Marketing For Learning® Ep 125 - The Attention Economy With Giles Hearn
Feb 3, 2026
Ashley Hinchcliffe, marketing strategist and founder of MAAS Marketing with 13 years in learning technology, explores the attention economy at work. Short takes on dopamine and novelty, interruptions and the twenty-minute recovery cost. Practical tactics like personas, triggers, spaced repetition and protected learning time. A lively look at marketing thinking applied to learner engagement and attention management.
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Attention Is The Scarce Resource
- Herbert A. Simon: information abundance creates attention scarcity and attention is now a scarce organizational resource.
- Knowledge workers face constant app-switching and interruptions that fragment deep focus and learning time.
Dopamine Rewards The Expectation
- Dopamine rewards expectation more than receipt, so unpredictable feeds train us to keep checking for novelty.
- That conditioning shifts brains toward scanning rather than sustained focus, undermining deep learning.
Child’s Screen Use Shows Dopamine Effects
- Ashley describes his five-year-old son's short-form video use and his decision to block shorts to avoid constant dopamine hits.
- He links the child's emotional dysregulation after stopping to the same attention effects adults face.
