Book Surgeon No. 30

Happy Sunday everyone. I find myself with some time before my flight to think about the book I have been reading on my recent trip to New York City—The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt. Nonetheless, I have recently found myself with a lot of writing on the docket with graduate school applications ramping up. Thus, there may not be a blog post every week, but I will continue to read and write when it feels enjoyable and productive. 

This week, I started The Anxious Generation, which discusses some of the consequences of growing up in a world with such easy access to an abundance of technology—focusing on our youngest generations. Haidt’s fundamental thesis in this book is that “two trends—overprotection in the real world and under protection in the virtual world—are the major reasons why children born after 1995 became the anxious generation.” He argues that children are being exposed to technology too early in their lives, which is impeding their growth and development. Specifically, he indicates four main harms: “sleep deprivation, social deprivation, attention fragmentation, and addiction.” When we observe the world around us, these harms seem intuitive. The more time children spend with technology, the less time that will be spent on activities that previous generations embraced. Maybe not all of these activities are necessary. For instance, I greatly enjoy reading the daily newspaper, but this activity seems to be becoming increasingly obsolete. People seem to find other ways to stay informed about the world around us, whether it be social media or other online media sources. It is unclear to me if there are any significant differences when it comes to our health between different forms of consuming media. Is reading any better than a video that conveys the same information? Is a video better because it is more time efficient? These are important questions to consider. Yet, there are even graver consequences we have to pay attention to. How is technology affecting our sleep and social connections—two extremely fundamental components of our lives and mental health? We all know that it does not feel good to be sleep deprived. Our heads hurt. Our body aches. We probably become grumpy and irritable. These are all signs from our brain that rest is needed. However, technology is often a distraction from the signs of our body. When I am tired, I can grab my phone and watch something that will take my attention away from what my body is telling me. It is almost like a mental painkiller. In turn, we stop listening to our own bodies and push it to new boundaries. Even if we still schedule enough time for sleep, excessive technology use before bed can affect the quality of our sleep without even noticing it. 

And it is not just sleep that is being changed. The basis of social connection and how we form relationships is in constant flux. First, there may be less of a desire in children to seek new social connections with such easy access to technology. Boredom is a natural feeling that we can all feel, particularly at a young age. In the past, figuring out how to alleviate one’s boredom did not always have an obvious answer. Yet, some common sources of alleviating boredom would be to play outside or go look for someone to talk to and interact with. In the US today, there are countless kids that will never have to face the agony of boredom. There are simply too many sources of media to consume and too many online games to play. Before technology was so accessible, the activities I pursued as a kid to alleviate boredom had a natural end. For instance, there are only so many pages in a book. Alternatively, at some point the sun would set or friends would return home and it would be time for me to go home myself. Yet, the internet and devices created to access the internet have allowed for an endless distraction and answer to boredom. With an iPad and an internet connection, a child can find content to entertain oneself for many lifetimes. And as they consume more content, new content is constantly being created and uploaded to be viewed. Naturally, we start to lose touch with ourselves. We become less observant of our emotions and signs from our body to change what we are doing. We begin to take comfort for granted and do not look for ways to push ourselves forward. And unfortunately for the health of young generations, we do not fully know how technology is affecting us. The scientific community does not move at the same pace as technological innovation, which is often driven by companies bringing new products to the market as fast as possible. Thus, as Haidt alludes to, we are essentially living in an experiment where the consequences of our rapidly changing lives are not entirely established. With this in mind, we can strive to pay attention to the ways that we are being affected by technology, and with awareness, we are more likely to stay in control of technology rather than letting technology control us. 

Share with others if you enjoy! Thanks for reading and see you next week!