I sometimes wonder how much this relates to listening to music while coding. Sometimes we're banging out code that requires very little planning or thought, and noise or music in the background really doesn't matter.
But sometimes code requires care and craft. In those cases we need not to be distracted by outside noise. Some people achieve this by having known noise/music on their headphones, and they claim they can think and work without a problem.
But are they susceptible to the same kind of inadvertent inattention described here? Can they tell? By definition - no.
I've still not succeeded in tracking down the study referred to in Peopleware where they allegedly tested this. I'd really, really like to see it reproduced.
I hope they distinguish between music and vocals. Coding to techno has subjectively gone pretty well, and it seems reasonable that hearing words should be more of a problem.
That's the question. Maybe you would, in fact, code "better" (whatever that means) with complete silence.
I'm interested in the difference between music you're accustomed to and music that's less familiar, words, no words, loud, soft, silence, etc. You think you like techno, but maybe, just maybe, objectively something else would be better.
But sometimes code requires care and craft. In those cases we need not to be distracted by outside noise. Some people achieve this by having known noise/music on their headphones, and they claim they can think and work without a problem.
But are they susceptible to the same kind of inadvertent inattention described here? Can they tell? By definition - no.
I've still not succeeded in tracking down the study referred to in Peopleware where they allegedly tested this. I'd really, really like to see it reproduced.
Or refuted.