#x27;s when I cut the feed, double-time my focus, and once I&amp;#x27;m convinced it&amp;#x27;s &amp;quot;safe&amp;quot; I can hit play again.&lt;p&gt;Brains are weird and finicky I tell ya.</text></comment>
<story><title>Context switching costs more than we give it credit for</title><url>https://thinkingthrough.substack.com/p/context-switching-cost-more-than</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>Jaygles</author><text>For me it depends on if the music has lyrics or vocals in it. Someone speaking or singing is the factor for whether my brain expends cognitive effort in listening. I just can&amp;#x27;t help but try and pick up on words and discern what the meaning of them are.</text></item><item><author>saurik</author><text>There was a semi-famous study (one that I feel every developer should have at least considered) that gave software developers a problem to code in the form of some convoluted set of steps, and they were either assigned to listen to music or not to listen to music. There was (usefully) no difference in the correctness of the implementations, but people who listed to music reported more subjective happiness &amp;#x2F; less boredom doing the task... only... they were also much less likely than the people who did the task in silence to notice that all of those steps collapsed down to &amp;quot;return a constant number&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;I personally feel like there are different components of my brain and some of them just want to do something, and if I don&amp;#x27;t &amp;quot;distract&amp;quot; them then they do something arbitrary and maybe in turn distract me... but if I need them, and they are busy deciding some music I am listening to, I lose out on the maybe-even-often subconscious processing they do that gives me valuable insight. I thereby find some (mostly useless) tasks easier if I am seriously even playing a video game with a targeted skill while doing them (people hate me in meetings sometimes ;P), or &lt;i&gt;maybe&lt;/i&gt; listening to music, but if I am doing the hard coding work I &amp;quot;should be doing&amp;quot; I just can&amp;#x27;t :(.</text></item><item><author>axxl</author><text>&amp;gt; Trying to code and listening to music falls under cognitive functions. Naming a variable while listening to your favorite songs&amp;#x27; lyrics may result in cognitive overload. You are more likely to name a variable after the singers&amp;#x2F;songs name than what the variable is supposed to reflect (true story).&lt;p&gt;This point in the article lost me pretty quickly. My flow state is drastically improved by music, and I have never ever named a variable after the song name or song artist I&amp;#x27;m listening to in my life.&lt;p&gt;Edit: Nor have I ever seen a variable named after a song name or artist.&lt;p&gt;Edit2: NotoriousViewController. TheWeekndTimer. RedHotChiliPointers. Now I &lt;i&gt;want&lt;/i&gt; to name my variables like this.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>corobo</author><text>For me it&amp;#x27;s how long I&amp;#x27;ve been doing it.&lt;p&gt;If I&amp;#x27;ve just started both are probably going to be good results. If I&amp;#x27;m 4 hours in the music one will probably do better because I&amp;#x27;ve not wandered away from my desk distracted by a shiny pen.</text></comment>