What is Divided Attention

Students increasingly control their learning as university instructors shift away from lecture formats, courses are offered online, and the internet offers near infinite resources for student-controlled informal learning. Students typically make effective choices about learning, including what to learn, when to learn, and how to learn, but sometimes make less-than-optimal study choices, including trying to study while multi-tasking. Dividing attention among various tasks impairs both learning and learners' control over their learning because secondary tasks divert cognitive resources away from learning and metacognition. This chapter reviews recent studies explaining how dividing attention affects students' metacognition, including their assessments of their own learning and the study choices that they make. This chapter reviews the fundamentals of metacognition, describes the impact of dividing attention on the effectiveness of learners' metacognition, and provides suggestions about how to enhance the efficacy of metacognition when students' attentional resources are limited.