Attention Span Test

"Attention span" is an everyday phrase. What researchers measure is sustained attention, also called vigilance: staying ready for a signal that comes at random moments. This page runs the brief Psychomotor Vigilance Test (PVT-B), a 3-minute version of the 10-minute PVT, made for real-world settings where 10 minutes is too long [1]. The original PVT was designed to track how alertness drops during long stretches of work without sleep [2].

The rules follow the published brief version: the circle turns green after a random 1 to 4 seconds (including the 1 second your time is shown), a tap 355 ms or slower counts as a lapse, and a tap under 100 ms or before the green circle is a false start [1].

• Slow taps (lapses): the number to watch. Each one is a moment your attention slipped. Lapses rise clearly when people are short on sleep [3].
• Average reaction time: your mean speed over the whole run.
• Early taps: taps before green. A lot of them can mean you were guessing instead of waiting.

There is no fair "normal" number to give you: phones, screens and mice add their own delay, and a touchscreen version of the PVT measured the same people about 95 ms slower than the lab device [5]. Compare with your own runs on the same device.

On purpose. Keeping your focus on a dull task is exactly the skill being measured. Early in a run most people do well; slips tend to show up as the minutes go by, and they show up more when you are tired [3].

In a meta-analysis of short-term sleep loss, simple attention and vigilance tasks were among the measures hit hardest [4]. Time of day, caffeine, distraction and practice can also move your score, so look at several runs taken at similar times instead of one.

The reaction time test is about a minute and shows your speed. This one lasts longer, so it can catch the lapses that come with fading focus. In research, the 3-minute version tracked the 10-minute test through total and partial sleep loss, with somewhat smaller effects [1].