Attention Reinvented

The prevailing discourse laments a “crisis of attention” caused by digital technology. But what if this reading overlooks a deeper transformation: the emergence of a new demand among citizens who have become creators?

Attention: what are we talking about?

Before diagnosing a crisis, one must first define what is being discussed. Attention is not a quantifiable substance that we hold in limited stock. Cognitive sciences distinguish several forms:

• sustained attention, which allows for maintaining concentration on a prolonged task;
• selective attention, which filters stimuli to retain only those judged relevant;
• divided attention, which allows for managing multiple sources of information simultaneously.

These distinctions, far from being simple academic categories, reveal that attention is less a unitary capacity than a dynamic set of adaptive skills.

The philosopher Yves Citton, in The Ecology of Attention (2014), proposes a radically different approach. Rather than considering attention as an individual resource to be preserved, he invites us to think of it as a collective, relational, and political phenomenon. Our attention does not wear out; it is constructed, shared, and negotiated. It is the product of a cultural, media, and social environment that shapes it as much as attention shapes that environment in return. This ecological perspective shifts the problem: it is not the attention of individuals that is failing, but rather certain institutional frameworks that struggle to adapt to new forms of availability.

For attention is fundamentally relational. It does not unfold in a vacuum; it responds to a solicitation, it is oriented toward an object, it is inscribed in a context. The attention I pay to a work of art, a conversation, or a landscape depends on the quality of the encounter. This is where the dominant discourse on attentional deficit reveals its blind spot: by accusing individuals of no longer knowing how to concentrate, it carefully avoids questioning the relevance of what is being offered to them.

The dominant narrative: anatomy of a discourse

The discourse on the crisis of attention follows a now-well-worn pattern. Screens and social networks are said to have created a generation incapable of concentrating for more than a few seconds. Algorithms, designed to maximize engagement time, are said to have transformed users into compulsive consumers, prisoners of dopaminergic mechanisms comparable to those of addiction. Faced with this apocalyptic picture, cultural institutions (museums, theaters, cinemas, libraries…) are presented as the last bastions of “authentic,” contemplative, and disinterested attention.

This narrative is not entirely false, but it is profoundly incomplete. Yes, the attention economy has created sophisticated capture devices. Yes, notifications, infinite news feeds, and variable reward mechanisms stimulate our neural circuits intensely. But reducing digital practices to these mechanisms alone is a caricature. The very same platforms accused of destroying attention allow millions of people to learn new skills, discover unsuspected cultural universes, and create communities for mutual aid and sharing.

Michel Serres, in Thumbelina (2012), captured this transformation with acuity. The young generation he describes is not diminished; it is different. It has developed new cognitive skills, new ways of navigating information, and new ways of forming a society. The accusation of attentional deficit often masks a generational misunderstanding coupled with a refusal to recognize that “legitimate” forms of culture may no longer be the only valid ones.

For it must be stated clearly: the discourse on the crisis of attention emanates primarily from institutions whose cultural authority is being contested. Museum directors who deplore the visitors’ inability to contemplate a painting for more than a few seconds perhaps forget to question the quality of the mediation offered, the choice of works (only 5% of which are visible outside of storage), or even the choice of what constitutes a “work” (a question long explored by contemporary art). Theater programmers worried about the disaffection of young audiences might ask themselves about the relevance of programs designed without them, for a world that no longer exists for them.

From scarcity to demand: reversing the perspective

What if we were simply dealing not with a deficit of attention, but with an increase in demands? I propose to take this hypothesis seriously. When access to cultural content was rare and costly, when choices were limited to a few television channels, a few movie theaters, a few theaters, a few bookstores, and a few record shops, attention was deployed by default on what was available. Contemporary abundance has changed the game: faced with a near-limitless supply, individuals have become selective. They no longer tolerate wasting their time on content that does not concern them, or that they can quickly decode as being unenriching.

This new demand is not an impoverishment; it is rather a form of cultural maturity. Digital platform users have learned to navigate profusion, to quickly identify what resonates with them, and to build personalized cultural paths. Far from being passive in the face of algorithms, they develop sophisticated strategies of appropriation and circumvention. The TikTok algorithm, so often decried, is also a remarkable discovery tool that allows unknown creators to reach vast audiences, bypassing the traditional gatekeepers of cultural legitimacy.

I propose, therefore, to reverse the perspective: what is diagnosed as an incapacity could be an emerging skill—the skill of refusing what does not suit us, of exercising rapid judgment on the relevance of content, and of “zapping” not out of an inability to concentrate, but out of discernment. Pierre Bourdieu, in Distinction (1979), showed how cultural tastes are socially constructed and serve to maintain hierarchies. The discourse on attentional deficit may well be an updated form of this distinction: those who do not linger before legitimate cultural forms are disqualified as deficient, while they are simply making different choices.

Lessons from everyday life

Two examples from ordinary life help illuminate this reflection. The first concerns romantic encounters. A considerable portion of couples today form via digital applications. These relationships lead to lasting commitments, marriages, and births. If the users of these apps truly suffered from a pathological attention deficit, how could they build bonds as demanding, time-consuming, and involving as a romantic relationship? The attention they give to their phones is not “empty” attention: it is attention oriented toward meeting another person.

The second, more delicate example concerns obesity. Our society has progressively learned to stop stigmatizing people with overweight, recognizing the complexity of the determinants of this condition and the right of everyone to their own body. Faced with the same situation, two obese individuals may have radically different experiences: one may consider their relationship with food as a suffering to be treated, while the other may embrace it as a life choice. This essential nuance, which pertains to respect for dignity and free will, is totally absent from the discourse on digital attention.

For who decides that spending time on social networks is a problem? This activity can indeed be experienced as an addiction by some, who legitimately seek help to modify their behavior. But it can also be embraced as a choice, as a source of pleasure, social connection, or learning. The systematic stigmatization of digital practices reproduces the exact error we have learned to avoid in other domains: it confuses moral judgment with objective analysis, it presupposes what remains to be proven, and it pathologizes majority practices.

Furthermore, a comparison with physical risk-taking is enlightening. A person in excellent physical shape who practices alpine skiing every weekend exposes themselves to considerable objective dangers—accidents, trauma, or even death; while they are in “peak shape,” they may be putting their life in much greater danger than someone who consumes large quantities of food. Yet, we do not pathologize this practice; we even celebrate it as a sign of an active and fulfilling life. The passionate skier is not summoned to justify their “addiction” to the mountain. Why should the assiduous reader of social networks have to account for their use of time?

Attention as a bond: toward a relational definition

To escape the impasse of the deficit discourse, we must rethink what we expect from attention. Museum contemplation, often held up as the model of “true” attention, is not an end in itself. It only makes sense through what it produces: an encounter with a work, which is to say, with the sensitivity of another human being crystallized in an object. Attention paid to art is not a performance of concentration: it is a relational act.

Cultural objects function as what psychoanalysts call “symbolic thirds”: mediators that allow for an encounter between human beings. A painting, a film, or a piece of music has no value in itself detached from any context; they are occasions for sharing, transmission, and dialogue between sensibilities. What we seek in the cultural experience is the encounter with the other—be it the artist who created the work, the spectators contemplating it with us, or the people we will talk to about it afterward.

This relational dimension of attention extends far beyond the artistic sphere. Wonder in the face of a natural landscape, interest in a conversation, absorption in a video game… all these forms of attention connect us to the world, to others, and to ourselves. Walter Benjamin, in The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction (1935), spoke of the “aura” as that “unique phenomenon of a distance, however close it may be” that connects us to the work. This aura does not disappear with digital technology; it shifts, transforms, and finds new modes of existence.

Seen from this angle, attention paid to social networks and digital technology in general is not a “degraded” attention compared to museum attention. It is an attention oriented toward the bond, toward connection with other humans, toward participation in communities of interest. That this bond is mediated by algorithms and interfaces does not make it any less real. Friendships born online, knowledge exchanged on TikTok or in forums, and creations circulating on platforms are authentic manifestations of contemporary cultural life.

What the deficit discourse reveals: a question of power

It is time to name what the discourse on attentional deficit carefully hides: a question of power. Who has the power to define what deserves attention? Who decrees that certain cultural forms require sustained concentration while others are mere entertainment? Who establishes the hierarchy between contemplative attention in a museum and participatory attention on social networks?

Traditional cultural institutions long enjoyed a monopoly on legitimacy. They defined what was worthy of interest, shaped tastes, and organized transmission. The digital intrusion has disrupted this order. Anyone can now produce and distribute cultural content. Peer recommendations compete with the expertise of programmers. The cultural practices of young generations largely escape the institutions that claimed to train them.

Faced with this loss of centrality, two responses are possible:

• The first consists of lamenting the situation and pathologizing new practices: people no longer come to the museum because they are “sick” from their smartphones, not because our offerings don’t interest them. This response has the advantage of preserving institutional self-esteem, but it condemns it to helplessness.
• The second, more demanding response consists of self-questioning: what is it in our offerings that no longer meets contemporary expectations? How can we create forms of mediation that respect the new skills of our audiences? How can we accompany rather than prescribe?

This second path assumes the acceptance of a major anthropological shift. Since roughly 2005, with the advent of the participatory web and smartphones, citizens live a considerable part of their existence through images they produce and share. They are no longer passive spectators but active contributors. This transformation, which can be called anthropological, profoundly modifies the relationship with cultural content. We can no longer ask them simply to receive: they want to participate, create, and dialogue.

Attention-Link: toward a new conceptualization

At the end of this journey, I propose replacing the deficit-based concept of attention with a more fruitful notion: that of Attention-Link. This notion rests on several principles:

1. Attention is not an individual resource to be saved, but a relationship to be cultivated. It does not exist in the abstract: it is born from the encounter between a subjectivity and an object worthy of interest.
2. The quality of this encounter depends as much on the one offering as on the one receiving. Accusing the public of an attentional deficit is a way of exonerating oneself from any responsibility for the quality of what is being offered.
3. Attention-Link values reciprocity. In the traditional model of cultural transmission, a legitimate sender (the artist, the institution, the expert) addresses a supposedly ignorant receiver. Attention-link recognizes that the “public” possesses its own knowledge, sensibilities, and skills. A cultural encounter is only successful when it allows for a true exchange, a mutual transformation. Cultural institutions that persist in a top-down model do not suffer from the inattention of their publics; they suffer from their own inability to create spaces of reciprocity.
4. Attention-Link is not exclusive. It does not prioritize objects worthy of attention according to pre-established criteria of cultural legitimacy. Attention paid to a recognized masterpiece is not inherently superior to that paid to a TikTok video created by a teenager. What matters is the quality of the relationship established, the depth of the encounter, and the intensity of the bond created. This position is not a lazy relativism; it simply recognizes that cultural value does not pre-exist the relationship but is constructed in and through it.
5. Attention-Link respects free will. It refuses to pathologize life choices. It recognizes that people may prefer to devote their time to social networks rather than museums, without this constituting a deficit to be corrected. It acknowledges that the intensity and duration of attention vary according to individuals, moments, and contexts, without setting a single norm as a universal model. This ethic of non-stigmatization, which we have learned to apply to other fields, must extend to digital practices.

Changing lenses

The discourse on the crisis of attention functions as a symptom. It reveals less a pathology of individuals than a difficulty for institutions to accept their own displacement from the center. Faced with contemporary cultural mutations, two postures are available to us:

• The first, defensive and nostalgic, consists of deploring the world as it is becoming and searching for culprits—Big Tech, algorithms, the younger generations. This posture readily dresses itself in the garb of cultural resistance, but it is fundamentally a disguised conservatism, a refusal to see that the world has changed.
• The second, more demanding posture consists of changing lenses. Not to naively celebrate everything that digital technology brings, but to observe without prejudice what is actually happening in contemporary practices. This observation reveals new skills rather than deficits, increased demands rather than diminished capacities, and unprecedented forms of bonding rather than generalized isolation. It invites cultural institutions not to abandon their mission, but to reinvent it by taking the ongoing anthropological transformations seriously.

Attention-Link is not a concession to relativism or a renunciation of cultural standards. On the contrary, it is an elevation of those standards. Rather than passively demanding the public’s attention, it is a matter of creating the conditions for a true encounter, an authentic dialogue, and a reciprocal transformation. Institutions that embark on this path will no longer complain about a lack of attention, for they will be too busy cultivating the bonds that their offerings bring to life!