If we don t care about a topic, we re less likely to stick with it and continue to learn. Even when we re interested in learning a topic, we re sometimes more motivated to play with the equipment or to daydream. We can get easily distracted from the task at hand and become more motivated to do something else perhaps not on task. The big issues are relevancy and immediacy. Information has to be relevant to our current wants and needs, and it must feel useful to us.
Most people don t have time to waste.
We want to spend time learning what will make a difference now. In one of the earliest studies of why adults volunteer for education activities, most said they do so to acquire the necessary knowledge and skills for vocational and professional advancement. While today another common reason may be to stay ahead of the influx of information in our jobs, career success motivates us to learn. No matter the motivator, if we can learn more of what we want and less of what we don t, learning becomes more appealing. The inquiring mind .