Interruption - IT-Mediated Interruptions as Stressor

Research on interruptions has generated many different perspectives and fundamental ideas over time. The technological environment, particularly the information and communication technologies used in the workplace, allows interruptions to be ubiquitous in the workplace and to occur at any time, for example, in the form of planned or unplanned interruptions, which in turn affects task completion and also task performance. Although responding to these occasional interruptions may not seem to take much time, the sheer number of emails and instant messages during a workday and the time required to manage the resulting interruptions is a problem in the modern workplace. Managing interruptions therefore plays an important role in getting tasks done. Against this background, the project "Interruption", funded by the Federal State of Upper Austria through the Austrian Research Promotion Agency (FFG), investigates the consequences of interruptions caused by digital technologies, especially from a user stress perspective.