KANSAN.COM / THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN / THURSDAY, AUGUST 26, 2010 / NEWS / 7A
RESEARCH
Professor ditches devices for science
BY CAROLINE
BLEDOWSKI
cledowski@kansan.com
They seem like two different worlds: rafting in the Utah wilderness and working in a technology-filled office.
Paul Atchley, associate professor of psychology, switched between those worlds in May. He took a trip to the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, Utah, with a group of cognitive scientists. They explored the effect of digital devices on the human brain by not using any during their time in the recreation area.
"I became much more aware of the people around me," Atchley said.
Atchley is interested in the way technological devices, especially cell phones, affect our ability to concentrate and the level of addiction it produces. Technology is, especially for young people today, important for socializing and communicating, but it could
have a negative effect on our ability to pay attention, Atchely said. He found that we are dividing our attention in ways our brain is not built for.
"It seems like we're adapted to that natural environment, not to what we're doing now," Atchley said. "That has negative consequences."
Some of the consequences include inability to focus and withdrawal symptoms, and in some cases the distraction can lead to car accidents.
"Texting while driving is about six times as dangerous as driving drunk," Atchley said. "People know that it's dangerous and yet they just can't help themselves from doing it."
A survey conducted by Atchley shows that only 2 percent of young adult drivers do not text or read texts while they are driving.
Ryan Bartlett, first year law student from Sioux Falls, S.D., said he does not text when he is driving. His sister was involved in a car accident in which her friend
died because she was texting instead of looking at the road.
Bartlett is one of few students who does not react to his phone whenever it rings.
"It's a matter of personal choice for me," said Bartlett. If the call seems important, he will call back, he said.
Sarah Payne only turns off her phone when she needs to concentrate in the library, she said. Payne, a junior from Leavenworth, even went through withdrawal symptoms when she lost her phone.
"I go into a little frantic period," she said. "I felt like I was disconnected from the world."
Cell phones, iPods and laptops are common necessities today, even if we do not need to be reached any time. Yet research shows that this can prevent us from focusing on one task completely.
"Thinking works best in natural environments," Atchley said.
- Edited by David Cawthon
ODD NEWS
Bad assassin shoots self, dies
ASSOCIATED PRESS
SAVANNAH, Ga. — To his wife and friends, Roland Haas was a patriotic hero who secretly risked his life for the U.S. government during the Cold War, yet critics denounced him as a "James Bond wannabe" who fabricated a memoir claiming he had been a CIA assassin.
nection to his disputed past.
Regardless of which version is true, police and Haas' family insist the gunshot that killed the 58-year-old author in west Georgia last weekend was an accident, a fatal fluke without intrigue or any con-
Haas was found dead Saturday night behind his car at a roadside in Newman, a quarter-mile from his home. Investigators say he accidentally shot himself in the leg and bled to death after the bullet pierced his femoral artery. They found Haas' own gun on the ground by his head.
Three years earlier, Haas published "Enter the Past Tense: My Secret Life as a CIA Assassin." In the book, he claimed to have worked as a Cold War secret operative in the Middle East and Eastern Europe. He wrote that he had assassinated international
drug dealers, helped Soviet officers escape East Germany and had been tortured in an Iranian prison.
The book was denounced as a hoax by several former CIA officers who said Haas' spy story was too outlandish to be true. The author's wife stands by his memoir and said her husband wasn't a man who told elaborate lies.
"There are a lot of things that happen all over the world that nobody knows about, and it's supposed to be that way," said Marilyn Haas, his wife of 30 years.
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