Human serial attention limits make attention the scarce resource

Evidence

In an information-rich world, most of the cost of information is the cost incurred by the recipient. […] Human beings, like contemporary computers, are essentially serial devices. They can attend to only one thing at a time. This is just another way of saying that attention is scarce. — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 137

Categorization

• DEFINE: Herbert Simon’s canonical statement of attention scarcity — the foundational definitional anchor for the whole attention-economy literature.
• XREF: connects to: Attention scarcity can be turned into an asset through redistributed attention — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 337; Attentional tasks fail when capacity cannot meet their demands; Herbert Simon defined attention as the scarce resource that information consumes. — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 35 (+7 more)

Broader Connections

• Attention is a scarce resource drained by information overload #corroborates (0.95) — Thomas Davenport & John Beck, The Attention Economy, 17
• Information abundance creates a scarcity of attention #corroborates (0.90) — Michael H. Goldhaber, The Attention Economy and the Net, 7
• Abundant information makes human attention a scarce economic resource. #corroborates (0.90) — Annual Review of Anthropology contributors (⚠ verify author line), The Political Economy of Attention, 18
• Attention is the scarce resource that powers the information economy. #corroborates (0.88) — Michael H. Goldhaber, The Attention Economy and the Net, 8
• Attention is a finite resource whose unequal distribution produces symbolic misery #corroborates (0.85) — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 185
• Attention is socially and materially mediated, not just a scarce mental resource #complicates (0.80) — Annual Review of Anthropology contributors (⚠ verify author line), The Political Economy of Attention, 26