248 Developing Mental Toughness The estimates 20 years earlier were in the order of 10­12 minutes. It is hypothesized that the advent of new technology and the speed at which anyone can access information may be a causal factor here. A study at Exeter University several years ago confirmed what many in- stinctively understood. When you are interrupted whilst carrying out a piece of mental activity (studying, writing, thinking, etc) or you break off to do something else, when you return the original activity, you do not return at the point you left. You have to retrace your steps to some extent and often redo what you have already done before making fresh progress with that mental activity. In fact each time you stop you run the risk of losing up to 30 per cent of the mental work you have just done! Given that mental activity is stressful in its own right, this simply adds another level of stressor to an already stress-laden activity. The suggestion therefore is that, if we can improve attention span, we can carry out activi- ties that involve some mental component (including creative work) more ef- fectively, more efficiently and much less stressfully. In education this would apply to study, revision and essay/dissertation writing. In the workplace this would apply to carrying out intricate work, high-quality work, report writing, preparing for important meetings and conferences, etc. In each of these areas the ability to focus and to do so for as long as possible is a clear advantage and brings significant benefits. Recent research in the United States shows that it is possible to improve attention span fairly easily to 45 minutes or more and in many cases to two hours. Achieving this makes most mental activity much easier to accom- plish. It is suggested that there is a need for a (short) break between sus- tained periods of focus to provide some opportunity to `refresh' the mind. Attentional control and mental toughness When we consider focus and mental toughness, it is a variable that is intri- cately linked to each of the main components of mental toughness. Mentally tough people can effectively focus their attention under pressure (challenge), refocus their attention in the face of distraction (control), allocate attention to relevant tasks to achieve success (confidence) and know what their atten- tion should be directed to in line with goal intentions (commitment). Indeed, research has highlighted that mentally tough individuals are aware of what to focus on, particularly when under pressure. For example, research by Stephen Bull and colleagues from the Sport Psychology Sup- port team for the England and Wales Cricket Board showed that the in- performance confidence of mentally tough individuals was underpinned by a controlled self-focus. That is, these individuals were able to focus on their own needs to ensure that effective performance was supported. Further- more, these researchers showed that concentration of the mentally tough