> That people get anything done at all on these little midget laptops is, quite frankly, amazing to me.

Simply lacking screen real estate reduces available working memory that would be used to focus on a coding task.

Given how this empirically impacts work quality, I'm pretty amazed how younger tech companies have pushed employees in this direction.

It's not all that different from the open office trend.

As with all matters of psychology, YMMV. But it's definitely not for everyone.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/251521/when_two_monitors_aren...

>"People dramatically overestimate their ability to manage their environment," Meyer says, adding that in some ways, using multiple monitors to keep all sorts of data visible is analogous to using a cell phone while driving.

Well, sure, but isn't it rather obvious that using resources to engage in distracting non-work activities is detrimental to work efficiency?

I've got 6880x1440 worth of curved display on my desk, and obviously, watching Netflix, browsing Facebook, or otherwise distracting myself with one of them would be a net productivity loss.