注意，“数字原生代”即将步入职场

    有些人称他们为“数字原生代”，他们随处可见，也许在你家里就有几个这样的新新人类。

    他们是下一代员工，他们中很多人都是自小伴着互联网长大。浸淫于数字世界给这一代人的大脑带来了前人未曾经历过的影响。

    “企业需要意识到这一点，”独立非营利研究机构未来研究所（Institute for the Future）的研究总监戴维•佩斯科维茨称。“因为我们将看到人类工作方式的转变。”

    当然，“数字原生代”绝非同质化群体，对科技的了解和掌握存在个体差异，大脑应对环境的方式也有所不同。专家们相信，数字世界对神经发展的影响需要做更深入的研究。但越来越清楚的一点是，数字原生代拥有全新的思维方式。

    大脑在发展的过程中会加强它认为最有效的神经通路。“从出生到青春期，脑细胞之间的连接有60%被切断，”加州大学洛杉矶分校（UCLA）Semel Institute的心理学教授以及《如何预防老年痴呆症》（The Alzheimer's Prevention Program）一书的共同作者盖瑞•斯默尔表示。这就像森林小径如果经常有人走，就会越走越宽；如果人迹罕至，就会被杂草重新湮没。

    数字原生代强化了管理特定活动的脑细胞。他们习惯于瞬间连接到一大群人，习惯于筛选海量信息。从很多方面看，他们更习惯于短期见效，就像在游戏中那样，而且他们会在工作环境中寻找机会复制这样的情形。

    “我们过去教课时会要求大量的背诵，如今则更多是关于认知敏捷性和多任务处理，”加州大学洛杉矶分校医学院的神经病学和精神病学教授保罗•汤姆森称。“大脑中涉及记忆的海马区域略不同于大脑前端负责多任务处理的区域。”

    汤姆森表示，年轻人变得非常善于多任务处理，它已差不多成为一项工作记忆习惯。但他也指出，同时执行多项任务可能导致长期记忆能力衰退。“古希腊人拥有非凡的记忆力，是因为花很多功夫将所有东西写在纸上。军事将领要知道军队中所有人的名字。而我们根本就不需要这样的记忆力。”

    这意味着数字原生代整体（涉及长期记忆）的大脑额叶发展不同于以往的人们。大多数年轻人倾向于同时关注多项刺激。“我不是说这是件好事，它也不一定是坏事。我要说的是这件事值得关注，”未来研究所的佩斯科维茨说。“我看到侄女做家庭作业时，会在笔记本电脑上打开维基百科（Wikipedia），同时开着好几个即时通讯窗口，而且还在听着音乐。”

    Some call them "digital natives," and they're everywhere. You may even be raising some right now.

    They're the next generation of workers, and they include anyone who has grown up with constant access to the Internet. This state of digital immersion has sculpted their brains in ways that people have never experienced before.

    "Organizations need to recognize that, " says David Pescovitz, research director, for non-profit research center Institute for the Future, "because you're seeing a transformation in how people work."

    Of course, "digital natives" aren't a homogenous group with equal access to technology, and their brains don't adapt to their environment in the same way. And experts agree that much more research on the impact of the digital world on neural development is needed. But it's becoming clear that digital natives think in a novel way.

    As the brain develops, it reinforces the neural pathways that it finds most useful. "From birth through adolescence, 60% of the connections between brain cells are pruned away," says Gary Small, a professor of psychiatry at UCLA's Semel Institute and co-author of The Alzheimer's Prevention Program. Like forest paths traveled over and over again, some trails get stronger while other unused paths grow over.

    Digital natives are strengthening brain cells that regulate specific activities. They are used to connecting to a large network of people instantaneously and culling vast stores of information. In many ways, they're geared towards short-term rewards like the kinds you see in gaming, and will look for situations that replicate that in a work environment.

    "We used to teach in a way that demanded a tremendous amount of memorization, but now it's more about cognitive agility and multi-tasking," says Paul Thompson, professor of neurology and psychiatry at UCLA's school of medicine. "The part of the brain, called the hippocampus, that's involved in memory is a little different than the multitasking part at the front of the brain."

    Young people are getting very good at multi-tasking, he says, which is basically a working memory trick. But the ability to do several tasks at once perhaps comes at the expense of long-term memory, he suggests. "The ancient Greeks used to have fantastic memories because of the terrific cost in putting anything down on paper. Army generals would know the names of all their troops. We just simply don't need that memory at all."

    That means that the frontal lobe of the brain, involved in storing long-term memory, develops differently in digital natives, as a whole, than it has for previous generations. Most young people are prone to pay attention to multiple stimuli, all at once. "I'm not saying that's a good thing, it's not necessarily a bad thing, but I'm saying it is a thing," says the Institute for the Future's Pescovitz. "When I look at my niece doing her homework, she's also got Wikipedia open on her laptop, as well as several IM windows, and she's listening to music."