Focused Attention: 5 Fun Ways To Experience It And Boost Your Memory

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Focused attention is…look a squirrel!

Aren’t they the cutest?

Gotta get to the laundry.

Now, wait a minute…where was I?

Right! I was writing about focused attention.

More precisely, focused attention is your ability to direct your attention toward one task or stimulus while filtering out competing information.

That ability matters enormously for memory.

After all, if you don’t pay enough attention to information in the first place, you’re giving your memory much less to work with later.

So what exactly is focused attention, how does it support memory and what can you do to practice it?

In this post, I’ll explain all about it plus give you five magnetic ways to improve your concentration abilities.

Here’s what I’ll cover on this page:

• What Is Focused Attention?
• Why Focused Attention Matters for Memory
• A Few Risky Examples of Focused Attention
• The Different Types of Attention
• 5 Ways to Strengthen Your Focused Attention

What Is Focused Attention?

Focused attention is the ability to concentrate on one source of information or activity while allowing other stimuli to fade into the background.

When you use focused attention, you direct limited cognitive resources toward what matters at that moment.

That also means something important:

Paying attention to one thing usually means paying less attention to something else.

If every sight, sound, sensation and thought received equal priority, it would be very difficult to get anything done.

For example, imagine you are at a loud, crowded party looking for a friend.

You remember that she is wearing a blue sequined dress. You also listen for her voice over the music and surrounding conversations.

Your attention helps you prioritize those particular cues over everything else happening in the room.

And there she is!

Calling out your name over the general uproar.

That ability to prioritize relevant information is one of the reasons attention matters so much when you want to remember something.

Why Focused Attention Matters for Memory

Memory does not begin when you try to recall something.

It begins much earlier, when you first encounter the information.

Researchers studying the relationship between attention and memory have long shown that attention plays an important role in the encoding and retrieval of explicit memories. You can read an overview of this relationship in this review of attention, encoding and retrieval.

In practical terms, that means there is a simple problem with trying to remember information you barely noticed in the first place.

The encoding was weak.

This is why attention is so important when using memory techniques.

A Memory Palace, mnemonic image or association cannot do much with information you never properly registered.

You first need to notice what matters.

Then you can encode it deliberately.

Later, you can practice memory recall and retrieval to strengthen your ability to bring the information back.

Have you ever noticed how easy it is to pay attention when something interests you?

For example, you might focus effortlessly on the World Cup while struggling with a 10-page sales report.

But if your boss is waiting for that report, suddenly the stakes can help keep your attention on the task.

The point is not that attention is always perfect when something matters.

It’s that attention changes depending on the task, the environment and what you are trying to accomplish.

When memory is the goal, deliberate attention gives you a much stronger starting point for encoding.

A Few Risky Examples of Focused Attention

Imagine watching TV while cooking.

You are doing two things, but if your focus wanders too far away from the pot, you may burn your sauce or over-boil the pasta.

On the other hand, when you are concentrating on cooking, you may miss the next Kardashian scandal.

Tragic?

Perhaps.

But it illustrates the point.

Attention is limited.

Although people can switch rapidly between activities and divide their attention in some situations, trying to process two demanding sources of information at once can make accurate learning more difficult.

That’s one reason why trying to concentrate on your studies while following a television show is unlikely to be your best strategy for retaining information.

Of course, not every environment needs to be silent.

I’ve worked successfully in plenty of coffee shops.

There are customers ordering lattes, people exchanging gossip and someone inevitably speaking too loudly on the phone.

But your attention can often prioritize the work in front of you while allowing much of that background activity to remain in the background.

That brings us to an important distinction.

Focused attention is only one way psychologists describe attention.

What Are the Different Types of Attention?

The American philosopher and psychologist William James famously described attention as the mind taking possession of one among several possible objects or trains of thought.

His discussion in The Principles of Psychology remains worth reading more than a century later.

More recently, researchers have developed different ways of categorizing attention.

One influential framework associated with cognitive rehabilitation researchers McKay Moore Sohlberg and Catherine Mateer distinguishes several attentional processes. Their work on attention training and rehabilitation can be found through PubMed.

The categories commonly associated with this framework include:

• Focused attention: Your ability to respond to a particular stimulus. For example, directing your attention toward the question you are answering on an exam.
• Sustained attention: Your ability to remain engaged with an activity over a longer period of time, such as reading a chapter or completing a practice session.
• Selective attention: Your ability to focus on relevant information even when distractions are present.
• Alternating attention: Your ability to shift attention between activities that require different responses. Reading a recipe and then returning to preparing the meal is one example.
• Divided attention: Your ability to distribute attention across more than one activity at a time.

These distinctions matter because “pay attention” is not always a useful instruction by itself.

Different situations ask different things from your attention.

A routine task may require relatively little deliberate effort.

A new or complicated task often requires much more.

And when you are learning something you want to remember, dividing that limited attention unnecessarily can interfere with the quality of your encoding.

So what can you do about it?

5 Ways to Strengthen Your Focused Attention

Focus is to memory what a key is to a lock.

You can sometimes force the lock.

But things tend to work better when you have the key.

The following practices can help you become more deliberate about where you place your attention, especially when learning and using memory techniques.

1. Create Memory Palaces Regularly

Creating Memory Palaces gives you a practical reason to pay attention.

Think about what happens when you build one properly.

You observe a familiar location.

You identify useful stations along a journey.

Then, when new information arrives, you deliberately associate it with those locations.

None of this means that a Memory Palace is a clinical treatment for attention problems.

It means the technique gives you a structured way to practice noticing, selecting and encoding information.

When you combine that encoding process with Magnetic Recall Rehearsal, you repeatedly retrieve what you’ve learned rather than merely hoping it reaches your long-term memory.

That deliberate cycle of attention, association and recall is one of the reasons I find Memory Palaces so useful.

This video gives you more ideas for working with your attention deliberately:

2. Meditate

Meditation is another way to practice directing attention deliberately.

In focused-attention meditation, for example, you place your attention on something such as your breathing or a mantra.

Your mind wanders.

You notice.

Then you bring your attention back.

That simple cycle is one reason I’ve long used meditation for concentration.

What does the science say?

Research is not as simple as saying meditation automatically improves everyone’s attention or memory.

However, a large meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials reported small-to-moderate benefits in several areas of cognition, including sustained attention and working-memory accuracy.

So I think of meditation as practice, not a promise.

Personally, I also memorize lots of Sanskrit as part of my practice.

That gives me an interesting way to combine attention, meditation and deliberate memory training.

If you want to experiment, you don’t need anything complicated.

1. Choose a convenient time.
2. Select a place where you can sit without unnecessary interruption.
3. Set a short timer if that helps.
4. Choose an object of attention, such as your breath or a mantra.
5. When your attention wanders, notice that it happened and return to the object.

That’s enough to begin practicing the act of returning your attention deliberately.

3. Exercise

I also find physical exercise useful before returning to demanding memory work.

There’s research suggesting physical activity can influence aspects of attention too.

For example, one study involving Dutch school pupils examined the effect of 20-minute bouts of aerobic exercise during lessons.

Another large randomized trial involving children found that an after-school physical activity program was associated with improvements in some aspects of cognitive control, including the ability to deal with distraction. You can read that study here.

Of course, studies involving schoolchildren don’t mean that a particular exercise routine will automatically sharpen everyone’s attention.

For me, the practical takeaway is simpler:

Your memory training does not have to happen in isolation from the rest of your life.

Movement, learning and deliberate mental practice can work alongside one another.

4. Rest

Resting to improve focus may seem a bit odd.

But focused attention is difficult to sustain indefinitely.

In his book Rest: Why You Get More Done When You Work Less, Alex Soojung-Kim Pang discusses what he calls “deliberate rest.”

The basic idea is useful for memory training too.

Instead of expecting yourself to maintain intense concentration endlessly, work in meaningful periods and then stop.

Walk.

Rest.

Move on to something else.

Then return.

As this Harvard Business Review discussion of sustained focus explains, demanding concentration has limits.

This doesn’t mean using “rest” as an excuse to avoid practice.

It means giving serious mental work the recovery it needs so that you can return to it deliberately.

5. Practice Single-Tasking

Finally, give one important task your attention at a time whenever you can.

If you are reading something you want to remember, read it.

If you’re creating mnemonic associations, create them.

If you’re performing recall practice, recall.

There will always be interruptions.

And sometimes you’ll genuinely need to switch between tasks.

But deliberately reducing unnecessary switching gives the information in front of you a better opportunity to receive the attention it deserves.

Give Your Memory Something to Work With

When driving, focus on the road.

When eating breakfast, enjoy your cereal or avocado toast.

And when learning something you want to remember, give that information enough attention to encode it properly.

That’s the real connection between focused attention and memory.

Attention doesn’t magically guarantee that you’ll remember everything.

But it gives your memory something much better to work with.

From there, techniques such as association, Memory Palaces and active recall can help you remember what matters.

Need more ways to improve your memory?

Why not get started with the Magnetic Memory Method Masterclass?