Self-interruption on the computer: a typology of discretionary task interleaving
Jin and Dabbish note that the typical information worker is interrupted often and about half the time interrupts themselves, while most research has addressed external interruptions. They report a qualitative study of self-interruption on the computer, using a grounded theory approach and direct observation of users. They identify seven categories of self-interruption and describe the motivation, possible consequences and benefits associated with each.
Jin and Dabbish note that the typical information worker is interrupted often and about half the time interrupts themselves, while most research has addressed external interruptions. They report a qualitative study of self-interruption on the computer, using a grounded theory approach and direct observation of users. They identify seven categories of self-interruption and describe the motivation, possible consequences and benefits associated with each.
Written from the abstract as shown on the OpenAlex record, read 2026-11-04.
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Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '09), 1799-1808. doi:10.1145/1518701.1518979.