Periodic Reporting for period 4 - DISTRACT (The Political Economy of Distraction in Digitized Denmark)
Okres sprawozdawczy: 2024-07-01 do 2025-09-30
DISTRACT combined social and data science to explore the political economy of distraction. Mixing qualitative and quantitative data and methods, including state-of-the-art applied machine learning, an interdisciplinary team investigated mental, social, and material techniques by which attention is captured, retained, and distracted in the world’s most digitized country, Denmark as well as elsewhere in the world.
Subproject 1 explored dynamics of political attention in Denmark. The focus was both on political debates about digital distraction and in political attention dynamics. As such, the project contributed to social science scholarship on “issue attention” and related questions pertaining to how politicians and the public interact and influence each other both in digital platforms and contexts (for example during the Covid-19 pandemic) and in large-scale collective settings, such as the annual Danish politics festival Folkemødet.
Subproject 2 - Coding Distraction studied software practices, infrastructures, and valuation in the digital attention economy, focusing on social networks and practices of programmers. Combining (n)ethnographic and computational methods and seeking to contribute to relevant social science literatures the project’s data and findings originate from Danish app development market and international coding networks.
Subproject 3 - Defying Distraction investigated practices and discourses pertaining to digital disconnection and screen use, including moral discussions about the good life in the digital age and specific attentional technologies and practices developed to limit and control people's use of digital devices and platform.
Subproject 4 - Regulating Distraction explored the social and psychological effects of remote work and online collaboration in especially work but also educational contexts. Specifically, through a combination of quantitative and qualitative data and methods, the projects contributed to an empirically informed understanding of how the attention of some actors is regulated by other actors to reach certain goals.
Subproject 1 explored dynamics of political attention in Denmark. The focus was both on political debates about digital distraction and in political attention dynamics. As such, the project contributed to social science scholarship on “issue attention” and related questions pertaining to how politicians and the public interact and influence each other both in digital platforms and contexts (for example during the Covid-19 pandemic) and in large-scale collective settings, such as the annual Danish politics festival Folkemødet.
Subproject 2 - Coding Distraction studied software practices, infrastructures, and valuation in the digital attention economy, focusing on social networks and practices of programmers. Combining (n)ethnographic and computational methods and seeking to contribute to relevant social science literatures the project’s data and findings originate from Danish app development market and international coding networks.
Subproject 3 - Defying Distraction investigated practices and discourses pertaining to digital disconnection and screen use, including moral discussions about the good life in the digital age and specific attentional technologies and practices developed to limit and control people's use of digital devices and platform.
Subproject 4 - Regulating Distraction explored the social and psychological effects of remote work and online collaboration in especially work but also educational contexts. Specifically, through a combination of quantitative and qualitative data and methods, the projects contributed to an empirically informed understanding of how the attention of some actors is regulated by other actors to reach certain goals.
Following the first project stage, which was marked by filling vacant PhD and postdoc positions as well as a range of mostly internal seminars focused on methodology, compliance, and theory, for the long middle period the project team’ and subteam’s subsequent workshops and writing retreats were focused on data analyses and the writing up of results based on data from each subprojects’ case studies. Finally, in the project’s third phase, much time and energy were spent on the planning and execution of as well as follow-up and outputs from major international conference with researchers, policymakers, and journalists.
Key research activities and outputs that took place in the course the project include:
(1) Covid 19 related research in the form several talks and papers concerning both issue attention dynamics on Danish social media and new pandemic-induced social and existential possibilities and problems in work and leisure contexts. A blog on Distract Covid-19 research (https://coronakrisen.github.io(odnośnik otworzy się w nowym oknie)) gave rise to significant media attention in the form of resulted in several interviews of PI and other team members.
(2) The ambitious field experiment at Folkemødet (People’s Meeting), which resulted in the development of new interdisciplinary methods and digital infrastructures, several upcoming publications, and last but not least high-impact outreach and impact for policy makers and other stakeholders, including a high-profile presentation in the Danish Parliament, several newspaper and radio interviews, and meetings with NGOs.
(3) Research in screentime, digital detox, and digital dependence have resulted in a policy brief for the Copenhagen Tech Policy Committee, as well as several papers in peer-reviewed journals. Given the increasing national and international focus and debated on digital distraction and screen time issues, project findings have been publicized via prominent Danish newspapers, and TV and radio programs.
(4) Development, dissemination and commercialization of new a secure and systematic digital tool for qualitative data collection, storage sharing and processing, including publications in Big Data and Society, Social Science Computer Review, Ethnography, Anthrodendum, and Danish anthropology textbook.
(5) Other prominent publications include Lassen et al’ “The Negative Effect of Smartphone Use on Academic Performance May Be Overestimated: Evidence From a 2-Year Panel Study” in Psychological Science (2020), PI and co-PI’s co-authored paper on “The Political Economy of Attention” in Annual Review of Anthropology (2021); Otto, Blok, and Salka’s article on GitHub network published in Journal of Cultural Economy (2023); Lehmann et al’s “Exposure to urban and rural contexts shapes smartphone usage behavior” published PNAS Nexus (2024); DISTRACT researchers’ Pedersen’s and Otto’s contribution as co-editors and authors to the book The Economic Lives of Platforms: Rethinking the Political Economy of Digital Markets (2024, Bristol University Press); Albris et al’ special issue on digital trust in Journal of Cultural Economy (2024), Enggaard et al’s “Analyzing differences between discursive communities using dialectograms” published in Scientific Reports (2024); Jespersen et al’ “Deconstructing screen time: The connections between digital use, dissatisfaction, and disconnection” in Computers in Human Behavior Reports (2025), and Pedersen, Otto et al’s upcoming special theme issue on Agencies of Attention in Ethos: Journal of Psychological Anthropology.
(6) In the course of the project, especially PI but also the co-PIs have been invited to present talks and keynote at many leading (e.g. Stanford, UCL, Edinburgh) institutions, just as members from each sub-teams have presented their findings to an academic and general public audiences in Denmark and abroad.
(7) The two-day Weapons of Mass Distraction? event, held at the Danish Royal Academy of Science and Letters brought together leading experts to discuss the pressing issue of digital distraction and human well-being in an age defined by ubiquitous smartphone use and social media platforms.
Key research activities and outputs that took place in the course the project include:
(1) Covid 19 related research in the form several talks and papers concerning both issue attention dynamics on Danish social media and new pandemic-induced social and existential possibilities and problems in work and leisure contexts. A blog on Distract Covid-19 research (https://coronakrisen.github.io(odnośnik otworzy się w nowym oknie)) gave rise to significant media attention in the form of resulted in several interviews of PI and other team members.
(2) The ambitious field experiment at Folkemødet (People’s Meeting), which resulted in the development of new interdisciplinary methods and digital infrastructures, several upcoming publications, and last but not least high-impact outreach and impact for policy makers and other stakeholders, including a high-profile presentation in the Danish Parliament, several newspaper and radio interviews, and meetings with NGOs.
(3) Research in screentime, digital detox, and digital dependence have resulted in a policy brief for the Copenhagen Tech Policy Committee, as well as several papers in peer-reviewed journals. Given the increasing national and international focus and debated on digital distraction and screen time issues, project findings have been publicized via prominent Danish newspapers, and TV and radio programs.
(4) Development, dissemination and commercialization of new a secure and systematic digital tool for qualitative data collection, storage sharing and processing, including publications in Big Data and Society, Social Science Computer Review, Ethnography, Anthrodendum, and Danish anthropology textbook.
(5) Other prominent publications include Lassen et al’ “The Negative Effect of Smartphone Use on Academic Performance May Be Overestimated: Evidence From a 2-Year Panel Study” in Psychological Science (2020), PI and co-PI’s co-authored paper on “The Political Economy of Attention” in Annual Review of Anthropology (2021); Otto, Blok, and Salka’s article on GitHub network published in Journal of Cultural Economy (2023); Lehmann et al’s “Exposure to urban and rural contexts shapes smartphone usage behavior” published PNAS Nexus (2024); DISTRACT researchers’ Pedersen’s and Otto’s contribution as co-editors and authors to the book The Economic Lives of Platforms: Rethinking the Political Economy of Digital Markets (2024, Bristol University Press); Albris et al’ special issue on digital trust in Journal of Cultural Economy (2024), Enggaard et al’s “Analyzing differences between discursive communities using dialectograms” published in Scientific Reports (2024); Jespersen et al’ “Deconstructing screen time: The connections between digital use, dissatisfaction, and disconnection” in Computers in Human Behavior Reports (2025), and Pedersen, Otto et al’s upcoming special theme issue on Agencies of Attention in Ethos: Journal of Psychological Anthropology.
(6) In the course of the project, especially PI but also the co-PIs have been invited to present talks and keynote at many leading (e.g. Stanford, UCL, Edinburgh) institutions, just as members from each sub-teams have presented their findings to an academic and general public audiences in Denmark and abroad.
(7) The two-day Weapons of Mass Distraction? event, held at the Danish Royal Academy of Science and Letters brought together leading experts to discuss the pressing issue of digital distraction and human well-being in an age defined by ubiquitous smartphone use and social media platforms.
Theoretically, DISTRACT has significantly advanced the state-of-art pertaining to the political economy of attention within scientific literatures cross-cutting anthropology, sociology, economics, political science, and psychology. Methodologically, the team has also made significant developments and breakthroughs in terms of bringing together and integrating in social and data science data, techniques, and methods, including the development and promotion of the new field of computational anthropology. Commercially, the project played a key role in the early development of the new Ethnote software for qualitative data work.