Your smartphone is making you stupid, antisocial and unhealthy
A decade ago, smart devices promised to change the way we think and interact, and they have – but not by making us smarter. Eric Andrew-Gee explores the growing body of scientific evidence that digital distraction is damaging our minds.
[...] The evidence for this goes beyond the carping of Luddites. It's there, cold and hard, in a growing body of research by psychiatrists, neuroscientists, marketers and public health experts. What these people say – and what their research shows – is that smartphones are causing real damage to our minds and relationships, measurable in seconds shaved off the average attention span, reduced brain power, declines in work-life balance and hours less of family time.
They have impaired our ability to remember. They make it more difficult to daydream and think creatively. They make us more vulnerable to anxiety. They make parents ignore their children. And they are addictive, if not in the contested clinical sense then for all intents and purposes.
[...] Smartphones are "literally using the power of billion-dollar computers to figure out what to feed you," Mr. Harris said. That's why you can't look away.
Source: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/technology/your-smartphone-is-making-you-stupid/article37511900/
I am left wondering. Is it the devices? Certain apps? Or ourselves?
Ed's (FP) Note: I seem to remember BBC's More or Less radio program (available online still, I'm sure) addressing the "attention span" claim, and debunking it, mostly by virtue of it being a bit too intangible to measure. However, even if it is only confirmation bias, there's a good chance we've noticed some of the traits mentioned in the article in others, perhaps in ourselves too.
(Score: 5, Funny) by bob_super on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:01AM (3 children)
First, I was already stupid, antisocial and unhealthy!
Then the internet made it worse!
Your puny cell phone has no measurable effect on me!
(Score: 3, Funny) by takyon on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:02AM (1 child)
You have 1 new notification.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:20AM
It didn't make ME stupid, antisocial, or unhealthy... I'm only the middle one of those and that is because acting stupid, social, or unhealthy takes a lot of work and pretending to be long enough to befriend anyone isn't worth the effort :)
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:05PM
Preach, brother! Preach!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:04AM (14 children)
... because I cannot stand these stupid devices, or the crap software that they run.
I can look away for easily; indeed, it's difficult for me to find interest in them.
Flashing lights, flying colors, and annoying sounds. Blech! You can keep it; it's built for dummies.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:21AM (9 children)
Seconded, I don't have one. About 1/month I have a need and borrow the one my GF has.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:26AM (6 children)
Sigh... another AC who likes stupid, antisocial and unhealthy girls for dating/friending. (grin)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:30AM (4 children)
It's a fair swap, about 1/month she wants to ride a bicycle and I loan her one of mine (which I maintain for her).
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:57AM
Translation: that AC is ethical and will not take advantage of his GF stupidity or antisocial and unhealthy behaviour. (large grin)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:05AM (2 children)
Please don't reply to trolls. SN has too many. They need to starve to death.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:40AM
Let's feed the trolls. Feed the trolls to each other. Suck my cock and I'll suck yours. Let's get a little 69 going on. Better yet you bring a friend and I bring a friend and we get some 138 action in here.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:36PM
Why bother to troll SN? Trolling Breitbart or HuffPo, sure. You'd get all kinds of reaction there. But here?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Tuesday January 09 2018, @12:32PM
Hey, you kids: get out of my basement.
--Mom and Dad.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:27AM (1 child)
Check your privilege.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @04:24AM
Or don't, because that's not a privilege, but a failing. What a filthy normie.
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:59AM
I'm with you on that.
I got a cell phone originally because I wanted some way to call for help if I were stranded anywhere. I refuse to use phone directions; maps are irreplaceable (yet next to useless when cached in the app's hobbled storage). Nothing extra really appealed to me despite having decent hardware (in want of a decent OS). It's not like I ever get OS updates without installing an alternate “distro” anyway.
Best use I've found for a smartphone is as a node in distributed computing projects when it's charging. Remember when phones could go weeks, or at least multiple days, without needing to be charged?
Other concerns aside, I do really miss the printed shells I could put on my early phones.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday January 09 2018, @07:53AM (2 children)
I've got a feature phone. In theory it can go to the internet, but that functionality is broken. Apparently I could get an update that fixes it, but only using Windows. But I don't need that functionality urgently enough (it would sometimes be nice for checking bus timetables in advance). It's nice to have a camera and sound recording device with me all the time, though. Besides the functionality that I mostly have the phone for, making phone calls.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @06:37PM (1 child)
why are they called feature phones?
what features do they have if you just described a considerable lack of features?
It seems that it makes phone calls, but that you cannot connect it to a computer to transfer the camera pictures and sounds you might record with it though.
So what you have is a 'mobile phone'? i guess that's a feature in that it is mobile, but it doesn't merit an adjective to make that stand out--it already does, hence the "mobile".
but let me guess its just what the marketing called it because its not a $700 smart phone.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday January 09 2018, @07:50PM
Because they already were called that before smartphone existed.
Features that the dumb phones that preceded them did not have. Which includes the camera and recording functions, a built-in calendar, games, and also true internet connectivity (as I wrote, it is broken for my phone, but in principle it would work).
Of course I can. With a standard USB cable. Or I can insert an SD card and use that to store the data on, just like with a standard camera.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:11AM (16 children)
Like the other AC said: They are built for dummies; they aren't tools to aid production, but rather constructs to ease consumption. Total trash.
That's why nobody calls them mobile "computers". The corporate overlords know that such a term is tainted by the notion of personal computing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:21AM (4 children)
Massively improved inspection reporting, inventory tracking, financial tracking, navigation, portable video camera, audio recording, IR cameras, sleep sensors, levels, light meters, noise meters, reminders, reusable check lists, 3D scanners, etc... They're only non-productive if you use them like an idiot. Don't try to use them for typing-heavy tasks. Look at them professionally and they've transformed whole industries.
Mobile computers existed before cell phones. They were beasts. Current devices are still called cell phone because that's their roots. PDAs died out instead of adopting cell tech. "Cell" is also far easier to say than "mobile" and mobile doesn't distinguish between all the other types of portable computing devices (there are dozens of categories). That's why no one calls them mobiles anymore.
Your hat has damaged your brain.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:45AM (3 children)
Of course these devices are useful to corporations; they have the money to get other corporations to produce useful, application-specific devices for their drones in the field.
I'm talking about personal computing, where a whole world of productivity was open to anyone who bought a computer to own; for the imaginative individual, the smartphone has been a disaster—not only is it constrained by the iron fist of corporate manufacturers, but the philosophy of a walled "garden" has begun infecting traditional computing platforms, too.
Why do you think people like me are so upset? It's because we see the potential of these "devices", if only each of us could more readily use them to compute as each of us sees fit!
(Score: 2) by chromas on Tuesday January 09 2018, @11:42AM (2 children)
I have porn and Java in my pocket. What more does a person need?
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Tuesday January 09 2018, @12:34PM
A 'joystick' to use with the porn.
:)
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 3, Funny) by LoRdTAW on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:07PM
Less java.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by julian on Tuesday January 09 2018, @03:10AM (7 children)
They're computers, by every reasonable definition of computer. Even an iPhone can, if you jump through some hoops and pay a fee, run your own code. Too onerous? Get an Android phone with root access. It's a Linux computer, you can open up a terminal and it's going to feel completely familiar to any sysadmin. The naive use of these computers is the problem. If you use them the way the companies intend you to use them, then the path of least resistence leads to you spending money and attention in the greatest quantity they can coax out of you--and siphoning off as much personal information as they can in the process.
The fixes aren't difficult or complicated. There's a lot of low-hanging fruit. Simply not installing Facebook, and not having an account, eliminates probably half of all the negative effects that these computers cause for most people. Installing a robust adblocker wipes out another huge portion of negative side-effects.
I can carry Duckduckgo and Wikipedia in my pocket, that's hugely valuable and productive. I can send and receive email from anywhere on Earth. I can run arbitrary code on my phone, if I cared to. It's a computer, and it would have been considered a supercomputer of unimaginable power and sophistication three decades ago; it fits in my pocket and runs almost two days on a single charge. There's nothing in the essential nature of these computers that's stopping you from using them in life-affirming ways instead of degenerate ones.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by jelizondo on Tuesday January 09 2018, @05:13AM (4 children)
Mostly, I agree with you and my comment is not against your opinion, but against the way these devices are manufactured and marketed.
A “regular” computer is something I can build from parts, even if some of those parts are buggy (i.e. Meltdown or Spectre) or infect by some TLA, I get to choose the parts, the operating system and the applications.
None of this is true on those devices. One is subject to the manufacturer’s crap and then the phone company crap, pre-loaded and protected against deletion. And yes, I had a device with Cyanogen and I loved it, but most devices are hard to root and then you might not get full use of the hardware because alternatives are lacking on drivers or features.
I’d love to have a pocket computer with similar features to my regular desktop, being able to install Debian or Mint or whatever I feel like, and to change it whenever I want. Only it is not generally available. Now if you have some secret source for such devices, please share.
(Score: 2) by julian on Tuesday January 09 2018, @05:31AM (2 children)
The nature of these devices, being highly miniaturized and integrated, makes modularity difficult if not impossible. When it comes to software, you do have a choice for the main operating system. You'd probably want something like Replicant [wikipedia.org]. So choose hardware that supports what you want to accomplish. If you contest that the baseband OS is still proprietary, then your problem is with the infrastructure our society has created to run the cellular phone network. I share the concerns, but the overall benefits are worth the costs to me. For people like RMS, they are not. We all get to choose.
You can always buy one of these devices and use it without a cellular connection. It's functionally no different from a laptop.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @03:16PM (1 child)
Except you can't. Adding a SIM card does not magically make a phone able to connect to networks, it even says so in the name SIM=subscriber identity module. It's just the info who to bill and who the powers that be are spying.
(Score: 1) by toddestan on Thursday January 11 2018, @02:19AM
They work fine on Wifi, with or without a SIM. So basically just like a small tablet, except you could call 911 in a pinch.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday January 09 2018, @07:57AM
Are you forced to buy the phones through the phone companies? At least in Germany, you can buy them in a normal electronics shop, without a contract.
Of course then you'll have to pay the whole cost directly, instead of having it hidden in the communication fees.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 1) by jshmlr on Tuesday January 09 2018, @12:49PM
This. These devices can be used as tools and not toys. The companies that manufacture them are working against us, but you can make a conscience effort to use them in a way that's healthy and useful. You still have the freedom of choice.
As far as these not being "regular" computers, that's a bit pedantic. They're computers in every sense of the word. However, they're really designed to be devices of consumption and not creation.
Need nothing, then see what happens.
(Score: 3, Informative) by DannyB on Tuesday January 09 2018, @03:04PM
On an Android phone, you can run your own code without having root access, and without paying any fees or getting anyone's permission. (Unlike Apple) The development tools run on Linux / Windows / Mac. All you have to do is go to your phone's settings and enable developer mode and allow installing apps from untrusted sources. Plug it in to your computer with development tools and edit-compile-debug away.
You do not have to put your app into the Play store. You can run it on your device and only your device. Or you can easily install it on other devices by the same means of plugging in to your development computer. After your app is installed you can go back to settings and disable developer mode and untrusted sources.
Also . . .
You can put your APK file onto your own website.
1. Your friends (or you) download the APK onto your device through the device's web browser
2. Go to settings and allow installing apps from untrusted sources
3. Go to your file manager and install your APK, which installs the app.
4. (optional) delete the APK file
5. Go to settings and undo step 2.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by jimtheowl on Tuesday January 09 2018, @06:57AM
If your kid is on a "device" all day and is catatonic to the point of not knowing what a computer is, it might be time to pry it off its thumbs.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Joe Desertrat on Tuesday January 09 2018, @09:12AM (1 child)
Maybe we should stop calling them "smartphones" and instead start calling them what they are, "spyphones", as in being tracked and spied upon as one uses it.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @04:24PM
"Smart" literally means surveillance. Try it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:15AM (5 children)
doesn't this happen with everything new?
If we reserve judgement until after a generation has grown up with smartphones, people will probably have gotten over them.
(Score: 3, Funny) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:24AM (1 child)
True but it's a lot of work to round up and euthanize an entire generation.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:30AM
I blame democracy for our shortage of Archdukes.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:39AM (2 children)
It used to be TV, rock-and-roll, drugs, "open" sex, video games, etc. I'm not sure "wasted time" has increased. True, there are now a wider variety of potential distractions than in the past, as they all pile up as options to tempt us.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @04:26AM (1 child)
time spent rock-and-roll, drugs, "open" sex, video games, is not wasted time , itis quality time
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @09:35AM
that's exactly what the current gen would say about smartphones :)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:30AM
It also has given me enough education in the span of a year to start two side businesses which will most likely eventually let me quit my day job and retire 20 years early (thank you Optimal Living Daily and related).
I wonder how the study results would come out if they controlled for nutrition. Food isn't as good as it used to be (lower quality soil, breeding for taste and looks over nutrition, race to the bottom to sell at scale, etc...). How many of the issues are increased by imbalanced nutrition?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:13AM (5 children)
I'm much healthier since I began my hobby of war-walking for open wifi. It's like wardriving except I walk everywhere instead of driving. I've already lost 50 pounds of body weight from the exercise.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:22AM (1 child)
You should try dumpfeeding. All you have to do is find a dumpster and hope people wasted perfectly good food.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:25AM
I don't need to eat out of dumpsters because I know which places give away free food before they throw it away.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:25AM (2 children)
Continue on this path and after some time you'll have a negative mass.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:30AM
I ache for you to fill my negative cavity with your positive rod!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @03:48AM
Something something oblig XKCD extrapolation.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:48AM (3 children)
People commonly misuse hammers, screwdrivers, saws of various types, television, telephone, you name it. So, those little personal mobile computer/communication devices are used in ways that are generally wasteful, and unhealthy. Mmm. Let me get excited.
(Score: 2) by jimtheowl on Tuesday January 09 2018, @06:50AM (2 children)
That said, people addicted to their phones do not like when their behavior is pointed out to them. They have that in common with other types of addicts.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @03:21PM (1 child)
Not to mention hammers are not designed to abuse you, unlike "smart"phones.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @05:15PM
You mean, the hammer is not designed to hit your thumb?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by DutchUncle on Tuesday January 09 2018, @03:36AM
It's about ongoing stimulation, just like thrill sports or gambling or lots of other activities and/or drugs. Humans aren't designed for this, any more than they're designed for continual food availability (especially high sugar) or continual long days (thanks to artificial light). Some of us get hooked on the stimulus rush. There's less guilt, because you can get the same rush from continual "intellectual" stimulus (let's read everything we can find about Linux! politics! science! something that sounds useful!). But it's the same dopamine.
(Score: 4, Funny) by bzipitidoo on Tuesday January 09 2018, @05:05AM (1 child)
1. sexting while underage
2. texting while driving
3. recording police
4. inciting border guards to detain you until you reveal the password
5. trespassing in search of Pokemon Go creatures
I guess playing violent video games and pirating music is passe.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @06:26AM
#1 terrorist activity. We can't allow police to be held accountable.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:08PM (1 child)
Is it the cellphone that is causing all that, or is it the social media addiction that the phone is an umbilical cord to? Like Julian said downthread, a smartphone is a computer, and is as useful as a computer if you use it that way. If you don't use it that way, and only as a Pavlovian trigger, then its effects are going to be different.
Also, is it the cellphone that's making the owners unhealthy, or the mode of travel they choose and the exercise habits and diet they would have anyway? I live in NYC, and everybody walks around with their nose buried in their phones, but they're walking. When people go to the gym and get on the treadmill their noses are buried in their phones, but they're exercising. At restaurants everybody is looking at their phones instead of talking to their companions, but the restaurants could be McDonald's or that vegan place down the block.
Reading TFA, its author's grasp of the history of smartphones is weak. He thinks Steve Jobs invented them; as an investor in Apple that pleases me, but as a technologist who's been doing this whole thing for a long time now, it's laughably wrong. Also, his prose is florid, and overwrought. He's clearly a millenial who is creating a stir by bravely contradicting conventional wisdom. Except, it's only conventional wisdom for 22-yr olds who just graduated from college.
The larger question comes back to, as always, "Is technological progress good?" It's been posed in a million permutations: "Are we better off for having automobiles?" "Are we better off for having TV?" "Are we better off for having factory automation?" "Are we better off for travelling by airplanes?" It is, though, the same question. And the answer, which is the correct answer in all those cases and will remain the correct answer until the end of time, is, "It depends."
Would you have bled to death had the ambulance not rushed you to the emergency room? Yes. In that case, automobiles are good. Would your dog have been run over in the street if cars hadn't been invented? No. In that case, automobiles are bad. It depends.
Are smartphones, then, bad? It depends. Me, I use mine like Julian does and find it very useful. But I also don't use it as a social media umbilical cord, nor to jabber away with other people all day on the phone, nor to text infinitely, and so can also empathize with kurenai. It depends.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @06:44PM
yeah guns don't kill people, people do.
few people wish to take responsibility for their own actions, though. As a result, others that see this try to take the resposbility away from them.
we're in the stage of shaming people but before long we'll have to enact laws that maintain social order and think of the children etc, since most people and businesses cannot be trusted to self-police and self-monitor violations of good behavior.
We had (once upon a time) net neutraility to enforce what wasn't being honored; and the cell phones... well texting and driving was made illegal not because it is evil, but because people had to have the fear of punishment to consider not engaging in the distraction as willinging as they do. Fear of death and harm isn't doing it, and we see this repeatedly. it's why the gun control slogan doesn't work, either. it never happens to you, it always happens to someone else, and the laws are unfair etc.
(net neutrality only plays into that statement because it was enacted due to the failure of isps playing nice; people are generally not expected to self police without social constructs, but they are expected to obey the police--and thus the law)