Johann Hari discusses why we've collectively lost our ability to focus and what we can do to get it back

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Johann Hari talks attention spans on Fox Nation's 'Tucker Carlson Today'

Americans have increasingly lower attention spans. We can’t spend minutes on a task without becoming distracted. Author Johann Hari says our attention has been stolen from us, and joins Tucker to explain how we can reclaim our focus.

Johann Hari, longtime journalist and author of the book "Stolen Focus: Why You Can't Pay Attention and How To Think Deeply Again" Johann Hari joined "Tucker Carlson Today" to discuss America’s dwindling attention span, the importance of being able to think in-depth, and how to retrain the mind to focus.

The native of England explained to Carlson how he grew up in a working-class family and what propelled him into his writing career.

"So I was very lucky I was from a working-class family," he said. "My dad's a bus driver. My mother worked in shelters for survivors of domestic violence. And I was really lucky I got to go to Cambridge University. I studied social sciences, and essentially, the only thing I can do is write. So it wasn't much of a choice. I was like, I could write or starve on the street. So I chose to write." 

Hari explained he had been a newspaper columnist for several years before he started writing books.

LOS ANGELES, CA - OCTOBER 20:  Alison Lundergan Grimes (L) and Johann Hari speak onstage during Politicon 2018. (Photo by Phillip Faraone/Getty Images for Politicon)

He said that for each book he has written, there was a "kind of mystery" he was seeking to solve for himself.

"Obviously, at the start, I have some ideas. But the first book I wrote, we'd had a lot of addiction in my family, and it's called "Chasing the Scream." And I wanted to understand, OK, what causes addiction? What can you actually do to solve the problem of addiction?," Hari said.

In his other book, "Lost Connections," Hari, who was approaching 40 at the time, found himself becoming increasingly more depressed and anxious. Through writing this book, he wanted to explore these feelings that only seemed to escalate with age.

"Why is it that with each year that passes, more and more of us are becoming depressed and anxious? And what can we do about it?" he asked.

For the impetus behind Hari's latest book "Stolen Focus," the author felt himself struggling with his senses and maintaining focus.

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"I was really troubled by something, which is that, with each year that passed, it felt to me that things that require deep focus, that are very deep to my senses – stuff like reading a book, watching a long movie, having deep conversations – were getting more and more like running up and down an escalator," Hari recalled.

To hear Hari's full account and for more interviews, watch "Tucker Carlson Today" available on Fox Nation.

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