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How Computers Affect Our Lives Essay

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How Computers Affect Our Lives: Essay Introduction

History of computers, positive effects of computer on human life, computers replacing man, negative computer influences, conflict with religious beliefs, conclusion: how computer influences our life, works cited.

Computers are a common phenomenon in the lives of people in today’s world. Computers are very vital especially to those people who run businesses, industries and other organizations. Today, almost everything that people engage in makes use of a computer. Take for instance, the transport sector: vehicles, trains, airplanes, and even traffic lights on our roads are controlled by computers.

In hospitals, most of the equipments use or are run by computers. Look at space exploration; it was all made possible with the advent of computer technology. In the job sector, many of the jobs require knowledge in computers because they mostly involve the use of computers.

In short, these machines have become so important and embedded in the lives of humans, they have hugely impacted on the whole society to the extent that it will be very hard to survive now, without them. This article discusses the influence of computers on the everyday life of human beings.

One can guess what will exactly happen if the world had no computers. Many of the cures found with help of computer technology would not have been developed without computer technology, meaning that many people would have died from diseases that are now curable. In the entertainment industry, many of the movies and even songs will not be in use without computers because most of the graphics used and the animations we see are only possible with the help of a computer (Saimo 1).

In the field of medicine, pharmacies, will find it hard in determining the type of medication to give to the many patients. Computers have also played a role in the development of democracy in the world. Today votes are counted using computers and this has greatly reduced incidences of vote rigging and consequently reduced conflicts that would otherwise arise from the same.

And as we have already seen, no one would have known anything about space because space explorations become possible only with the help of computer technology. However, the use of computers has generated public discourses whereby people have emerged with different views, some supporting their use and others criticizing them (Saimo 1).

To better understand how computers influence the lives of people, we will have to start from the history, from their invention to the present day. Early computers did not involve complex technologies as the ones that are used today; neither did they employ the use of monitors or chips that are common today.

The early computers were not that small as those used today and they were commonly used to help in working out complex calculations in mathematics that proved tedious to be done manually. This is why the first machine was called by some as a calculator and others as a computer because it was used for making calculations.

Blaise Pascal is credited with the first digital machine that could add and subtract. Many versions of calculators and computers borrowed from his ideas. And as time went by, many developed more needs, which lead to modifications to bring about new and more efficient computers (Edwards 4).

Computer influence in the life of man became widely felt during World War II where computers were used to calculate and track the movements and also strategize the way military attacks were done (Edwards 4). It is therefore clear, that computers and its influence on man have a long history.

Its invention involved hard work dedication and determination, and in the end it paid off. The world was and is still being changed by computers. Man has been able to see into the future and plan ahead because of computers. Life today has been made easier with the help of computers, although some people may disagree with this, but am sure many will agree with me.

Those who disagree say that computers have taken away the role of man, which is not wrong at all, but we must also acknowledge the fact what was seen as impossible initially, become possible because of computers (Turkle 22).

As we mentioned in the introduction, computers are useful in the running of the affairs of many companies today. Companies nowadays use a lot of data that can only be securely stored with the help of computers. This data is then used in operations that are computer run. Without computers companies will find it difficult store thousands of records that are made on a daily basis.

Take for instance, what will happen to a customer checking his or her balance, or one who just want to have information on transactions made. In such a case, it will take long to go through all the transactions to get a particular one.

The invention of computers made this easier; bank employees today give customers their balances, transaction information, and other services just by tapping the computer keyboard. This would not be possible without computers (Saimo 1).

In personal life

Today individuals can store all information be it personal or that of a business nature in a computer. It is even made better by being able to make frequent updates and modifications to the information. This same information can be easily retrieved whenever it is needed by sending it via email or by printing it.

All this have been made possible with the use of computers. Life is easier and enjoyable, individuals now can comfortably entertain themselves at home by watching TV with their families or they can work from the comfort of their home thanks to computer technology.

Computers feature in the everyday life of people. Today one can use a computer even without being aware of it: people use their credit cards when buying items from stores; this has become a common practice that few know that the transaction is processed through computer technology.

It is the computer which process customer information that is fed to it through the credit card, it detects the transaction, and it then pays the bill by subtracting the amount from the credit card. Getting cash has also been made easier and faster, an individual simply walks to an ATM machine to withdraw any amount of cash he requires. ATM machines operate using computer technology (Saimo 1).

I mentioned the use of credit cards as one of the practical benefits of using computers. Today, individual do not need to physically visit shopping stores to buy items. All one needs is to be connected on the internet and by using a computer one can pay for items using the credit card.

These can then be delivered at the door step. The era where people used to queue in crowded stores to buy items, or wasting time in line waiting to buy tickets is over. Today, travelers can buy tickets and make travel arrangements via the internet at any time thanks to the advent of computer technology (Saimo 1).

In communication

Through the computer, man now has the most effective means of communication. The internet has made the world a global village. Today people carry with them phones, which are basically small computers, others carry laptops, all these have made the internet most effective and affordable medium of communication for people to contact their friends, their families, contact business people, from anywhere in the world.

Businesses are using computer technology to keep records and track their accounts and the flow of money (Lee 1). In the area of entertainment, computers have not been left behind either.

Action and science fiction movies use computers to incorporated visual effects that make them look real. Computer games, a common entertainer especially to teenagers, have been made more entertaining with the use of advanced computer technology (Frisicaro et.al 1).

In Education

The education sector has also been greatly influenced by computer technology. Much of the school work is done with the aid of a computer. If students are given assignments all they have to do is search for the solution on the internet using Google. The assignments can then be neatly presented thanks to computer software that is made specifically for such purposes.

Today most high schools have made it mandatory for students to type out their work before presenting it for marking. This is made possible through computers. Teachers have also found computer technology very useful as they can use it to track student performance. They use computers to give out instructions.

Computers have also made online learning possible. Today teachers and students do not need to be physically present in class in order to be taught. Online teaching has allowed students to attend class from any place at any time without any inconveniences (Computers 1).

In the medical sector

Another very crucial sector in the life of man that computers has greatly influenced and continues to influence is the health sector. It was already mentioned in the introduction that hospitals and pharmacies employ the use of computers in serving people.

Computers are used in pharmacies to help pharmacists determine what type and amount of medication patients should get. Patient data and their health progress are recorded using computers in many hospitals. The issue of equipment status and placement in hospitals is recorded and tracked down using computers.

Research done by scientists, doctors, and many other people in the search to find cures for many diseases and medical complications is facilitated through computer technology. Many of the diseases that were known to be dangerous such as malaria are now treatable thanks to computer interventions (Parkin 615).

Many of the opponents of computer technology have argued against the use of computers basing their arguments on the fact that computers are replacing man when carrying out the basic activities that are naturally human in nature.

However, it should be noted that there are situations that call for extraordinary interventions. In many industries, machines have replaced human labor. Use of machines is usually very cheap when compared to human labor.

In addition machines give consistent results in terms of quality. There are other instances where the skills needed to perform a certain task are too high for an ordinary person to do. This is usually experienced in cases of surgery where man’s intervention alone is not sufficient. However, machines that are computer operated have made complex surgeries successful.

There are also cases where the tasks that are to be performed may be too dangerous for a normal human being. Such situations have been experienced during disasters such as people being trapped underground during mining. It is usually dangerous to use people in such situations, and even where people are used, the rescue is usually delayed.

Robotic machines that are computer operated have always helped in such situations and people have been saved. It is not also possible to send people in space duration space explorations, but computer machines such as robots have been effectively used to make exploration outside our world (Gupta 1).

Despite all these good things that computers have done to humans, their opponents also have some vital points that should not just be ignored. There are many things that computers do leaving many people wondering whether they are really helping the society, or they are just being used to deprive man his God given ability to function according to societal ethics.

Take for instance in the workplace and even at home; computers have permeated in every activity done by an individual thereby compromising personal privacy. Computers have been used to expose people to unauthorized access to personal information. There is some personal information, which if exposed can impact negatively to someone’s life.

Today the world does not care about ethics to the extent that it is very difficulty for one to clearly differentiate between what is and is not authentic or trustful. Computers have taken up every aspect of human life, from house chores in the home to practices carried out in the social spheres.

This has seen people lose their human element to machines. Industries and organizations have replaced human labor for the cheap and more effective machine labor. This means that people have lost jobs thanks to the advances made in the computer technology. Children using computers grow up with difficulties of differentiating between reality and fiction (Subrahmanyam et.al 139).

People depend on computers to do tasks. Students generate solutions to assignments using computers; teachers on the other hand use computers to mark assignments. Doctors in hospitals depend on machines to make patient diagnoses, to perform surgeries and to determine type of medications (Daley 56).

In the entertainment industry, computer technology has been used to modify sound to make people think that person singing is indeed great, but the truth of the matter is that it is simply the computer. This has taken away the really function of a musician in the music sector.

In the world of technology today, we live as a worried lot. The issue of hacking is very common and even statistics confirm that huge amounts of money are lost every year through hacking. Therefore, as much as people pride themselves that they are computer literate, they deeply worried that they may be the next victim to practices such as hacking (Bynum 1).

There is also the problem of trying to imitate God. It is believed that in 20 years time, man will come up with another form of life, a man made being. This will not only affect how man will be viewed in terms of his intelligence, but it will also break the long held view that God is the sole provider of life.

Computers have made it possible to create artificial intelligence where machines are given artificial intelligence so that they can behave and act like man. This when viewed from the religious point of view creates conflicts in human beliefs.

It has been long held that man was created in the image of God. Creating a machine in the image of money will distort the way people conceive of God. Using artificial methods to come up with new forms of life with man like intelligence will make man equate himself to God.

This carries the risk of changing the beliefs that mankind has held for millions of years. If this happens, the very computer technology will help by the use of mass media to distribute and convince people to change their beliefs and conceptions of God (Krasnogor 1).

We have seen that computer have and will continue to influence our lives. The advent of the computers has changed man as much as it has the world he lives in.

It is true that many of the things that seemed impossible have been made possible with computer technology. Medical technologies have led to discoveries in medicine, which have in turn saved many lives. Communication is now easy and fast. The world has been transformed into a virtual village.

Computers have made education accessible to all. In the entertainment sector, people are more satisfied. Crime surveillance is better and effective. However, we should be ware not to imitate God. As much as computers have positively influenced our lives, it is a live bomb that is waiting to explode.

We should tread carefully not to be overwhelmed by its sophistication (Computers 1). Many technologies have come with intensities that have seen them surpass their productivity levels thereby destroying themselves in the process. This seems like one such technology.

Bynum, Terrell. Computer and Information Ethics . Plato, 2008. Web.

Computers. Institutional Impacts . Virtual Communities in a Capitalist World, n.d. Web.

Daley, Bill. Computers Are Your Future: Introductory. New York: Prentice, 2007. Print.

Edwards, Paul. From “Impact” to Social Process . Computers in Society and Culture,1994. Web.

Frisicaro et.al. So What’s the Problem? The Impact of Computers, 2011. Web.

Gupta, Satyandra. We, robot: What real-life machines can and can’t do . Science News, 2011. Web.

Krasnogor, Ren. Advances in Artificial Life. Impacts on Human Life. n.d. Web.

Lee, Konsbruck. Impacts of Information Technology on Society in the new Century . Zurich. Web.

Parkin, Andrew. Computers in clinical practice . Applying experience from child psychiatry. 2004. Web.

Saimo. The impact of computer technology in Affect human life . Impact of Computer, 2010. Web.

Subrahmanyam et al. The Impact of Home Computer Use on Children’s Activities and Development. Princeton, 2004. Web.

Turkle, Sherry. The second self : Computers and the human spirit, 2005. Web.

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Bibliography

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Greater Good Science Center • Magazine • In Action • In Education

What Makes Technology Good or Bad for Us?

Everyone’s worried about smartphones. Headlines like “ Have smartphones destroyed a generation? ” and “ Smartphone addiction could be changing your brain ” paint a bleak picture of our smartphone addiction and its long-term consequences. This isn’t a new lament—public opinion at the advent of the newspaper worried that people would forego the stimulating pleasures of early-morning conversation in favor of reading the daily .

Is the story of technology really that bad? Certainly there’s some reason to worry. Smartphone use has been linked to serious issues, such as dwindling attention spans , crippling depression , and even increased incidence of brain cancer . Ultimately, though, the same concern comes up again and again: Smartphones can’t be good for us, because they’re replacing the real human connection of the good old days.

Everyone’s heard how today’s teens just sit together in a room, texting, instead of actually talking to each other. But could those teenagers actually be getting something meaningful and real out of all that texting?

The science of connection

A quick glance at the research on technology-mediated interaction reveals an ambivalent literature. Some studies show that time spent socializing online can decrease loneliness , increase well-being , and help the socially anxious learn how to connect to others. Other studies suggest that time spent socializing online can cause loneliness , decrease well-being , and foster a crippling dependence on technology-mediated interaction to the point that users prefer it to face-to-face conversation.

It’s tempting to say that some of these studies must be right and others wrong, but the body of evidence on both sides is a little too robust to be swept under the rug. Instead, the impact of social technology is more complicated. Sometimes, superficially similar behaviors have fundamentally different consequences. Sometimes online socialization is good for you, sometimes it’s bad, and the devil is entirely in the details.

This isn’t a novel proposition; after all, conflicting results started appearing within the first few studies into the internet’s social implications, back in the 1990s. Many people have suggested that to understand the consequences of online socialization, we need to dig deeper into situational factors and circumstances. But what we still have to do is move beyond recognition of the problem to provide an answer: When, how, and why are some online interactions great, while others are dangerous?

The interpersonal connection behaviors framework

As a scientist of close relationships, I can’t help but see online interactions differently from thinkers in other fields. People build relationships by demonstrating their understanding of each other’s needs and perspectives, a cyclical process that brings them closer together. If I tell you my secrets, and you respond supportively, I’m much more likely to confide in you again—and you, in turn, are much more likely to confide in me.

This means that every time two people talk to each other, an opportunity for relationship growth is unfolding. Many times, that opportunity isn’t taken; we aren’t about to have an in-depth conversation with the barista who asks for our order. But connection is always theoretically possible, and that’s true whether we’re interacting online or face-to-face.

Close relationships are the bread and butter of happiness—and even health. Being socially isolated is a stronger predictor of mortality than is smoking multiple cigarettes a day . If we want to understand the role technology plays in our well-being, we need to start with the role it plays in our relationships.

And it turns out that the kind of technology-mediated interactions that lead to positive outcomes are exactly those that are likely to build stronger relationships. Spending your time online by scheduling interactions with people you see day in and day out seems to pay dividends in increased social integration . Using the internet to compensate for being lonely just makes you lonelier; using the internet to actively seek out connection has the opposite effect .

“The kind of technology-mediated interactions that lead to positive outcomes are exactly those that are likely to build stronger relationships”

On the other hand, technology-mediated interactions that don’t really address our close relationships don’t seem to do us any good—and might, in fact, do us harm. Passively scrolling through your Facebook feed without interacting with people has been linked to decreased well-being and increased depression post-Facebook use.

That kind of passive usage is a good example of “ social snacking .” Like eating junk food, social snacking can temporarily satisfy you, but it’s lacking in nutritional content. Looking at your friends’ posts without ever responding might make you feel more connected to them, but it doesn’t build intimacy.

Passive engagement has a second downside, as well: social comparison . When we compare our messy lived experiences to others’ curated self-presentations, we are likely to suffer from lowered self-esteem , happiness, and well-being. This effect is only exacerbated when we consume people’s digital lives without interacting with them, making it all too easy to miss the less photogenic moments of their lives.

Moving forward

The interpersonal connection behaviors framework doesn’t explain everything that might influence our well-being after spending time on social media. The internet poses plenty of other dangers—for two examples, the sense of wasting time or emotional contagion from negative news. However, a focus on meaningful social interaction can help explain decades of contradictory findings. And even if the framework itself is challenged by future work, its central concept is bound to be upheld: We have to study the details of how people are spending their time online if we want to understand its likely effects.

In the meantime, this framework has some practical implications for those worried about their own online time. If you make sure you’re using social media for genuinely social purposes, with conscious thought about how it can improve your life and your relationships, you’ll be far more likely to enjoy your digital existence.

This article was originally published on the Behavioral Scientist . Read the original article .

About the Author

Jenna Clark

Jenna Clark, Ph.D. , is a senior behavioral researcher at Duke University's Center for Advanced Hindsight, where she works to help people make healthy decisions in spite of themselves. She's also interested in how technology contributes to our well-being through its effect on our close personal relationships.

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• Stories From Experts About the Impact of Digital Life
• 2. The negatives of digital life

Table of Contents

• 1. The positives of digital life
• 3. Fifty-fifty anecdotes: How digital life has been both positive and negative
• About this canvassing of experts
• Acknowledgments

There were considerably fewer complaints about the personal impact among these expert respondents. But their own lives and observations give testimony that there are ways in which digital life has ill-served some participants. The following anecdotes speak to the themes that the internet has not helped some users’ well-being.

If someone would have told me I was going to spend 10-12 hours in front of a computer most days to do my job, I would never have chosen my current occupation, but it seems like most jobs these days require constant computer use. Carolyn Heinrich

Carolyn Heinrich , professor of public policy, education and economics at Vanderbilt University, wrote, “If someone would have told me I was going to spend 10-12 hours in front of a computer most days to do my job, I would never have chosen my current occupation, but it seems like most jobs these days require constant computer use. We do everything electronically now -communications, writing/documentation, searching for information, etc. – or filling out a survey like this one! I would much rather be having this conversation via a phone survey than sitting and typing at my computer. … Also, we text and email in most of our personal communications now, too, rather than speaking by phone or meeting up in person. I email with a colleague two office doors down from me rather than arranging a meeting. The consequence for me physically is that I am sitting too much and I have chronic back and neck pain, as well as tendonitis, from repeated motion and leaning into a computer monitor. I also worry that social media like Facebook, Twitter, etc., are increasing social anxiety and are as destructive as they are potentially beneficial in their facilitation of communications. And we all never seem to get a break. I wake up in the morning and cringe at how many emails I already have waiting for me to attend to, and the need to keep up takes away from my time in more concentrated and potentially productive endeavors.”

A professor at one of the world’s leading technological universities who is well-known for several decades of research into human-computer interaction wrote, “For the worse: The ritual of a weekly phone call with friends where there seemed like enough ‘space’ to talk about things in a meaningful way has eroded to texting to ‘keep up.’ On the one hand, several of my friends feel more in touch because they are sharing memes, feel they are sharing witty things ‘on the spot,’ but there is less going into depth. We don’t seem to be able to maintain both. That is what is so curious.”

David Ellis, Ph.D. , course director of the department of communication studies at York University in Toronto, said, “Several years ago I walked into my fourth-year class and, in a fit of pique, announced I was confiscating everyone’s phone for the entire three hours. I later upped the ante by banning all digital devices in favor of pen and paper. Some unusual revelations have emerged since then – including some happy outcomes from going digital cold turkey. The students in my courses are there to learn about telecom and internet technologies. On the surface, it looks like a perfect match: hyperconnected digital natives acquiring more knowledge about digital. If only. The sad truth is they suffer from a serious behavioral addiction that makes it pretty much impossible for them to pay attention to their instructors or classmates.

“It also turns out these self-styled digital natives don’t know anything more about digital than their elders. At the start of classes, students react with predictable shock and annoyance when I confiscate their phones. Some even drop out rather than suffer the indignity of being offline for an entire class. Yet to pretty much everyone’s surprise, redemption comes to almost everyone. Within a month, I get enthused reactions about how good it feels to be phone-deprived. Grades go up, along with the quality of class discussion. Some students report this is the first time they’ve been able to concentrate on the course material. Or it’s the only course in which they’ve learned something. That would be flattering if it weren’t such a sad indictment of the state of higher education today, where classrooms have become a wasteland of digital distraction.

“It’s tempting to assume our hyperconnected 20-somethings are the authors of their own fate, and have only themselves to blame for not getting the best from their education. Except it’s not that simple. First, students are behaving exactly like the grownups in our tech-addled culture, ditching their moment-to-moment social responsibilities for another jab at the screen. Second, the unseemly classroom behavior is a coping strategy for many students, who have to put up with indifferent professors and a pervasive campus culture that casts them in the role of customers rather than learners. And third, they have many enablers – the instructors who see not paying attention as the new normal; the parents who can’t bear to be out of touch with their kids for even an hour; and the campus administrators who turn a blind eye because of their own obsession with new technologies as a panacea for every institutional problem. For all their initial resistance, however, depriving students of their devices for three-hour stretches has turned out to be a remarkably simple and effective solution. There’s also good research that students are less effective at learning their course material when they’re online and ignoring the instructor. Not to mention studies showing that students learn more and better using pen and paper instead of keyboards and screens.”

An anonymous respondent wrote, “More access to communication and information hasn’t improved lives like we thought it would. In the early years of the internet, it was life-changing to send emails across borders and time zones, to look up encyclopedic answers any time you had a question or connect with family far away via social media. Personally I have stopped using Flickr and Yahoo due to security issues. I have stopped using Facebook because of the unreliable and untrue information shared there (and constant political fighting) and email has grown to a bloated box of messages I really don’t enjoy reading anymore. I do enjoy Instagram (and its fictionalized escape from reality via beautiful photography) but I find myself using social media, email and search much less than I used to. There isn’t enough novelty to want to Google everything I wonder about in a day. I’d get nothing done. I do work in digital, so I make a living from understanding how this all works, and I am dismayed at the way it has changed over the last 20 years. My son is 4 and he believes TV is always available on demand via YouTube (with supervision of course), shopping only happens on Amazon via phone and FaceTime is how phones always work. (He puts his face up to the landline phone like it is a camera). So things have changed and we can’t go back to the way it was years ago. I do think searching for medical information has gotten a lot better (more reliable accurate info) in the last 10 years and generally leads to more educated and adherent patients if the physician is willing to see the relationship as a partnership. While families use texts to stay connected during their hyper-scheduled busy lives, I think people have lost their ability to focus on the needs of others and really listen to another person because of how self-centric social media really is. Sometimes I think people have lost their ability to communicate in-person and have substantial conversations.”

These one-liners from anonymous respondents hit on a number of different themes:

• “Digital technologies have made it more difficult for me to say on task and devote sustained attention. This interferes with my work productivity.”
• “I can’t seem to get my brain to calm down and focus. It is all over the place. I can’t concentrate. I just start thinking about what I’m going to do next.”
• “Increased isolation is a negative effect I feel in my life; the time I spend using digital technologies could well be spent in other more creative and productive ways.”
• “I am becoming increasingly aware of the way constant access to digital forms of communication can be overwhelming.”
• “It has become an ever-present overhang on all aspects of life. There is no escape.”
• “The rise of hatred, the manipulation of politics and so on – these are not distant events with no personal impact.”
• “Digital life has tipped the balance in favor of John Stuart Mill’s ‘lower pleasures’ and has made engaging in higher-order pleasures more difficult.”
• “One major impact is the overall decrease in short-term memory, and … what was the question?”
• “Real-life relationships are less bearable; everyone is so much less interesting with the spoiling of technology.”
• “Digital technology radically increases expectations for instantaneous responses. This is unhealthy.”
• “It has become harder to take your eyes off a screen to enjoy life as it’s happening.”
• “Technology is being driven by business across all areas for money, money, money. Greed has taken over.”
• “Engagement with technology is starting very young, and we don’t really know what the impact will be.”
• “We don’t understand what we can trust anymore.”

Here are some diverse answers about the ways digital life hurts the lives of some of the expert respondents.

Alone together

I look at my grandchildren busily playing some game and they are quiet and not ‘bothering’ anyone and I’m a bit afraid of how easy it is to let them just be. Lucretia Walker

Lucretia Walker , a quality-improvement associate for planning and evaluation social services, said, “I am astounded at how difficult it has become to have someone actually look at you when they are speaking. I’m constantly informing my 17-year-old that it used to be rude to talk to someone without even looking at them. I am hyperaware of how easy it seems now to look after young children as long as they are on some type of device. I look at my grandchildren busily playing some game and they are quiet and not ‘bothering’ anyone and I’m a bit afraid of how easy it is to let them just be. This summer, I bought all the young children in my family the ‘old’ toys: marbles, pick-up sticks, jacks, water guns, darts – everything I could think of to get them interested and off their devices. I’ve not heard about the deaths of people because I refuse to spend all my time on Facebook.”

Mark Glaser , founder and executive director of MediaShift, said, “In our family, smartphones, TV, computer, laptops all have a major place in our living space. They are central to communication and entertainment. Because they are always on and always there, it becomes much easier to spend time on our own, in our own world on the devices. The smartphones especially have a way of siloing us off from each other. It takes extra effort to take a few hours, or a day, away from them. We have become obsessed – checking news, checking social media, checking texts at all hours of the day – and it doesn’t feel healthy. Our publication, MediaShift, has covered the idea of ‘technology Sabbaths’ extensively, and they are always popular stories, because society at large is having problems taking time away from technology.”

[specious reasoning]

Erika McGinty , a research scientist based in North America, wrote, “Even limiting my friends on Facebook to people I know or knew well personally, I realize that over time we talk and see each other less now that we can merely ‘like’ or comment on each other’s Facebook pages to give the impression we’re close.”

Tom Massingham , a business owner based in North America, wrote, “Perhaps it is just generational, but I’m not sure, nor am I sure that is sufficient justification, but those in their teens and 20s constantly have their noses in their electronic devices. My anecdote: I pick up a friend’s niece (age 14) after an athletic practice. She hopped in the car, said ‘Hi, Tom,’ and started looking at her phone. This is the generational part: I felt that if I tried to talk with her, I’d be interrupting what she was doing. I drove her home, she said, ‘Thanks’ and hopped out of the car. There was NO interaction between us. No ‘How did practice go?’ or ‘How’s school?’ or anything else. Are we creating a generation that doesn’t speak or acknowledge others in the same room, share feelings or thoughts? I hope not, but I fear that we are.”

Kat Song , communications and digital strategy director at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), wrote, “My kids are 14 and 12. Their social and emotional lives have been negatively impacted because they tend to seek less real-life interaction with friends because they can so easily interact with them online.”

Darlene Erhardt , senior information analyst at the University of Rochester, commented, “My nephews and niece have gotten so used to texting their friends that it’s challenging for them to talk face to face and carry on a conversation for any length of time. In order to have quality family time, they are supposed to turn off their phones during dinner. Technology is good in that they can chat with their friends more easily regardless of where they are, the phone can be used to help find them if their parents don’t know where they are (like while shopping) and if they get into a situation that’s uncomfortable it can possibly help to get out discretely (friends checking on them during an event). At the same time there need to be some intelligent guidelines in terms of using the technology and when it’s appropriate to use it and not use it.”

An associate professor based in North America said, “It is hard to be ‘present’ with the omnipresent imposition of technology. When I am with family, technology reminds me of work. When I am alone, technology reminds me of friends I am missing. When I am at work, I cannot be present when technology reminds me of friends and family.”

A senior fellow a major university on the U.S. West Coast commented, “I have seen friends and families where dining together is increasingly rare, even when people are in the same home. It might seem like a media cliché, but even when at the same table people are distracted by their phones and tablets. In the rush for the ‘new thing’ or endorphin-reinforced digital transaction they are forsaking the opportunities to interact with other people. Many of my colleagues are disconnected from those they love by the very technologies they helped to create.”

Danny Gillane , librarian at Lafayette (LA) Public Library, said, “My friends and family stare at their phones while talking to me or others and are constantly checking their smartwatches to see who just texted or updated. My daily life has changed by becoming less personal.”

A professor at a major state university in the United States wrote, “At family gatherings, half of the family are on their digital devices looking at social media and they are not enjoying who’s around them.”

A computer scientist based in North America wrote, “The vast wealth of information available at one’s fingertips can have a negative impact on people’s well-being. Several people close to me have developed an addiction, or near addiction, to internet content. They prefer to interact with others via electronic means rather than face to face. They have a fear of missing out on the latest news or happenings in the world, so they are constantly updating news feeds, blogs, etc. One person has exhibited classic signs of withdrawal when forced to abandon internet access for more than an hour. While I work on the technologies that underpin the internet infrastructure, I have made a concerted effort to maintain more personal, face-to-face time with friends, colleagues and family. The above has convinced me that tools such as Facebook, Twitter and blogs can be abused and cause people to lose the ability to physically interact with others.”

An anonymous respondent said, “I used to go out to bars sometimes for conversation. Now everybody’s on their phone, and I am doing it too.”

A business development director at a large law firm said, “I have a sister who checks her Facebook feed every hour and responds immediately to nearly every comment that is posted to one of her posts. It seems she is using social media as a substitute for real connection with friends.”

A retired professor based in India wrote, “While it has helped to reach out and has made life easier, it has also reduced warm human context. We communicate through social media rather than spend an evening chatting, building relationships and enjoying company. Increased isolation is a negative effect I feel in my life; the time I spend using digital technologies could well be spent in other more creative and productive ways.”

Distractions and addiction

Beth Kanter , an author, trainer, blogger and speaker based in North America, wrote, “I’m a social media professional/networker, and I noticed over the last five years or so, how much more work I do on my mobile phone. And, that I started to have a behavior addiction in a way to the phone. I was using my iPhone as an alarm clock, but lacked the discipline not to look at CNN or Facebook before bed and first thing upon waking. This happened quite a bit during the election and shortly after it. I found myself not being well-rested, having nightmares, losing ability to focus or concentrate, and wasting a lot of time endlessly scrolling on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. I decided to kick the iPhone out of my bedroom and replace it with a moonbeam alarm clock. I also set a goal not to pick up my mobile phone until I had been up for two hours and do offline activities – like walk, read, meditate, or professional writing. I did replace my CNN habit with using Headspace during the day when I feel overwhelmed from using technology. After a month, I noticed a huge difference in my moods, thoughts and productivity. I know that this experiment of one is not scientific, but I do know that there is research that suggests looking at the your mobile phone before bed – which is 7,000 kelvins – is like looking at the sun on a bright day and it tells your brain and body to wake up, disrupts your sleep.”

Ebenezer Baldwin Bowles , author, editor and journalist, said, “A friend of mine, ever the safe driver, was rolling down the road in his favorite old truck, listening to FM radio, when another driver, hyperconnected to digital technology, set about the task of typing a text message, drifted across the center line of the road, and crashed head-on into my friend. The offending driver died at the scene. My friend suffered life-changing injuries, breaking his will and his bank account.”

I deliberately avoid involvement with social media, but even email has become a black hole sucking up my time in unproductive and unrewarding ways. Douglas Massey

Douglas Massey , a professor of sociology and public affairs at Princeton University, wrote, “I deliberately avoid involvement with social media, but even email has become a black hole sucking up my time in unproductive and unrewarding ways. My email is clogged with messages from people and organizations incessantly seeking to capture my attention and time, producing a state of information overload that I find psychologically distressing, not to mention hate mail and personal attacks. I receive 150-200 emails a day and find the time I spend just deleting things I don’t want to see ever-growing and oppressive.”

Gabriel Kahn , professor of journalism at the University of Southern California, said, “My attention span has been condensed. It’s more difficult to concentrate for long stretches. There is less face-to-face interaction in the home. It’s not good.”

Dana Chisnell , co-director of the Center for Civic Design, wrote, “Being online all the time is stressful and distracting. It has come to feel like I’m performing for the makers of the platform rather than having real conversations. There are too many channels running concurrently, and it’s too hard to keep up. I feel unfocused all the time. Until today, I had three Twitter accounts and a Facebook account and I have been on about a dozen Slack teams. I find being hyperconnected to be time-consuming and distracting. I have read less fiction and spent less time doing personal writing over the last few years. This is largely due to the time I spend on social media. That time has connected me to thousands of interesting people, but it hasn’t brought me closer to any of them. Today, I deactivated one of my Twitter accounts and my Facebook account. I hadn’t been to Facebook in more than a year, and I hadn’t missed it. I learned that my tweets were also forwarded to my Facebook account – a setting I must have made years ago – and that people were responding to them in Facebook. So, to them, it felt like I was present. But I was basically a Facebook bot. So, rather than continue to be rude by not participating in the conversation there, I deactivated the account. By closing the accounts and limiting my time on the internet, especially with social media, I’m hoping for a more productive life and to have closer, more-focused relationships with close friends and family.”

Vicki Davis , an IT director, teacher and podcaster based in North America, said, “My life is more fulfilling since I have fought a battle with internet addiction and won. I have blogged since 2005 and been on Twitter from the early years of the service. My children have grown up with a mom who struggled with internet addiction for many years. There were times I might be busier tweeting than watching the kids make sugar cookies at Christmas. After four or five years, I got a wake-up call. It happened when I saw a woman who was at school helping her son try to fly a kite at the kindergarten ‘fly a kite’ day. The mom had a 5-year-old looking at her, begging, ‘Mom help me fly,’ and the mom had her cellphone in one hand talking to someone about flying the kite as she tried to help her son fly the kite with the other hand. The kite wouldn’t fly. Simply put, the kite wouldn’t fly without her total attention to her son. And as I watched, I saw myself. I saw my own failures. My children needed my complete attention so they could fly. So, that summer, I talked to my husband Kip. I scheduled the tweets for the next two weeks in Buffer and gave Kip my phone for two weeks. I went cold turkey on all social media. At first, it was shocking because I thought of my phone constantly and all those people ‘out there.’ But over the days, I found myself coming back to a healthy center. Since that time, I put down my phone every Sunday. My phone has no place at meal times. When we go on vacation, I will put my phone in ‘airplane’ mode all the time so I can just use it as a camera. I wrote about some of this on a blog post on Edutopia titled ‘Put the cell phone down and be there.’ I used to believe the lie that multitasking is possible. It isn’t. I live life with more intentionality and find myself far more productive than I could have ever dreamed. Instead of getting on social media 20 times a day, I check it once or twice a day and now have a five-day-a-week podcast for educators, blog, speak, joined the choir at church and live life deeper. And as a woman with over 150,000 Twitter followers, it would be easy to live a shallow life full of shallow relationships. But instead I now go deep and am a much happier person. My kids need my full attention to fly. Social media and my smartphone have a place, but not everyplace. I am a human being and not just a human doing. I turn off just about every notification and I jealously guard against interruptions like spam and silly apps that beg for my attention. My attention is finite, and the choices I make about how to spend it are strategic. I take this passion along to help students and teachers understand it but I often feel like it is a losing battle. I see a basketball player brag about Snapchat streaks and wonder what would happen to their game if they did free throws with the same intentionality.”

Anita Salem , a human systems researcher based in North America, commented, “I have email, a smart home, a smart phone and an Apple Watch. When I have a question, I look it up. When I can’t think of the name of a song, I don’t search my memory, I ask Alexa. When I’m lonely, I check Facebook or text a friend. When I take a walk, I’m being told by my calendar that I had better hurry, I’m told by an app that I’m walking too slow and I get a text that gets me thinking about tomorrow. When I’m waiting in line, idling at a stop light, or waiting for a friend, I read texts or the news or a book on my small screen. What do I miss? Discussing questions and figuring things out with a friend. Racking my brain to remember and being satisfied when I do. Getting up off my butt to see or talk to a friend. Walking and listening to the birds and watching my dog pick just the right spot to pee. Stopping and enjoying the pause, the white space in-between, the wide-open space where the world lives.”

David S. H. Rosenthal , retired chief scientist of the LOCKSS Program at Stanford University, said, “‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it’ – George Santayana. Society’s memory has moved from paper, a durable medium, to the Web, an evanescent medium. I have spent the last two decades working to build tools and organizations to make the Web less evanescent. My efforts, and those of others in the field, are increasingly failing to measure up to the task. See my keynote at the year’s Pacific Neighborhood Consortium: http://blog.dshr.org/2017/11/keynote-at-pacific-neighborhood.html”

Meredith P. Goins , a group manager at Oak Ridge Associated Universities (ORAU), wrote, “My 15-year-old son loves chatting with his friends at night after dinner via a game, but he would get so sucked into the conversation, he would look up and see that it was three hours later and hadn’t done his homework. He has no impulse control. He is impatient – it must load now! – and he doesn’t have strong in-person communication skills, as with many, or so I believe. Kids are great at talking in small groups or via text or via gaming, but are horrible at doing it in a professional setting. For example, my son, and some other kids, have preferred to take a C on a paper instead of an A because they would not stand and present their findings.”

An anonymous respondent said, “The opportunities for distraction afforded by my heavily digitally-mediated lifestyle makes it harder for me to do both the things I want to do and the things I should be doing in at least two ways: I have a much harder time sitting still and doing nothing than I used to, and I also have a much harder time sitting still and doing ONE thing than I used to. I usually find I’m happiest when I am doing one, and only one, thing for an extended period of time. And when I give myself permission to sit still and do nothing for a while, I often find that I naturally transition into doing ONE thing that I really want to do, or remember the ONE thing that I really should be doing right now.”

A professor wrote, “A negative anecdote: Years from now, filmmakers may portray people hunched over their phones the way they today portray people from an earlier era hunched over their cigarettes. I recently ate at a very high-end restaurant to celebrate a special occasion and the people next to us spent the entire evening photographing their food to post it on Instagram, texting people and looking things up online. One of the individuals had her phone in her hand the entire time. I find similar behavior among many. Mid-conversation at parties I’ve seen people pick up their phones and turn away from others around them. I have seen people sitting with each other in restaurants or cafes and staring at their phones rather than talking to each other, and parents ignoring their kids in favor of doodling on their phones (including at beaches, swimming pools, etc.).”

A head of research and instruction at a major U.S. university wrote, “While I’m better-connected to friends and affinity communities in distant locations as an information professional, turning off the flow of content at home in the evenings to focus on my family is a strain in several ways. It limits how much professional and civic reading gets done, it forces the need to create boundaries (for one’s own good) that have been blurred, it raises almost-involuntary questions about what kinds of conversations your partner or friends are having without you or even with you nearby. Without intervention, it’s easy to experience strong affective responses that often don’t get interrogated in helpful ways.”

Erin Valentine , a writer based in North America, wrote, “A simple example of technology affecting well-being is when you’re at the dinner table with your family. Growing up 10 to 15 years ago, there was no distraction from the conversation over the meal. Now phones are on the table and in people’s hands. The conversation can be stunted or just lost due to phones being so easily accessible.”

Melissa Rach , a content consultant based in North America, commented, “Although sometimes you can have real, human interactions on social media, these channels … masquerade as human interactions, but are really competitions of worth. I have been an internet consultant for 20-plus years and I worked on internet projects before that. For me, digital technology has been a fairly rewarding career. My daily life and digital technology are completely intertwined. But honestly, some days I wish they weren’t. I waste so much time watching videos, reading articles and learning trivia that I would have never ‘needed’ to know before the internet. And I spend less time doing things that make a difference. … Before the internet, I used to make lists of things I wanted to look up when I went to the library and only the really important things made the list. Now, I know a lot about many things that are unimportant. More to your point: When I got my first email account in the early 1990s, one of the first things I did was locate a pen pal from Spain I had exchanges with when I was a child. We started emailing every day and then instant messaging. We became really great friends over the digital space. Instead of just getting a letter once a month, we got to know each other’s daily lives. Eventually we met in person. We’re still friends today. I will see her in March. That was the really good side of the internet. However, once social media started and you could find all your long-lost friends (and acquaintances) on Facebook or Twitter, things changed. We figure out what to post based on what will get likes and retweets. It’s about what builds audiences, not what builds relationships. I think back to the 1980s, when my tween self had pen pals all over the world. I would sit down and carefully think about what to write on those expensive airmail sheets. Each person got personal attention, not a form letter, because we didn’t have an option. It might have been communicating with people far away, but it was a really different kind of communication. My high school friends, college friends and I often say things like, ‘Thank goodness the internet didn’t exist then.’ Most youthful shenanigans should be left to memories of the people involved, not the people who watched a performance on YouTube. Failing on YouTube makes you a social pariah. Failing with your friends makes for a good story to laugh about later.”

An anonymous respondent said, “Tech has potential to do great good. I am a genealogist and I use it to help unite families. But the other side is that it is too easy not to selectively help but to be drawn into an artificial world. Facebook and Twitter are addictive, and both aim at showing you only what they think you want to see (since that is how they make money).”

A professor of political science at a major U.S. university said, “With a smartphone near my bed and the parental responsibility to keep abreast of what my teenage children are doing with smartphones, I read far fewer books in the evening. I am more connected to the social media outrage of the day, less in tune with art and culture.”

I am bombarded with news through a number of apps that are constantly sending notifications. As a consequence, I find myself worried about many political issues simultaneously and often distractingly. Anonymous Respondent

An anonymous respondent commented, “I am bombarded with news through a number of apps that are constantly sending notifications. As a consequence, I find myself worried about many political issues simultaneously and often distractingly.”

A professor of computer science at a major U.S. university wrote, “I am a college professor and have seen the performance of my students degrade over the last seven years in terms of hours required to complete the same, essentially, take-home exam. The average time has gone up from 8 hours to 11 without improvement of their final grade range. They do not get better grades while they spend more time.”

An anonymous respondent wrote, “When I was a kid, we did not have cellphones. I played with my friends for hours and my parents were fine (I think). Today parents have the technology to track their kids and contact their kids any time they want, which gives kids today a much shorter leash to be kids. The whole reason there is a childhood is to learn how to be your own person and with today’s helicopter parents, it’s really hard to learn to be your own person.”

A pre-law student based in the United States said, “When the blog site Tumblr was super popular, I would stay up until around 5 or 6 in the morning in hopes of seeing everything my ‘dashboard’ had to offer. I had FOMO – Fear Of Missing Out. There would be several tabs open at the same time because I would open a new one each time I got back on the site in the morning; hoping I didn’t miss too much while I was sleeping. I was definitely operating on information overload; there was way too much content for me to view, let alone synthesize.”

A college senior and social media professional wrote, “Today, when I try to sit down and read a book, I can’t seem to get my brain to calm down and focus. It is all over the place. I can’t concentrate. I just start thinking about what I’m going to do next. I hate admitting it, but I know that my attention span has shortened, making it harder for me to concentrate whether it’s reading for a class or attempting to read for fun. A few years ago I loved to read. I would finish a book in one or two days and start the next one immediately. I preferred reading books over watching movies. But as I moved into the digital age, as my parents gave me a cellphone and then a computer, I spent less and less time reading books and more time online or on my phone. I am now used to spending my time getting instant answers and skim-reading online, not spending much time on any one thing. I can search a keyword with a few clicks of the keyboard. I don’t spend time actually reading and understanding what I am looking at – even often reading the search engine synopsis of a site to get my answers instead of actually clicking through to the site.”

A college student wrote, “I fear that as technology is perfected to be more addictive and VR and AR advance to envelope everyone that more and more people will fall into those worlds and not necessarily be able to return to that which we now consider to be real. While digital life is good, the downsides are quite troublesome. My brother spent a period between graduating school and obtaining a job idly watching screens and interacting only via them. He spent all day and into the night constantly immersed in this. The TV was always on in the background while he played intense online video games on his laptop, while also continuously texting or messaging others about the game. Technology became his life. It was difficult to separate him from his virtual world and to interest him in physical human interaction. He became grumpy, began sleeping less and less, and stopped dedicating time to his own physical needs. Although it was a scary time, he was later able to pull himself out of it and eventually reconnect with the real world. While he was lucky to be able to quit, some are not able to do so.”

Adam Popescu , a journalist, wrote, “If you’re a writer, a journalist, an artist, it’s your job to engage with the world, to look under the rocks of humanity, and most of all, to read. Read books. In print. It’s a deeper read, without the threat of a distracting tab or a push notification. Read magazines, read newspapers – a range of them, from your state and city and even other nations. And read them deeply. Too few of us do that. ‘Oh, I read plenty,’ you say. If you’re reading based on what’s trending on Facebook or via a link pulled from Twitter, that’s not really reading and it’s time we stopped pretending. That’s feeding at the trough of stupidity. If you’re a writer, a journalist, an artist: stop being part of the disconnect problem. Stop everything. First off, read. Set time aside to really do that and do nothing but that in that period. See if your sleep doesn’t get better, your sex, too, your everything. It helps you think and slow down. If you’re a busy editor – ********, whoever you are – read the emails people send you and respond in a timely manner. This is schoolyard but still true: Treat others the way you want to be treated. Don’t look down at your phone during a meeting, a coffee, a dinner, a date. Be there. Wherever you are. How many photos from your camera roll memorializing your life do you actually look back on? Look up.”

A professor wrote, “Facebook is a relentless resource for a bored mind. There is always something sticky there. It’s the new TV. It is designed to keep you ‘engaged’ and not to offer any obvious work of filtering, even though its algorithms are busily at work.”

A professor based at a top university in the U.S. upper Midwest commented, “I have significantly less time to think or to stay away from work-related issues. Less time for family.”

Family and societal challenges

Giacomo Mazzone , head of institutional relations at the European Broadcasting Union, said, “I’ve worked all my life as a journalist and I believed that this was not a job, but something like a mission. Being a watchdog of democracy is a very exciting and rewarding sensation. Today the job I liked and practiced all of my life still exists only in a few ivory towers that became global (The New York Times, the BBC, some of the public service broadcasters financed by states …). The small independent newspaper where I started doesn’t exist anymore and could never return because their business model doesn’t work. Rather than being considered the watchdog of democracy now, I’m stigmatized as a ‘mediator’; that means that I’m blamed and considered a priori as part of the establishment. Verification of sources and accuracy in reporting seems to be considered a waste of time and the news of non-existent flying donkeys (or, for instance, false statements such as ‘Obama is not a U.S.-born citizen’) get millions of likes thanks to algorithms while the real news of the donkey walking on the hill doesn’t get any. To remediate the most evident damages of this, now hundreds of non-skilled youngsters hungry for (badly paid) jobs are hired and gathered in cold hangars to ‘take down’ the most damaging ‘news’ in an ‘ex-post’ exercise with no sense, no future and no accountability to society. If this is the future of the journalistic career, I will encourage my children not to get into it.”

Evan Selinger , a professor of philosophy at Rochester Institute of Technology, wrote, “It’s a bit depressing to look at the problems of online life through my everyday experiences interacting with my daughter, who is in middle school. Despite everything that I know about the problems of continuous partial attention, corporate surveillance and the idealized personas that are curated online, I suspect I don’t do enough to address them. I’m not fully checking my knowledge at the door. And, of course, my intentions are good. But engineered addiction is more powerful than cautionary discourse, and social pressures readily tug on heartstrings.”

Jennifer deWinter , an associate professor of rhetoric and a director of interactive media and game development, said, “Email. I remember working as a professor before email and after email. The insidious belief that we should always be available, always ready to answer questions for anyone about anything, is one of the most highly detrimental changes that I have seen. The same can be said about whatever dominant electronic communication technology a community uses. I think, too, about raising my two children. And – this will sound ironic? counterintuitive? – but I teach game development in a well-ranked university games program while I simultaneously limit my children’s time on games. My 9-year-old son said it best recently: He told me that when he plays too many video games, he starts to hate any interruption, anyone who gets in his way. While this is probably true of anyone in a flow state of being deeply immersed, games have a way to constantly provide a well-timed dopamine hit so that the player always craves more. Research bears this out. I don’t know what to do with this, because I don’t demonize the technologies of our world. I am constantly watching and evaluating their impact, nevertheless.”

A professor in media studies at a Norwegian university commented, “When we are on vacation in the mountains with no internet or cell coverage, the mood of the whole family improves. We are more together and present in the moment.”

A research leader at one of the top-five global technology companies said, “Digital technology allows us to follow our children’s school progress in detail. This enables parents to detect signs that a child is having trouble and administrators to detect signs that a teacher is not performing effectively. It also increases the stress on children and teachers who realize they are constantly observed and no longer have the same opportunities to correct their performance on their own. It pushes teachers to make every grade nuance explicit, ramping up the stress for students and parents. Such double-edged swords are common, and we don’t have any idea how to evaluate the net impact.”

A pre-law student said, “Anxiety and depression have been on the rise in those within my generation. I was recently diagnosed with mild depression. I believe that being hyperconnected within this digital life could be a root of the issue. I find myself, my mood and thoughts, influenced tremendously by scrolling mindlessly on social media platforms and by the content that I come across daily, even hourly. It has become increasingly hard to not constantly compare the reality of my life with those reflected though my iPhone screen and – even though I am aware of the false reality of the profiles I come across – it is hard not to have my own self-esteem and confidence plummet when I come across a perfectly tailored life. Netflix and all of the streaming sites have proven to be hazardous for my productivity, as I have become effortlessly addicted to them as a means of distraction and procrastination. I also see this constant hyperconnectedness impacting my friends. It worries me, truly does, to see the impact it is having on my family, as my parents are constantly struggling to catch up to the newest innovation that impacts their daily lives, and my little sister has seemingly found life behind a screen. She has adapted so quickly to life with an iPhone that she does not even remember ever playing with the traditional toys she once enjoyed.”

An anonymous respondent wrote, “Recently I participated in a family reunion attended by a 2-year-old child. When the child’s behaviour became too disruptive of adult conversation, she was given a tablet and shown the movie Frozen. The child became mesmerized and non-verbal, almost in a trance-like state. I compare this to when my children were young and were entertained by non-digital distractions – human contact, arts and crafts, a story – and I wonder what the impact of this very early digital exposure will be. Engagement with technology is starting very young, and we don’t really know what the impact will be.”

An anonymous respondent said, “I recently did some research into the digital lives of parents and teens in Japan to mirror research that was done in the U.S. It is very clear that when you compare these two cultures there is more similarity than difference in the ways digital technology is reshaping our most intimate relationships. In many of the families we heard from, mobile devices and the content on them is a source of anxiety, conflict and concern. Parents are struggling with their own use and overuse of these devices as they are monitoring the use in their children, creating a new parenting challenge. One of the most alarming bits of data from this study was the number of teens who reported that they sometimes felt their cellphone was more important to their parents than they were – 20%. This is just not a message we want to send our children.”

A North American professor wrote, “There is almost no one with whom I regularly interact solely face to face. I spend an inordinate amount of time with digital technology. I communicate via email, use the internet in my research and teaching, use social media for teaching, read the news online and shop online.”

An executive for a major internet business wrote, “The easy availability of information makes it so much easier for me and my kids to, say, look at a dictionary to gain a basic understanding of a topic. This is why Wikipedia is so useful. But the profusion of digitally enabled entertainment – movies, YouTube, streaming music, video games, and so on – has not, on balance, been good for my kids. They insist on being glued to their screens, and much of what they consume is, in the words of Newton Minnow (talking about TV in the early 1960s) a ‘vast wasteland.’ Like nearly every medium, like radio and TV, the internet was supposed to herald an era of great information access, which would enable better democratic participation. Instead, it’s become – in many corners – a cesspool, with nearly zero information value. This is not true of the whole Net. But now that Net neutrality is on the way out, the internet fast lane will be devoted to dreck, not to socially useful information.”

Jason Abbott , professor of political science at the University of Louisville, said, “My children are increasingly incapable of spending quiet time alone, appear more bored and easily distracted from tasks. As an adult I find there is a growing pressure to always be available online and to respond immediately to messages and requests.”

Gail Brown , an instructional designer in Australia, wrote, “A young person I know began cutting himself when an online relationship with a girl suddenly ended. This was a person he had never even met, nor did he really know that anything she posted was real or truthful. Yes, lies can happen in the real world, but such lies are much more difficult to continue than those that are shared online.”

I see all around me how people’s self-esteem is now wrapped up with their online social activity. This is very problematic for our inner, ethical lives. Fay Niker

Fay Niker , postdoctoral fellow at Stanford University’s Center for Ethics in Society, wrote, “I see all around me how people’s self-esteem is now wrapped up with their online social activity. This is very problematic for our inner, ethical lives.”

Paul Manning , a manager, commented, “I have seen one of my children walk away from a difficult interaction rather than work it out. She did so quietly and without the other person being aware until it was too late. Another one of my children cannot live without her cellphone because, she says, ‘I can have six to eight conversations at the same time.’ This same child cannot stand when there is silence or she lacks the ability to interact in a large crowd. She cannot focus on one person at a time or participate in a group conversation that requires listening. While digital life has positive benefits, due to the immediate exchanges of information and the short length of the exchanges, sometimes critical information is assumed.”

Tanja Cupples Meece , a homeschool educator based in North America, wrote, “I am a student and an educator as well as a freelance writer. I teach online courses and spend more time checking to see if I am doing the teaching properly, rather than actually teaching. It is also a family problem, my husband also spends a great deal of time on his phone, and if both of us are on our phones, our grandson acts out. He isn’t getting the best of us.”

A professor at a college in North America commented, “I have an 11-year-old child who is pulled into technology in ways that can be beneficial but it is also shaping his childhood in ways that are concerning. I am concerned about this new generation’s capacities to balance technology activities when they are so ever-present.”

A research scientist said, “One of the most palpable changes is how much digital technology has changed the dating landscape and our approach to relationships – especially for those of us who are younger (I’m in my late 20s). We’ve spent most of our romantic lives with online dating at least being an option. Just as having the constant stimulation of social media available makes it harder to commit to something like reading a book, the constant availability of new partners lowers the threshold for starting something new, which makes people less inclined to stick through the hard parts and build something lasting with a partner. It makes our dating more conservative also – we read through each other’s profiles thinking we’re selecting better matches, but in taking the element of chance out of the equation we miss out on the opportunity to date people different from ourselves who could potentially be very good for us, whom we might have unexpected chemistry with, etc.”

An anonymous respondent commented, “I’ve grown weary of the oversharing that occurs on social media. When people break up, get engaged, have children, etc., seeing the photos and status changes can be overwhelming and disheartening when you’re in a certain emotional state and don’t want to take it all in.”

Toxic social media

John Markoff , a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University and longtime technology writer at The New York Times, said, “Reading Twitter at times makes me almost clinically depressed. I have done what I can to try to break the habit with only marginal success to date. Frequently it feels like I am drinking from a fire hose of polluted water.”

Jillian C. York , director for international freedom of expression at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said, “Digital technology has greatly enhanced my life over the past decade. Just over 10 years ago, I was living abroad for the first time and began to use blogging and nascent social media platforms as a way to connect with my friends and family back home. This led to surprising connections with individuals all over the world and friendships that last to this day. I don’t have enough fingers and toes to account for all of the friends I’ve made – and later met ‘in real life’ – through social media, nor the career and other opportunities that have unfolded for me through these mediums. My life, my career, wouldn’t have been possible before the age of digital connectivity. All good things must come to an end, however, and those social media environments that once led to beautiful opportunities and friendships have now become toxic. In spaces where I was once likely to receive positive feedback, I now face threats and harassment on a daily basis. I’m still unsure whether it’s us, or the architecture of these spaces, or perhaps, that they’re simply not scalable.”

Raymond Hogler , a professor of management at Colorado State University, wrote, “People consume content that is self-selected, ideologically conformist and socially reinforcing. That trend will continue. I’ve observed, along with many other people, that the ubiquitous cellphone is displacing social interaction. As a teacher, I see students fixated on their phones in public areas, classrooms and study rooms. I think this phenomenon is tremendously isolating and divisive.”

Rosanna Guadagno , a social psychologist with expertise in social influence, persuasion and digital communication and a researcher at the Peace Innovation Lab at Stanford University, wrote, “During the 2016 presidential election, I ended up losing many friends on social media because of all the divisiveness caused by the spread of misinformation through fake news from fringe news sources and Russian interference. In particular, I recall pasting a link from The New York Times on Facebook. The article ranked the candidates on honesty. Unsurprisingly, Hillary Clinton was the most honest and Donald Trump was the least honest. Some of my Republican friends thought this was a joke and laughed in response to it. This caused a pretty nasty fight between some of my academic friends and the people who laughed, and I had to shut the conversation down. I ended up unfriending a couple of my Republican friends. It made me sad, distressed and confused, and my Facebook use never returned to pre-2016 levels because these things kept happening. Since then, I’ve made a concerted effort to connect with people using non-text-based options (such as phone calls and face-to-face visits).”

Peter Levine , associate dean of Tisch College at Tufts University, said, “I have shifted from reading news stories about a wide range of topics in a small number of publications to obsessively following a few breaking stories on many media platforms, most of which basically repeat the same information. This shift heightens my anxiety, limits my learning and wastes time. Although it’s my own fault, the new digital media landscape enables it.”

Steven Polunsky , a research scientist at Texas A&M University, wrote, “My high school reunion was held as we approached the 2016 elections and was almost canceled due to high emotions and anger, fed by internet misinformation combined with an organized effort to sow mistrust of institutions like the press, police and the judiciary.”

Brittany Smith , a digital marketing consultant based in North America, said, “Overall, social media now takes away from my sense of well-being, and I try to limit my exposure to it. As a professional digital marketer this has been a hard realization to come to. Initially, platforms such as Facebook helped me stay in touch with the people I care about. As more and more people joined Facebook and the algorithm changed I found that I was seeing less and less from them. Facebook was filled with updates from people who weren’t close to me, and because of our tendency to share happy things that make us look good, I would come away feeling negative about my life.”

A professor at a major state university in the United States who said digital life will be mostly harmful in the next decade wrote, “The best example of impact on digital life I can think of is the ongoing effects of the 2016 U.S. presidential election and the role social media apparently played in determining its outcome.”

A writer/editor based in North America , wrote, “For me, the internet has gone from being a place where I could be myself, to a place where I must carefully analyze every bit of behavior. There is also a lot I do online that I would rather not do. I hate Facebook, but I have to stay a member to keep up with events in many of my friends’ and family’s lives. I have to use LinkedIn for work, but I deal with a stalker, who greatly appreciates all that information (which I must keep public, if I’m to expect any potential clients to take me seriously). What was fun is now stressful.”

A general manager commented, “A member of my family who is in her early 60s has seen her general contentment with life decline as her consumption of social media has risen. In the past, her mornings, for example, meant reading the newspaper and listening to the radio. Even when the news was bad, she nonetheless was generally hopeful and optimistic. Now, she checks her Facebook, Twitter and Instagram while still in bed and by the time she comes downstairs in the morning, her mood for the day is already defined. More often than not, that mood is a negative one (anger, anxiety, fear, stress, pessimism, etc.) than a positive one. While this family member recognizes that her now hyperconnected life is bad for her, she has been unable to moderate her digital consumption throughout the day. This is now having a negative impact on her relationships with other family members.”

An anonymous respondent said, “My internet service provider throttles many websites and interjects ads into others. And this was before the end of net neutrality. While it is easier to contact friends and family, most social media sites seem to be fragmenting civil society by creating information and entertainment bubbles for like-minded people. Uber is convenient but it doesn’t provide a living wage for drivers.”

A cybersecurity entrepreneur, coach and investor wrote, “There appears to be an increasing population of people who mistake social media presence with professional achievement. This is confusing to new entrants into the industry. Simultaneously, there seem to be increasingly prevalent moral panics. These are often followed by fervent attempts to demonstrate one’s alignment, in the hopes of either gaining favor or avoiding opprobrium for being insufficiently ‘aware.’ People attempting to remain on task in professional contexts risk censure if they aren’t visibly participating in the cause of the day.”

An anonymous respondent commented, “Three and a half years ago there was a school shooting at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Seven people were killed, including the shooter Elliot Rodger. Within a day, reporters found a chilling YouTube video where Rodger vowed ‘retribution’ for a lifetime of sexual rejection. My social network was full of posts about this video and the need for gun control. I understand the outrage – it’s certainly justified – but it felt like there was no room for anyone to express any other feelings on social media. And I needed to express other feelings. I had taught some UCSB students the prior year. After I saw there was a shooting I had no idea if some of my favorite former students were dead. Either way I had to deal with the shock that my students could be shot and killed around campus. When I talked to my family or my friends outside of social media, they were able to show empathy for what I was feeling. That’s a credit to my family and friends, but also says something about how people share feelings on social networking sites. When I tried to reach out and share my experience on Facebook, I was judged for not immediately leaping to outrage. I could sense such a profound lack of empathy that I logged off for a few days. This seems to be a common pattern after traumatic events. People who want to share their outrage leap to social media to get things off their chest, blocking out anyone who needs a more empathetic back-and-forth to deal with the trauma.” An anonymous respondent commented, “My half sister – in her early 30s – abandoned Facebook having found it made her miserable and envious. Her well-being has improved dramatically.”

The adults in my life are also hyperconnected and are on their devices right before sleep and upon waking up. The decrease of human interaction is evident. Anonymous respondent

An associate professor at a U.S. university said, “Family members, especially children, are addicted to their devices. In some cases, the lack of social skills is evident. The adults in my life are also hyperconnected and are on their devices right before sleep and upon waking up. The decrease of human interaction is evident. I try to stay as disconnected as possible. I am much happier when I am not on Facebook. When I do check it (it is handy for keeping up with people) I am compelled to continue to look through it, and I spend too much time on it.”

An anonymous respondent said, “Digital tech has made it infinitely easier to shop and pay bills, but it has NOT addressed protection of American security from foreign ‘meddling’ (Russia, et al.), and it has not addressed protection of individuals from hacking and similar mispursuits.” A retired public opinion researcher wrote, “I have cancelled my Facebook page because uninvited and socially untested information, opinions and behaviors had the potential to influence my own political (as in polis) social contracts.”

Never-ending work with new demands and expectations

Lori Laurent Smith , an entrepreneur based in North America, commented, “The promise of digital technology was to make our lives easier, freeing our time to do the things we wanted to do. My reality has been the opposite. There is so much more than I ever imagined that I still want to learn, research and do. Also I spend a ridiculous amount of time learning how to set up a blog, upgrade memory in a laptop, take better pictures, write meaningfully in 140 characters, learning how to use new apps, writing comments and feedback, and reading millions of pages of content. I was spending a disproportionate amount of time using the internet and interacting with people online more than I did with my husband, daughters and friends in real life. As this realization has slowly dawned on me in recent years, I’ve set timers to limit my time online when my family is around and when anyone needs me, I immediately shut down what I was doing online to give them my full attention. I turn off my phone regularly when I’m hanging out with my friends and family in real life (which annoys people trying to get in touch but it’s my life).”

Annette Markham , professor of information studies and digital design at Aarhus University in Denmark, said, “I exemplify the hyperconnectivity of knowledge workers. At this stage of my career, where I network internationally with colleagues, work with dozens of students at a time, and administer multiple projects and people, I simply cannot be disconnected. I feel this emotionally and bodily every single day. My wrists hurt frequently from ongoing carpel tunnel syndrome; I suffer from chronic back pain that we colloquially call ‘academic back.’ I feel increasing pressure – as well as a lure – to build my international reputation as a social and digital media expert through intensive connectivity, continuous publishing and strategic self-branding on multiple platforms. I feel like this is an all-or-nothing situation. Sometimes I just feel exhausted. Other times, I feel like one of thousands of ants trapped in a barrel filling up with water and we’re all clambering on top of others to keep from drowning. In the early 2000s, I could ask my media students to disconnect for one week. Around 2012, I could get them to disconnect for 48 hours. Now, maybe one in 20 will be able to disconnect for 24 hours. As more services enter the electronic-only sphere, people are required to be connected, to know how to access and use these services effectively. It means being online. Those of us who have been obsessively online for 20 years may be accustomed to an always-on lifestyle and have learned how to live with it. But knowing how to deal with hyperconnectivity is not the same as being unaffected by it. We – and by that, I mean myself and many of my friends and colleagues in the knowledge or tech industry – pay a heavy price. Sustained stress leads to chronic health issues. Continuous exposure to millions of people personally reacting to crisis after crisis on Twitter leaves many of us feeling sad, angry and hopeless. But we seem unable to stop checking our newsfeeds. The negative energy feeds on itself. After the U.S. presidential elections in 2016, almost all of my colleagues showed classic signs of depression. Worse, we no longer find it surprising to feel sad, angry and depressed. We may not be immured to the violence this constant exposure does to our bodies, minds and souls, but we don’t fight it either. I could say more, but you get the point.”

Douglas Rushkoff , a professor of media at City University of New York, said, “Right now, I’m interested in the mental health crises being experienced by the young men who took BJ Fogg’s captology classes, implemented the strategies at Facebook and Snapchat and are now realizing how much mental, psychological and social destruction they have caused.”

Paul Rozin , a professor of psychology at the University of Pennsylvania, said, “I’m not sure that email is such a great thing. One colleague doesn’t use email and seems to be extremely productive. I spend half the day on it. Much of that half would have been spent on productive thinking or teaching in the old days.”

The biggest change to daily life is the difficulty in having a solid block of uninterrupted time in one’s day to think… Even if I am not looking at my email or my phone, I know they are there and it is distracting. Thad Hall

Thad Hall , research scientist and co-author of the forthcoming book “Politics for a Connected American Public,” wrote, “The biggest change to daily life is the difficulty in having a solid block of uninterrupted time in one’s day to think. When communications were primarily by phone or mail – or even when Wi-Fi/smartphones were not ubiquitous and it was easy to get away with a laptop without being constantly connected – it was possible to separate yourself from the digital world. Even writing this, I am aware of my phone next to me and that my email alerts are on, and it is hard to avoid being mentally distracted. Even if I am not looking at my email or my phone, I know they are there and it is distracting.”

Meg Mott , a professor of politics at Marlboro College, said, “Early in my teaching career, I thought that teachers should be judged by their response time to emails. Perhaps this was my way of proving myself worthy of joining an esteemed faculty. I may not have read Plato’s ‘Republic’ in the original, but I could check my email on an hourly basis. At a certain point I realized that speed was working against me. My replies may have been prompt but the tone was unmistakably crabby. This was particularly true during times when I was trying to carve out time to work on my own research. It took a rather dramatic change in my lifestyle to unhook myself from my 24-hour inbox. Suffice it to say that a yurt and an outhouse were involved. The effect on my stress level was immediate. In order to check my email I had to be in my office during a time when I was not teaching. Not surprisingly, even though I was less available to my students, the teaching relationship greatly improved.”

An associate professor at a major university in the U.S. Midwest said, “The divide between work and life, and the time I spend not connected, is increasingly non-existent. My phone and computer are always by my side. I might be working from home to my office with only a 15-minute gap in between. During that gap, I often check email when at a red light. Even if I bike, I am listening to something streaming on my phone. I have communicated via email with my spouse. I have also texted my children to come to dinner in order to easily get their attention. I am hyperconnected and always responding to the first thing rather than looking around me or making decisions that take time and thought. I have back problems and posture-alignment problems as a result of extended time in front of a multitude of screens.”

A research scientist said, “Rather than reading a book or magazine on my commute, I do things like check Facebook and look at emails that I can’t easily respond to. Rather than arriving at work refreshed or arriving home with some space from work, it all comes with me.”

A college administrator based in North America said, “In terms of personal impact, I have developed the habit of taking more work home, which often negatively impacts family interactions and leads to home-based stress development. Further, it has reduced the time for exercise and leisure – all of which can negatively impact physical, emotional and mental health.”

A co-founder of an institute studying values wrote, “Work is now a 24/7 ordeal.”

A professor emerita of public policy at a major U.S. private university said, “I am becoming increasingly aware of the way constant access to digital forms of communication can be overwhelming. I think I’m relatively politically/socially aware, but the current (growing) bombardment of email appeals for political action or donations to address a multitude of apparently apocalyptic problems may at some point numb my senses.”

Changing norms about speedy responses and engagement

Renee Dietrich , a retired professor, commented, “The main change is that people expect a response faster. There is not much time for reflection or analysis.”

A professor at New York University wrote, “My professorial title should be ‘professor of email.’”

A North American entrepreneur wrote, “There have been many instances when I haven’t responded on Facebook in a way that someone felt I should, resulting in resentment. There have been other times when I’ve been ‘stuck online’ and then late for real-world activities. There have been lots of times where information presented sounded good and healthy but upon research turned out to be dangerous advice.”

A CEO of a publishing house said, “While digital technology has certainly connected me with old friends and family members, it’s not like we really know these people. I now have former classmates asking me for money, I also know things about relatives and their political beliefs that make me never want to spend time with them. So as much as it brings people together, it also drives wedges. I’m not proud of the contempt I feel for some former friends after reading their Facebook posts, but nor can I deny it.”

A research scientist said, “Checking Facebook has become a chore, yet I must do this regularly to shore up ties with friends and family. As a woman, I’m culturally conditioned to do so.”

The attention economy and surveillance society

Jeremy Blackburn , a computing sciences professor who specializes in the study of the impacts of digital life, wrote, “My children (girls, 2 and 7) spend significant amounts of time on the internet (probably too much, but, hey, I practice what I preach). Bottom line: Google and Amazon probably know more about their preferences than I do, and could probably influence them in ways that I can’t even fathom. To that end, my eldest daughter really enjoys one particular YouTube channel, which is entirely appropriate for her (FGTV), however, she has trouble recognizing that the channel is a *business.* Thus, she will on occasion come to us and ask to do one of the absurd things that the channel operators do. For example: A giant food fight. My daughter simply does not have the maturity to fully understand that these people are making their livelihood with their videos, that they are edited in such a way as to make them entertaining, and that what she sees is not their normal familial activities. We have spent a lot of time discussing this with her, but it still pops up on occasion. Perhaps this is an indication that we are not properly regulating the online content she consumes, but I suspect that, even though we provide her with a fair amount of freedom, we are much more stringent than the ‘average’ parents. I believe that this general idea extends to teens and adults as well. We are inundated with content that represents a *curated* slice of our contacts life online. This slice is non-representative of reality, and can lead to some serious misconceptions about how other people live. This was much less of an issue before the ubiquity of the Web, and my gut feeling is that it will grow unabated for quite some time.”

Marcus Foth , professor of urban informatics at Queensland University of Technology, wrote, “We need to stop using digital technology for the blind and undirected acceleration of neoliberal growth expectations and instead reintroduce a moral compass of compassion and ecological thinking. While I see the potential of digital technology to do great things for society, I have strong reservations about how it is used and adopted in everyday life in pursuit of neoliberal growth trajectories that are further fueled by the big data analytics craze. Critical humanities research is urgently needed to influence the technocratic and engineering driven culture to solve humankind’s problems. In my personal experience, I lament seeing how great research outcomes are increasingly being reviewed by bean counters in a quantitative assessment of research performance that reduces research to numbers: grant income, Ph.D. completions and number of articles in Q1 journals. Big data is killing the zest of aspirational researchers who wanted to change the world for the better and are now just reduced to a row in a spreadsheet. Speaking of well-being, many just quit.”

If I, a social scientist, cannot resist this temptation, what is happening to our children and our children’s children? Deborah Coe

Deborah Coe , a coordinator of research services based in the U.S., said, “I hate to admit this, but I spend a ridiculous amount of time on my cellphone, checking emails, Facebook, Pinterest, the news and playing games, on a daily basis. And I do it to the point of choosing to not go outdoors on a beautiful day, or to the point of getting blurry vision and ignoring the warning signs that I’ve overdone it. Here’s my question: If I, a social scientist, cannot resist this temptation, what is happening to our children and our children’s children?”

A professor based in North America said, “I want to share a short excerpt from Chapter 1 of Frischmann and Selinger’s ‘Re-Engineering Humanity’ (Cambridge, April 2018): ‘Last year, my first grader came home after school very excited. ‘Dad, I won. I mean, I’ve been picked. I get a new watch.’ ‘That’s great,’ I said, ‘What happened?’ He quickly rattled off something about being one of the kids in his class who was selected to wear a new watch for gym class.

[physical education program]

“When I read the letter, I went ballistic. Initially, I wondered about various privacy issues: Who, what, where, when, how and why? With regard to collection, sharing, use and storage of data about kids. The letter did not even vaguely suggest that parents and their children could opt out, much less that their consent was required. Even if it had, it couldn’t be informed consent because there were so many questions left unanswered. I also wondered whether the school district had gone through some form of institutional review board (IRB) process. Had someone, anyone considered the ethical questions? I read the letter again but got stuck on: ‘We ask that students do not take off the watch once it’s on their wrist. They should sleep, even shower with the watch in place.’ Seriously, bath time and bedtime surveillance! The letter made me think of one of those Nigerian bank scam emails that go straight into my spam folder. Such trickery! I thought.

“I remembered how my son had come home so excited. The smile on his face and joy in his voice were unforgettable. It was worse than an email scam. They had worked him deeply, getting him hooked. He was so incredibly happy to have been selected, to be part of this new fitness program, to be a leader. How could a parent not be equally excited? Most were, but not me. I contacted someone at the PTA, spoke with the supervisor of health, wrote a letter to the school district superintendent, and eventually had some meetings with the general counsel for the school district.

“The program is like so many being adopted in school districts across the country – well-intentioned, aimed at a real problem (obesity), financed in an age of incredibly limited and still shrinking budgets and elevated by the promise of efficiency that accompanies new technologies. What caught people’s attention most was a line from the letter I sent to the superintendent: ‘I have serious concerns about this program and worry that the school district hasn’t fully considered the implications of implementing a child-surveillance program like this.’ No one previously had called it ‘child-surveillance.’ All of a sudden, the creepiness of bath time and bedtime surveillance sunk in. Naturally, this triggered familiar privacy concerns. The term ‘surveillance’ generated a visceral reaction and was an effective means for getting people to stop and think.

“Up to that point, no one seemed to have done so for several obvious reasons. People trust the school district and love technology. The salient problem of obesity weighs heavily on the community; activity watches seem to be a less intrusive means for addressing the problem. People obtain information about their activity levels and then are better able to adjust their behaviour and improve fitness. They can do so on their own, as a family, or in consultation with the physical education teacher. Plus, it was funded by a federal grant. The activity watch program presents substantial upside with little or no downside, an easy cost-benefit analysis. For most people, it seems like one of those rare win-win scenarios. After my intervention, very little changed; better disclosure and informed consent apparently would fix everything. These limited privacy concerns fall woefully short of acknowledging the full power of techno-social engineering. The 24/7 data collection and the lack of informed consent are real problems. But the stakes run much deeper.”

Sleep problems and stirred-up woes

Larry Rosen , a professor emeritus of psychology at California State University, Dominguez Hills known as an international expert on the psychology of technology, wrote, “Since publishing a journal article on the impact of technology on sleep, I have made a conscious effort to silence my phone one hour prior to bedtime, and it has improved my sleep and alertness during the day.”

Time previously spent dealing with boredom – day dreaming, contemplating, etc. – is now spent tethered to one’s phone, which is not relaxing and eventually makes my thumbs hurt. A North American professor

An attorney based in North America wrote, “There is a loss of, and interruption of sleep. There are conflicts over failure to respond in what is now seen to be a ‘timely’ fashion. There is increasing personal impatience. The effects are especially strong on teenagers.”

A communications professional based in North America said, “My sleep patterns have been negatively impacted.”

A North American professo r wrote, “Time previously spent dealing with boredom – day dreaming, contemplating, etc. – is now spent tethered to one’s phone, which is not relaxing and eventually makes my thumbs hurt.”

General concerns and complaints

Yasmin Ibrahim , an associate professor of international business and communications at Queen Mary University of London, said, “The problem is as digital technologies become seamlessly part of our everyday engagement and mode of living – we may not question our actions or decisions we make online. Making the internet a healthy space means analysing our modes of being and everyday engagements in the digital realm and this itself can be stressful. But keeping the internet a space of ideals requires us to do precisely that; to question every action and think about the internet architecture and how our activities are connected to a wider digital ecology of producing and consuming.”

Riel Miller , team leader of futures literacy at UNESCO, said, “Digital life should be pull not push. Demand-driven. What it hasn’t yet been able to deliver on is the capacity to know why, when and how to pull. Without the curiosity engine configured for pull’s life of surprise we suffer under the regime of push’s desperate need for certainty, diminishing what the Net can deliver, even if it allows much more spontaneity.”

Mike Caprio , innovation consultant for Brainewave Consulting, said, “I have consciously made choices to limit the intrusion of my digital life into my real life. I no longer carry a smartphone, I only occasionally carry a flip phone when I know I am going to need to be reached or make calls. I only allow notifications from computers or tablets to interrupt me during work hours. I deleted my Facebook account in 2013. While this has reduced the number of interactions with friends, family and colleagues, I feel much more connected to my life and in my relationships.”

Scott Johns , a high school teacher, commented, “Just yesterday, I had been to a secondhand book store to get some specific texts (a job-related task) and as a joke bought a couple of old fiction books. Then there was a period of time when I was in my car waiting for my wife to finish a meeting and I thought I’d have a read. They weren’t great books so I expected to have a bit of a laugh at them. The written words on those old pages captured my mind in a way that was unexpected. My mind was soon lit up with imagery and I went into a deep state of contemplation of not only the story but the skill of the writer. I realized that there was nothing else to the book, it had its story and no more, so I was able to let go of the need for there to be more happening. Had the story been available online, firstly, I would not have chosen it above the proliferation of options and demands presented by the computer as vehicle for the internet. Secondly, had I started the story, my mind would not have wandered within the story but to the many other things the computer could have provided me at that moment. I would have engaged thinly with the story with the result that little trace of it would have remained in my neurology. The cute and clever choices of words made by the writer would have vanished by breakfast time. No enhancement of my mind would have occurred. It would have been a strangely empty task. But this morning I have the very unfamiliar desire to read fiction books.”

Laurie L. Putnam , an educator, librarian and communications consultant, wrote, “Anecdote #1 Digital technologies let us be more present in the lives of distant family and friends. My family is spread around the region, close enough to get together often, but far enough apart to make in-person visits an effort that requires significant travel time. Yet, despite the distance, I look after my elderly mother and keep in close touch with my 12-year-old nieces. Every day we depend on email, texting, document sharing and web-based medical systems. From 150 miles away I can order medications for my mother and communicate with her doctors online. I can help my nieces with their homework online, in real time, and we can share daily life in pictures, text, and video. Our days and lives would be very different without the internet. Anecdote #2 My shiny new washing machine blinked at me with a high-tech LED readout that offered more choices than ever for cleaning my clothes. Cool. But those lights went out a few years later, just after the warranty expired. A service technician diagnosed the death of the circuit board and ordered a replacement – cheaper than a new washer, he said. The new board arrived, but it didn’t work either, the fault of another faulty chip. ‘That happens. It’s not unusual,’ said the technician who next recommended discarding the entire 300-pound washing machine and buying a new one. The experience was frustrating, inconvenient and expensive. Did the digital washing machine clean my clothes better? Sometimes. I liked and used about 20% of the options. But overall I had been perfectly happy with my old analog washer. Was the digital washer more expensive? Yes. Did it break faster? Yes. Was it fixable when it broke? No. Recyclable? Unknown. Chips have relatively short life cycles, and if we don’t want our children to inherit landfills of disposable appliances, we need to design more reliable products that can be serviced and recycled. Did the digital machine raise my stress level? Yes. Overall, did the digital washer improve my well-being? No. And it wasn’t even connected to the Internet of Things, surreptitiously collecting data about my lost socks and water usage. Just because we can make everything digital doesn’t mean we should. There are cases where our well-being is better served by simpler, analog tools.”

[corporate entities’]

A professor from North America wrote, “The internet is everything for me, my family and my students today. We would not and could not do without it. Period. It is amazing! However, its ever-present influence in the lives of the hyperconnected also seems to be quite overwhelming – it is causing stress and anxiety and somewhat lowering the learning performance in courses for most of my students. I have been teaching at a fairly exclusive private university for 20 years. These students have all of the privileges of the most-connected. Over the past decade the students have been progressively more resistant to reading and writing assignments that require any sort of deep critical thinking, and I have had to annually reduce the course expectations as they literally buckle under what they perceive to be undue ‘pressure’ from simply being asked to do reading and writing assignments that were absolutely no problem for students of the first decade of the 2000s and previous.”

A research scientist based in Europe commented, “I used to hate writing text messages and only used them in case the other person couldn’t pick up the phone and I needed to leave an important information. Instead I called people, whether it was for making an appointment, asking them how they are, etc. Shortly after I started to use WhatsApp however, I was dragged into the constant availability and spend so much time on writing things that could have been discussed more easily on the phone. Because I receive so many messages, I cannot have my phone on loud when my data is switched on, which also means I miss phone calls. The fact that less and less people even recognise when they are being called makes it even more difficult to switch back to calls instead of messages again.”

Stephanie Mallak Olson , director at the Iosco-Arenac District Library in Michigan, wrote, “I am sad that people who are not ‘connected’ to the digital world are often ignored or left out. If you are not on Facebook and your family only shares photos via Facebook you never see them. If you don’t own a computer to get bank statements online you are often charged a fee to get the statements in hard copy. If you are not on a device and everyone else around you is then how do you get to be a part of the conversation? While at conferences, I find it rude that people are doing other online work instead of giving their attention to a speaker. Many sources of information are now only available online and people must rely on others to find the answers. I recently heard a doctor say to a patient ‘you need to find someone to look it up for you online.’ People in that same office wouldn’t take the time to assist a person with their ‘patient portal’ access but instead gave them a Web address where they could take an online course. I happen to know the person does not have or know how to operate a computer. I use computers every day both for work and home. I do not text or even have my cheap cellphone close by as I want a limit on my time spent on a mobile device. I also support getting together with family without devices so we can talk.”

A technology consultant and expert on attention and workflow previously with a top-five tech company wrote, “It’s been liberating and enslaving. It takes effort to ignore. We have given it more power than we’ve given the best parts of our humanity.”

Anthony Rutkowski , internet pioneer and business leader, said, “Although it has clearly changed daily life, it is arguably not for the better.”

We have a running quote in our family that sums it up so well. ‘Do you remember when you used to have to wonder things?’ Tiziana Dearing

Tiziana Dearing , a professor at the Boston College School of Social Work, said, “We have a running quote in our family that sums it up so well. ‘Do you remember when you used to have to wonder things?’”

A research scientist and internet pioneer commented, “In the small, digital technology has been a highly positive experience. I work from home part-time – a wonderful contribution to my well-being – and I keep in contact with friends too distant to see often. It is in the large – the societal – where I feel the negative aspects of the digital world have personal consequences for me, an impact on my well-being. The rise of hatred, the manipulation of politics and so on – these are not distant events with no personal impact.”

A professor wrote, “Now when I wake up in the morning I reach for my iPhone with trepidation to find out what outrage our so-called ‘president’ has perpetrated already. It’s horrible.” A senior product strategy expert commented, “I ride bikes with an older friend in the mountains of bucolic Pennsylvania. The friend, who had not yet discovered Facebook, Instagram and texting, and I would go for a ride. I loved that I was disconnected for a few hours. The last time we rode he was getting alerts through a Garmin mounted on his handlebars (they were mostly from Facebook – people liking a photo, etc.). It interrupted both my experience of the bike ride and my connection to my friend.”

A professor based in Oceania wrote, “I grew up with pen and inkwells at school and a typewriter at work. Right from the very beginning it was too complicated and time-consuming for men to do this type of demeaning, boring work. Over time, typing pools disappeared, executive assistants appeared and even some brave men would actually type. Technology improved ‘women’s work’ but not their prestige or paycheck. My first experience with email occurred while working for large American actuarial firm. I could send work last thing during the day (in Australia) and first thing the next morning I had a reply. Wow! Now technology is being driven by business across all areas for money, money, money. Greed has taken over. Isolated pensioners and the poor across the world are being excluded from knowledge, personal growth and education, due to costs, the need for constant upgrading of hardware and software and the greed of the 1% through money manipulation, laundering and crooked tax loopholes. Technology keeps increasing inequality. The disadvantaged will never catch up.”

A data scientist based in Europe wrote, “A friend has recently begun trading bitcoin. The volatility of the ecosystem, the potential for massive gains and the stories of others benefiting incredibly from their investments led to near-obsessive behaviour. He would phase out of meetings, meals and social events to check the current bitcoin value – it became more important than anything else.”

An executive director of a Europe-based nonprofit wrote, “We don’t understand what we can trust anymore. Just this week, a member of the family wrote over iMessage to ask me to share a password over a ‘secure’ medium ‘like email’; and another asked for a more secure way to do banking than over Wi-Fi. I’m not mocking either; I’m pointing out that people I know who don’t necessarily get what I do for a living don’t quite understand what’s going on but have concerns that will lead to both withdrawal and poor decisions that will negatively affect them.”

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What are the disadvantages of using a computer?

Although there are many advantages to using a computer, there are also dangers and disadvantages (like most things in life). Computers pose several potential health concerns if not used properly. Below are many of the negative impacts of using digital technology and computers and what type of problems you may personally experience.

Carpal tunnel and eye strain

A computer requires a lot of repetitive movement that often leads to carpal tunnel syndrome. For example, moving your hand from your keyboard to a mouse and typing are all repetitive and inflict injuries.

In addition to repetitive movements, staring at a bright screen for hours can cause a lot of eye strain and CVS (computer vision syndrome).

Taking breaks, keeping the proper posture , and understanding computer ergonomics help prevent or delay these injuries.

• How to protect your eyes when using a computer.

Too much sitting

Too much of anything is bad, and too much sitting for a long time and becoming a mouse potato can lead to health problems. Also, substituting a traditional desk for a standing desk is not a perfect solution. Studies show that standing for long periods of time is not healthy but is better than sitting. The best solution is to take frequent breaks to move around, stretch, and exercise.

Short attention span and too much multitasking

With today's computers, computer devices, and the Internet, humans have become hooked on instant gratification. As you use a computer and the Internet and get immediate answers to your questions and requests, you become accustomed to getting that quick dopamine fix. You can become easily frustrated when something doesn't work or is not answered in a timely matter.

With a reduced attention span, it is also not uncommon to multitask more and work on more than one thing at the same time. Many studies show that multitasking is less productive, can cause more mistakes, and may even be bad for your brain.

Can limit learning and create a dependency

If you can remain focused, a computer with the Internet can be one of the greatest tools in history to learn about anything. It's also easy to become overly reliant on a computer and other electronic devices. For example, a spell checker is a great tool for finding spelling errors. However, if you never learn the proper spelling of a word and rely on a spell checker or autocorrect , you're more likely to make spelling errors.

Other tools like grammar checkers, GPS (Global Positioning System), and calculators are also extremely helpful. However, if you become too reliant on these tools, you may be helpless when they're not available.

Potential of loss of privacy

With computers storing so much personal information, it's at risk of getting into the hands of others. Once a malicious person has your information, they could access your online accounts or use identity theft to open other accounts, such as a new credit card under your name.

• How to protect yourself while on the Internet.

Time sink and distractions

Although a computer can increase your productivity, it also can waste a lot of your time. For example, you could be trying to learn more about computers and see an interesting link on cooking spaghetti, spending a few minutes reading that page. Then, you read a page about the best pot to use, which leads to reading about healthy eating. Two hours later, you realize you never achieved your original goal.

Also, with the popularity of social networks and notifications, you can become easily distracted while you are trying to work.

Increases waste and impacts the environment

With the speed that computers and other electronics get replaced, older devices get thrown away frequently. These disposed of electronics can significantly impact the environment and be a hazard to humans and other life if disposed of improperly.

• Computer disposal and recycling information and help.

Can reduce jobs

As computers become smarter and more capable, they also replace the need for many jobs. In the future, it is also not inconceivable that computers can carry out any job.

• What jobs are being taken over by robots and computers?

Trolls, abuse, stalking, and exploitation

Anyone who has spent time on the Internet has encountered trolls or abusive people, intentionally inflicting pain and suffering on others. Unfortunately, with the anonymous nature of the Internet, it's easier to encounter these people.

With more people sharing information on the Internet, it is also easier for stalkers to find personal information about people and their family. They can also use online services to find information about people.

Finally, the Internet also makes it easier for those who prey on others to find people to exploit. For safety tips, see: How to protect yourself while on the Internet.

You could become anti-social or depressed

With all the possibilities available on a computer, it is easy to get obsessed to the point you become anti-social. For example, many online games (e.g., World of Warcraft ) are designed to be addictive, causing you to play the game more than being around others. Others may find online shopping so beneficial that they rarely go out to shop.

See our computer addiction page for further information about and help with computer addiction.

Social networks can also be an escape from the real world by socializing with friends and family over social networks, like Facebook . Many studies are showing social network sites can be depressing because they only show all the good, fun, and interesting things friends and family are doing. It can result in people believing that other people's lives and experiences are better than theirs.

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Listen to the essay, as read by Antero Garcia, associate professor in the Graduate School of Education.

As a professor of education and a former public school teacher, I’ve seen digital tools change lives in schools.

I’ve documented the ways mobile technology like phones can transform student engagement in my own classroom.

I’ve explored how digital tools might network powerful civic learning and dialogue for classrooms across the country – elements of education that are crucial for sustaining our democracy today.

And, like everyone, I’ve witnessed digital technologies make schooling safer in the midst of a global pandemic. Zoom and Google Classroom, for instance, allowed many students to attend classrooms virtually during a period when it was not feasible to meet in person.

So I want to tell you that I think technologies are changing education for the better and that we need to invest more in them – but I just can’t.

Given the substantial amount of scholarly time I’ve invested in documenting the life-changing possibilities of digital technologies, it gives me no pleasure to suggest that these tools might be slowly poisoning us. Despite their purported and transformational value, I’ve been wondering if our investment in educational technology might in fact be making our schools worse.

Let me explain.

When I was a classroom teacher, I loved relying on the latest tools to create impressive and immersive experiences for my students. We would utilize technology to create class films, produce social media profiles for the Janie Crawfords, the Holden Caulfields, and other literary characters we studied, and find playful ways to digitally share our understanding of the ideas we studied in our classrooms.

As a teacher, technology was a way to build on students’ interests in pop culture and the world around them. This was exciting to me.

But I’ve continued to understand that the aspects of technology I loved weren’t actually about technology at all – they were about creating authentic learning experiences with young people. At the heart of these digital explorations were my relationships with students and the trust we built together.

“Part of why I’ve grown so skeptical about this current digital revolution is because of how these tools reshape students’ bodies and their relation to the world around them.”

I do see promise in the suite of digital tools that are available in classrooms today. But my research focus on platforms – digital spaces like Amazon, Netflix, and Google that reshape how users interact in online environments – suggests that when we focus on the trees of individual tools, we ignore the larger forest of social and cognitive challenges.

Most people encounter platforms every day in their online social lives. From the few online retail stores where we buy groceries to the small handful of sites that stream our favorite shows and media content, platforms have narrowed how we use the internet today to a small collection of Silicon Valley behemoths. Our social media activities, too, are limited to one or two sites where we check on the updates, photos, and looped videos of friends and loved ones.

These platforms restrict our online and offline lives to a relatively small number of companies and spaces – we communicate with a finite set of tools and consume a set of media that is often algorithmically suggested. This centralization of internet – a trend decades in the making – makes me very uneasy.

From willfully hiding the negative effects of social media use for vulnerable populations to creating tools that reinforce racial bias, today’s platforms are causing harm and sowing disinformation for young people and adults alike. The deluge of difficult ethical and pedagogical questions around these tools are not being broached in any meaningful way in schools – even adults aren’t sure how to manage their online lives.

You might ask, “What does this have to do with education?” Platforms are also a large part of how modern schools operate. From classroom management software to attendance tracking to the online tools that allowed students to meet safely during the pandemic, platforms guide nearly every student interaction in schools today. But districts are utilizing these tools without considering the wider spectrum of changes that they have incurred alongside them.

Antero Garcia, associate professor of education (Image credit: Courtesy Antero Garcia)

For example, it might seem helpful for a school to use a management tool like Classroom Dojo (a digital platform that can offer parents ways to interact with and receive updates from their family’s teacher) or software that tracks student reading and development like Accelerated Reader for day-to-day needs. However, these tools limit what assessment looks like and penalize students based on flawed interpretations of learning.

Another problem with platforms is that they, by necessity, amass large swaths of data. Myriad forms of educational technology exist – from virtual reality headsets to e-readers to the small sensors on student ID cards that can track when students enter schools. And all of this student data is being funneled out of schools and into the virtual black boxes of company databases.

Part of why I’ve grown so skeptical about this current digital revolution is because of how these tools reshape students’ bodies and their relation to the world around them. Young people are not viewed as complete human beings but as boxes checked for attendance, for meeting academic progress metrics, or for confirming their location within a school building. Nearly every action that students perform in schools – whether it’s logging onto devices, accessing buildings, or sharing content through their private online lives – is noticed and recorded. Children in schools have become disembodied from their minds and their hearts. Thus, one of the greatest and implicit lessons that kids learn in schools today is that they must sacrifice their privacy in order to participate in conventional, civic society.

The pandemic has only made the situation worse. At its beginnings, some schools relied on software to track students’ eye movements, ostensibly ensuring that kids were paying attention to the tasks at hand. Similarly, many schools required students to keep their cameras on during class time for similar purposes. These might be seen as in the best interests of students and their academic growth, but such practices are part of a larger (and usually more invisible) process of normalizing surveillance in the lives of youth today.

I am not suggesting that we completely reject all of the tools at our disposal – but I am urging for more caution. Even the seemingly benign resources we might use in our classrooms today come with tradeoffs. Every Wi-Fi-connected, “smart” device utilized in schools is an investment in time, money, and expertise in technology over teachers and the teaching profession.

Our focus on fixing or saving schools via digital tools assumes that the benefits and convenience that these invisible platforms offer are worth it.

But my ongoing exploration of how platforms reduce students to quantifiable data suggests that we are removing the innovation and imagination of students and teachers in the process.

Antero Garcia is associate professor of education in the Graduate School of Education .

In Their Own Words is a collaboration between the Stanford Public Humanities Initiative  and Stanford University Communications.

If you’re a Stanford faculty member (in any discipline or school) who is interested in writing an essay for this series, please reach out to Natalie Jabbar at [email protected] .

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Computer/Internet Addiction Symptoms, Causes and Effects Ad PsychGuides independently researches, tests, and reviews products and services which may benefit our readers. Where indicated by "Medically Reviewed by", Healthcare professionals review articles for medical accuracy. If you buy something through our links, or engage with a provider, we may earn a commission.

The Internet has made life a lot easier by making information more accessible to all and creating connections with different people around the world. However, it has also led a lot of people to spend too much time in front of the computer, so much so that it becomes the center of their lives. This can lead to an Internet or computer addiction .

Computer/Internet Addiction Symptoms, Causes and Effects

An Internet or computer addiction is the excessive use of the former or the latter. The latest edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-V) actually includes it as a disorder that needs further study and research. In a publication on the National Center for Biotechnology Information website, the study, which was conducted by the Department of Adult Psychiatry in the Poland Medical University, showed that Internet addiction was seen to be quite popular and common among young people, especially those who were only children. In fact, every fourth child is addicted to the Internet. This is an alarming statistic that needs to be addressed as soon as possible.

Are There Different Types of Computer or Internet Addictions?

Internet or computer addictions manifest in several ways that cover various degrees and areas of Internet usage. They are the following:

• Information overload. Too much online surfing leads to decreased productivity at work and fewer interactions with family members.
• Compulsions. Excessive time spent in online activities such as gaming, trading of stocks, gambling and even auctions often leads to overspending and problems at work.
• Cybersex addiction. Too much surfing of porn sites often affects real-life relationships.
• Cyber-relationship addiction. Excessive use of social networking sites to create relationships rather than spending time with family or friends may destroy real-life relationships.

These are the most commonly observed types of Internet addiction. If you or someone you know is suffering from this kind of addiction, you don’t have to face it on your own. We can help you. Just call at any time to speak to one of our trained advisors.

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What Causes an Addiction to Computers or the Web?

Whenever Internet addicts feel overwhelmed, stressed, depressed, lonely or anxious, they use the Internet to seek solace and escape. Studies from the University of Iowa show that Internet addiction is quite common among males ages 20 to 30 years old who are suffering from depression .

Certain people are predisposed to having a computer or Internet addiction, such as those who suffer from anxiety and depression. Their lack of emotional support means they turn to the Internet to fill this need. There are also those who have a history of other types of addiction, such as addictions to alcohol, drugs, sex and gambling. Even being stressed and unhappy can contribute greatly to the development of a computer or Internet addiction. People who are overly shy and cannot easily relate to their peers are also at a higher risk of developing a computer or Internet addiction.

What Are the Signs of an Online Addiction Problem?

An addiction to the Internet is manifested in both physical and emotional symptoms; however, these specifics may vary for each person. These are basically warning signals that an addiction may be developing. If you feel that you or a loved one has these symptoms, it is not yet too late. All it takes is a phone call to and we can help you.

Emotional Symptoms of Online Addiction

The following symptoms are typical of online addicts:

• Feelings of guilt
• Euphoric feelings when in front of the computer
• Unable to keep schedules
• No sense of time
• Defensiveness
• Avoiding doing work

Physical Symptoms of Online Addiction

The following symptoms are characteristic of someone who uses the computer for a very long period of time:

• Weight gain or loss
• Disturbances in sleep
• Carpal tunnel syndrome
• Blurred or strained vision

Short-Term and Long-Term Effects of an Online Addiction

The short-term effects of an online addiction include unfinished tasks, forgotten responsibilities and weight gain. Long-term effects are seen more in the physical symptoms such as backache, neck pain, carpal tunnel syndrome, and vision problems from staring at the screen. It can also lead to bankruptcy, especially if the time spent online is focused on shopping , gambling and gaming .

According to Oberlin College of Computer Science, aside from being dependent on the Internet, addicts may develop technostress wherein they internalize how a computer works, such as accelerated time and perfect results. It can also cause social withdrawal, feeling more at ease interacting with people online rather than in person.

Is There a Test or Self-Assessment I Can Do?

A lot of studies and surveys are being conducted to measure the extent of this type of addiction. Dr. Kimberly S. Young has created a questionnaire based on other disorders to assess levels of addiction. It is the Internet Addict Diagnostic Questionnaire or IADQ. Answering positively to five out of the eight questions may be indicative of an online addiction. Here are the questions:

• Are you preoccupied with using the Internet? Do you think about your previous or future online activity?
• Do you have the need to be online longer to be satisfied?
• Have you made repeated but unsuccessful attempts to cut back, stop or control your Internet use?
• Do you become moody, restless, irritable or depressed when you stop or decrease your Internet use?
• Is your time spent online longer than what you originally planned?
• Did your online use negatively affect a significant relationship, education, career or job?
• Do you conceal the extent of your Internet usage from your therapist, family or others?
• Does the Internet serve as an escape from problems or relief from a bad mood?

Medication: Are There Drug Options for Internet/Computer Addictions?

These addictions may be triggered by underlying emotional disorders such as depression and anxiety, so medications used for those conditions can be given in the hope that treating the underlying cause will cause a cessation of the Internet or computer addiction. These medications are antidepressants and anti-anxiety drugs.

Drugs: Possible Options

When the addiction gets out of control, medications are sometimes needed to keep Internet addicts from harming themselves by staying online too long. Escitalopram is a drug option that has been shown to be effective for Internet addiction, according to studies by Mount Sinai School of Medicine.

Medication Side Effects

As with all other medications for psychological disorders, taking a medication for online addiction may cause adverse side effects. It’s important to consult with your doctor regarding any potential side effects prior to starting any medication.

Antidepressant Drug Addiction, Dependence and Withdrawal in Online Addicts

Taking an antidepressant for an online addiction may also lead to dependence on this medication. Withdrawal from an antidepressant should always be gradual and under medical supervision as is done with people who are being treated for depression .

Medication Overdose

The taking of medications should always be monitored and dispensed by a qualified health professional. Overdose of these medications may lead to further complications and can be extremely harmful.

Depression and Online Addiction

Depression is seen to be a risk factor and cause for online addiction. Treating depression may lessen the chance that an online addiction will occur.

Dual Diagnosis: Online Addiction and Substance Abuse

An Internet addiction and substance abuse often go hand in hand with each other. Most of the time, those who abuse alcohol or drugs are those with the predisposition to get addicted to the Internet as it serves as a means of escape from reality.

A study from Swansea and Milan Universities shows that when Internet addicts go offline or stop using the computer, they experience withdrawal symptoms similar to those experienced by drug addicts. This shows that these addictions are often interrelated.

Getting Help for an Internet Addiction

Any addiction is no laughing matter. It affects not only the addict but also everyone who surrounds them. If you think you need help for internet or computer addiction , or someone you know needs assistance to stop this addiction, we can help. Just call . We are here to help you get back on the road to an addiction-free life.

Additional Resources

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Influence of computers in students’ academic achievement

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Data will be made available on request.

With fast-growing technology, schools have to adapt and use technology constantly as a tool to grow. This study aims to understand the influence of computer factors on students' academic achievement. We propose a model on the influence of computer attitudes, computer learning environments, computer learning motivations, computer confidence, computer use, computer self-efficacy, loneliness, mothers' education, parents' marital status and family size on academic achievement (AA). To validate the conceptual model, 286 students aged 16–18 years old answered an online questionnaire. The most important drivers that positively affect AA are computer use, employment motivations, and mothers' education. While enjoyment attitudes, school environment, interest motivations, and loneliness influence AA negatively. Also, family size and computer self-efficacy work as moderators, and computer use works as a mediator between computer learning environments and academic achievement.

Academic achievement; Computers; Family; Learning; Students.

1. Introduction

Countries are constantly facing everchanging economic challenges and social transformations due to globalisation and technology development. Education helps overcome these challenges by developing knowledge and high skills, allowing better opportunities and faster economic progression ( OECD, 2019 ). Computers and information technology have become key to educational institutions worldwide ( Hsu and Huang, 2006 ). With the advantages of the digital era through digital markets, advanced scientific and social networks, there is a growth in innovation, development and employment ( OECD, 2015 ). Education needs to adapt to social changes, students' needs, and technology growth ( OECD, 2019 ), the perfect example of this adaptation is during the recent pandemic. The COVID-19 pandemic (meaning "CO" - corona; "VI" – virus; "D" – disease; "19" - "2019″) started in December 2019 in Wuhan, a province of China. It is caused by a highly contagious virus that has already claimed millions of lives worldwide ( Roy et al., 2020 ). The virus forced schools to close, and since classes had to continue, teachers and students had to adapt, resorting to virtual classes ( Ng and Peggy, 2020 ). However, it impacted academic life in yet unknown dimensions ( Rajkumar, 2020 ).

Digital technology provides access to high-quality learning and consequently allows schools to develop their teaching and learning methods ( Ertmer et al., 2012 ). Nonetheless, access to computers at home or the internet is not equal in every dwelling, and some students have the disadvantage of not having parental support or engagement to learn by themselves online. For these reasons, the pandemic can bestow tremendous advantages in digital education and academic achievement or significant disadvantages, mostly in developing countries. Therefore, access to technology is not enough; fostering a close relationship between families and teachers is essential ( OECD, 2020 ). Technology has been an invaluable tool, and it is being taken under consideration in students' academic achievement, including not only in access to the internet but also the way students use it ( Levine and Donitsa-Schmidt, 1998 ; Torres-Díaz et al., 2016 ; Voogt et al., 2013 ). Schools are expected to have a particular concern regarding integrating computers in classroom teaching ( Schmid and Petko, 2019 ), and technical devices such as computers, laptops, tablets and mobile phones should be included wisely in adolescent education. Through the information gathered, this study was motivated mainly by the atual pandemic context and the important role technology has on the academic achievement.

Over the years, researchers have tried to identify the variables that contribute to academic excellence in an attempt to understand which factors lead to better students' performance ( Valli Jayanthi et al., 2014 ). A vast number of studies have been conducted to identify predictors of academic achievement ( Gonzalez-pienda et al., 2002 ; J. Lee, Shute and Lee, 2010 ; Suárez-álvarez et al., 2014 ) although few have studied computer influences on the prediction of students' academic achievement.

Since there is a need to extend innovations in education ( Admiraal et al., 2017 ), we identified a need to investigate how students' relationships with computers impact their academic performance to understand the real impact of computers on schooling. To the best of our knowledge, some studies address computers' impact on academic achievement, but the data available is not totally enlightening. With the actual context of the pandemic, this subject gains additional importance, comparing technology use and academic achievement (AA) in such a tumultuous time for the world. This study presents three contributions. Firstly , it identifies which the best computer-related determinants to understand AA are through a research model that combines computer-related variables to students' grades. In this way, we identify the factors that lead to better academic achievement, helping schools and parents use them as a strategic advantage. Secondly , it investigates the moderation effect of family size and computer self-efficacy and the mediation effect of computer use between the factors identified and AA. Finally , to understand how the COVID-19 pandemic is influencing students' AA, using the variable loneliness, we explore how forced social isolation affected the use of computers and students' academic achievement in the pandemic period.

A literature review is presented in the next section. Section 3 introduces a theoretical model explaining academic achievement. Section 4 elucidates on the data-collection methods, followed by the results in Section 5 . The results are discussed in Section 6 , and conclusions are outlined in the final section.

2. Literature review and hypotheses

2.1. computer attitudes.

Attitudes and perceptions play a pivotal role in learning behaviours. Some researchers tested a model based on the concept of the attitude-behaviour theory, which argues that beliefs lead to attitudes, and attitudes are an essential factor to predict behaviour ( Levine and Donitsa-Schmidt, 1998 ). They predicted that computer use leads to more computer confidence and positive attitudes towards computers, and these elements influence each other. The computer attitudes refer to the opinion of students about: the stereotypes of those who use the computer the most – stereotypes; the use of computers for education purposes – educational; and about the use of the computer for fun – enjoyment. In their view, student achievement is a reflection of their behaviour in school. Even with the change of technology over time, recent studies support their theory that positive computer attitudes and positive computer confidence continue to lead to better outcomes ( Lee et al., 2019 ). Stereotypes associated with computers are usually on gender, proving the idea that women have less computer knowledge than men ( Punter et al., 2017 ). However, there are no results on how other stereotypes, such as the lack of computer use by athletes', or even if the concept of people who use computers are considered nerds, negatively affects the confidence of those who use computers.

Regarding the attitudes of enjoyment and educational use of computers, there is no consensus in the literature. Some researchers found a positive association between students' academic achievement and computer use for interactive social media and video gaming, as well as for educational purposes ( Bowers and Berland, 2013 ; Tang and Patrick, 2018 ), although other researchers have found that students who play more videogames have worse results in school ( Bae and Wickrama, 2015 ), some previous studies suggest that the technology intervention has a positive effect on students' attitudes toward the use of computers for educational purposes ( Gibson et al., 2014 ). Others show concerns on the effects of technology and social media use on students' outcomes and confirm that students who have lower grades spend more time using computers for fun ( Bae and Wickrama, 2015 ; Tang and Patrick, 2018 ), others find no evidence that using computers for fun causes higher or lower achievement ( Hamiyet, 2015 ). Milani et al. (2019) demonstrated that using computers with moderate levels of video gaming may improve student achievement because it increases visual-spatial skills ( Milani et al., 2019 ) when complemented with educational use such as homework, extracurricular activities, and reading ( Bowers and Berland, 2013 ). Regarding the effect on computer confidence, we expect students to feel confident about using computers when using them for school ( Claro et al., 2012 ) and even more when using them for recreational purposes. Taking this background into account, we propose the following hypotheses.

Educational attitudes have a positive effect on computer confidence.

Educational attitudes have a positive effect on academic achievement.

Stereotype attitudes have a negative effect on computer confidence.

Enjoyment attitudes have a positive effect on computer confidence.

Enjoyment attitudes have a negative effect on academic achievement.

2.2. Learning environments and motivations

The environment where students learn can affect their attitudes ( Hsu and Huang, 2006 ). Studies have found that students achieve higher grades when they have a computer at home ( Fairlie, 2012 ; Fairlie et al., 2010 ) and use it daily to facilitate their school work ( Gu and Xu, 2019 ), suggesting that home computers improve educational outcomes and computer skills, leading to more efficient use of computers ( Fairlie and London, 2012 ). Many researchers pointed to a positive impact of computer use in schools on students' educational outcomes ( Bayrak and Bayram, 2010 ; Murillo-Zamorano et al., 2019 ; Xiao and Sun, 2021 ). The integration of computers in the classroom positively influences the interaction between students and increases learning and teaching ( Murillo-Zamorano et al., 2019 ). Experimental class manipulations using a computer in class were tested over the years, with positive results: students' academic achievement increases when a computer assists them in learning ( Bayrak and Bayram, 2010 ). However, most students show dissatisfaction with the learning environment of schools ( Hsu and Huang, 2006 ). So, we propose that home and school environments positively influence computer use in general and student achievement particularly, as hypothesised below.

Home environments have a positive effect on computer use.

Home environments have a positive effect on academic achievement.

Computer use mediates the effect of home environment on academic achievement

School environments have a positive effect on computer use.

School environments have a positive effect on academic achievement

Computer use mediates the effect of school environment on academic achievement

Regarding motivations, several types of motivations have already been studied to predict academic achievement, and the best predictor so far is associated with interest. If the student is interested, he will engage in the activity independently, and there is also evidence that interest motivations directly affect reading achievements ( Habók et al., 2020 ). When analysing students' motivations for using computers, studies show that using computers at school and for schoolwork results in higher motivation when studying and positively impacts academic achievement ( Partovi and Razavi, 2019 ). Likewise, when the students' perceptions of learning motivations are improved, there is an increasing computer use by the students and, as a result, it enhances their computer self-efficacy - perceived skill on the use ( Rohatgi et al., 2016 ) - indirectly ( Hsu and Huang, 2006 ). Therefore, in order to increase computer self-efficacy, students need to use computers more frequently. Previous results indicate that interest motivations positively affect computer use and computer self-efficacy, predicting that when student interests in computers are higher, student computer self-efficacy increases. Students are also motivated by employment and recognise that computer abilities can help them get a good job ( Hsu and Huang, 2006 ). This factor can be predicted by self-efficacy because it defines the confidence and ability on achieving success ( Serge et al., 2018 ). A study showed that learners who are more engaged and motivated use more technology for their learning purposes, most likely for individual learning than for collaborative tasks ( Lee et al., 2019 ). Regarding the use of technology, students who use it more are more motivated to do it and have better grades ( Higgins, Huscroft-D’Angelo and Crawford, 2019 ), and students who are motivated by attaining better grades tend to use e-learning more ( Dunn and Kennedy, 2019 ). In line with the literature, we expect the confirmation of the presented hypotheses.

Interest motivations have a positive effect on computer use.

Interest motivations have a positive effect on academic achievement.

Interest motivations have a positive effect on computer self-efficacy.

Employment motivations have a positive effect on computer self-efficacy.

Employment motivations have a positive effect on academic achievement.

2.3. Computer confidence, computer use & computer self-efficacy

Hands-on experience with technology is the most important factor in increasing students' confidence while using it and consequently increasing their perceived computer self-efficacy ( Hatlevik and Bjarnø, 2021 ). Students with access to a computer are more involved and interested in their classwork ( Gibson et al., 2014 ). Higher commitment to school, curiosity, and positivism can help students develop motivation and interest in school subjects, leading to higher self-efficacy and consequently better academic achievement ( Stajkovic et al., 2018 ).

Computer use has a positive effect on computer confidence.

Computer confidence has a positive effect on computer self-efficacy.

Computer confidence has a positive effect on academic achievement.

Computer use has a positive effect on academic achievement.

We know from previous literature that employment motivations positively influence academic achievement, and computer self-efficacy is also a significant influence factor on employment ( Serge et al., 2018 ) to explain academic achievement, so we believe that computer self-efficacy can moderate this relation by proposing H14 .

Computer self-efficacy moderates the effect of employment motivations on academic achievement.

2.4. Loneliness

Due to the coronavirus pandemic, schools were closed to slow down the virus transmission as a control measure, affecting half of the students globally ( Viner et al., 2020 ). Schools were forced to adapt during coronavirus outbreaks since campus classes were suspended, and online platforms have been exploited to conduct virtual classes ( Ng and Peggy, 2020 ). Ng and Peggy (2020) states that virtual classes can improve students' learning outcomes if all students are self-disciplined. However, self-isolation may affect people's mental health ( Roy et al., 2020 ), primarily impacting adolescents, influencing their behaviours and achievement in academic pursuits. Interaction with others is a pivotal factor for academic performance since students who engage with colleagues and teachers tend to have more academic success than those who study by themselves ( Torres-Díaz et al., 2016 ). Loneliness or social isolation is linked to anxiety and self-esteem ( Helm et al., 2020 ), leading to unhealthy smartphone use ( Shen and Wang, 2019 ) and sedentary behaviours ( Werneck et al., 2019 ), motivating us to posit the following.

Loneliness has a negative effect on academic achievement.

2.5. Family and students' factors

Technology use is linked to additional factors that influence adolescents' academic outcomes such as family socioeconomic factors – in particular, parents' occupation, marital status ( Abosede and Akintola, 2016 ; Asendorpf and Conner, 2012 ), parents' educational level ( Chesters and Daly, 2017 ) and family size - and student socio-emotional factors - such as relationship with colleagues, student motivation and anxiety ( Balogun et al., 2017 ). Family involvement and closeness to younger progeny have positive impacts on their achievements ( Fang, 2020 ), so we believe that the relation between using computers in a school environment on academic achievement, verified above, may change depending on the family size. Also, we know from the previous results that computer use has increased with the pandemic due to online classes, and family context has a significant impact on home computer use, so we predict a moderation effect on the relation between computer use and academic achievement. The psychological status of parents, mostly their marital status and economic status, has a powerful association with the family environment and consequently on their child's educational attainments ( Poon, 2020 ). We predict there is a positive impact of mothers' education on academic achievement since the maternal figure is the most relevant for children ( Abosede and Akintola, 2016 ). Expecting that the higher the level of education of mothers, the better the students result at school, also, we predict that parents being married have a positive influence on students' results, H15 and H16 .

Family size moderates the school environment on academic achievement.

Family size moderates computer use on academic achievement.

Parents marital status has a positive effect on academic achievement.

Mothers' education has a positive effect on academic achievement.

According to their age and gender, students' grades can differ independently of their family characteristics: female students tend to achieve higher scores than male students ( Valli Jayanthi et al., 2014 ) and older students showed lower grades compared to younger students ( Chowa et al., 2015 ). Some of these factors are not of primary interest for this study. Nevertheless, it is crucial to include them in the research to control for bias since they influence the association between the use of technology and adolescents' outcomes ( Tang and Patrick, 2018 ). We have therefore used age and gender as a control variable on our research model.

2.6. Conceptual model

Figure 1 illustrates our proposed model. We focus our research on computers and their influence on academic achievement. The drivers shown in the research model emerged from the literature above. We first gathered information and identified the main factors that influence academic achievement through computer use, and from the most significant constructs relating to computers and academic achievement, we examined and analysed their viability on the study. From the computers' context, the most significant constructs found were computer attitudes (educational attitudes, enjoyable attitudes, stereotypes attitudes), computer use, computer confidence ( Levine and Donitsa-Schmidt, 1998 ), computer self-efficacy, learning environments (home environment, school environment) and learning motivations (interest motivations, employment motivations) ( Hsu and Huang, 2006 ). We identified loneliness as the most relevant construct from the pandemic context considering its impact on academic achievement ( Helm et al., 2020 ). We identified mothers' education, marital status, and family size as the most relevant influencers from the family context. Finally, with our central construct, academic achievement, we are trying to understand how it is impacted by computers, the pandemic and family factors from students' points of view. So, the proposed model tries to predict AA through students' computer attitudes, learning environments, learning motivations, computer confidence, computer use, computer self-efficacy and loneliness, adding sociodemographic data related to students and their families - parents' marital status, mothers' education and family size, where the latter only works as a moderator, including two additional control variables, age and gender. This model integrates several constructs on the literature relevant to the study of computers influence on academic achievement since is essential to fortify and unify the knowledge in this investigation field. As explained above, the model merges two existing models ( Hsu and Huang, 2006 ; Levine and Donitsa-Schmidt, 1998 ), allowing us to update the previous results and test new hypothesis. Additionally, the integration of the covid pandemic context brings a different and important analysis of today's reality.

Conceptual model.

3.1. Participants and procedure

For this study, we developed a questionnaire for students enrolled in public high schools. The survey, with an estimated completion time of 8 min was sent by e-mail to several schools in Portugal to achieve more diversity within the collected answers. The participants consented to the use of their information as long as it was anonymous and confidential. The questionnaire was answered online and comprised 26 closed questions (please, see Appendix A ) inquiring about computer attitudes, motivations, use at home and school, frequency of use, students' grade average from 0 to 20 marks, and sociodemographic information. With this data, we can compare and analyse the impact of their type of use and opinion about computers on their achievement in school. The study's target population were 16 to 18-year-old adolescents in the 10 th , 11 th and 12 th grades at secondary schools. This range of students allowed us to surround a group of people with similar maturity and identical needs in digital use. We chose to study public school students because teaching methods in private schools are quite different, as are the type of students and families who choose private schools. Also, most students in Portugal study at public schools, and it seems more coherent to study only public education since it is more accessible to address. According to the Ethics Committee of NOVA IMS and MagIC Research Center regulations, this project was considered to meet the requirements, being considered approved.

A pilot test with 30 answers allowed us to comprehend the viability of some survey questions and their order, and afterwards, when evaluating the model, the strength of constructs led us to drop a few items due to the lack of importance and correlations within them. The pilot test allowed us to improve the questionnaire to facilitate answering and adapt the research model initially built. After the complete collection of data, we considered only student responses 100% completed, amounting to 286 valid responses, from a total of 465 answers. We had 98 boys and 188 girls among the respondents, with an average age of 17 years old, with an average global grade of 15 points (on a scale from 0 to 20). Students' academic achievement was measured through students' average grades - on reading, mathematics and global average grade. Computer use was measured through a scale range from 1 (never) to 5 (every day) to measure the frequency of use. A 3-item loneliness scale was used to assess the loneliness construct ( Hughes et al., 2004 ) based on the UCLA Loneliness Scale ( Russel, 1996 ). This scale has been used in several studies recently ( Helm et al., 2020 ; Liu et al., 2020 ; Shen and Wang, 2019 ) to study loneliness as a consequence of the coronavirus. The remaining items, apart from the demographic variables (age, gender, marital status, mothers' education, family size), were measured through a scale range from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree).

4. Analysis and results

We used structural equation modelling (SEM) to test the relations estimated in our theoretical model and its effects ( Marsh et al., 2004 ). Consequently, we applied partial least squares (PLS), a method used to develop theories in explanatory research. The use of PLS-SEM is to maximise the explained variance in the dependent constructs and evaluate data quality, knowing that it is a method that works better on bigger sample sizes and larger complexity with less restrictive assumptions on data (Joe F Hair et al., 2014 ). We used the partial least squares method as the recommended two-step approach that first tests the reliability and validity of the measurement model and then assesses the structural model ( Anderson and Gerbing, 1988 ).

4.1. Measurement model

Measurement models measure the relation between the latent variables and their indicators for both reflective and formative constructs. In this study, all constructs are reflective except computer use, which is formative.

The internal consistency, convergent validity and discriminatory validity must be verified to assess the reflective measurement model. The composite reliability (CR), shown in Appendix B, is higher than 0.7 in all constructs, reflecting internal consistency ( Mcintosh et al., 2014 ). Also, by analysing the loadings of the items, which are all higher than 0,6, we can conclude there is indicator reliability. To demonstrate convergent validity, we verify the average variance extracted (AVE) values of constructs, and they are all higher than 0.5 (please see Appendix B), confirming there is convergent validity ( Sarstedt et al., 2017 ). To analyse discriminant validity, we implemented three methods - the Fornell-Larcker criterion, the loadings and cross-loadings analysis, and the heterotrait-monotrait ratio (HTMT) methodology. The Fornell-Larcker criterion supports that the AVE square root of each construct should be higher than the correlation between constructs ( Fornell and Larcker, 1981 ), which Appendix B can confirm. The second criteria support that the loadings should be higher than the respective cross-loadings (Joseph F Hair et al., 2014 ), which is observed in Appendix C. The HTMT method sustains that the HTMT values should be lower than 0.9 (Joseph F Hair et al., 2017 ; Sarstedt et al., 2017 ), confirmed by Appendix D. Thus, all the constructs have discriminant validity.

In order to assess the validity of the formative construct computer use, we assessed the model for multicollinearity using (variance inflation factor) VIF. Table 1 shows the VIF values are all under 5 (Joseph F Hair et al., 2017 ), as the threshold indicates it should be, so the model does not have multicollinearity problems. In terms of significance, the three items are statistically significant (p < 0.05), as Table 1 confirms, concluding that the formative construct is reliable.

Table 1

Formative measurement model evaluation.

Note: ∗p < 0.05, ∗∗p < 0.01, ∗∗∗p < 0.001.

We can conclude that both reflective and formative constructs present a good measurement model. For this reason, we can move to the structural model.

4.2. Structural model

To estimate the structural model, first, we assessed the VIF to check the model for multicollinearity issues. The VIF values are below the threshold of 5 ( Sarstedt et al., 2017 ), so the model does not have multicollinearity problems. To evaluate the statistical significance of the path coefficients, we did a bootstrap with 5000 resamples. Results from the model are presented in Figure 2 .

Conceptual model results.

The model explains 30.5% of computer confidence. Educational attitudes (β = 0.307, p < 0.001), stereotype attitudes (β = - 0.160, p < 0.01), enjoyment attitudes (β = 0.236, p < 0.001) and computer use (β = 0.136, p < 0.05) are statistically significant in explaining computer confidence, confirming hypotheses H1 a, H2 , H3 a and H8 . The explained variation of computer use is 42,5%. The results show that home environment (β = 0.421, p < 0.001), school environment (β = 0.317, p < 0.05) and interest motivations (β = 0.124, p < 0.05) are statistically significant and have a positive influence on computer use, thus hypotheses H4 a, H5 a and H6 a are supported. The model explains 35.8% of computer self-efficacy. The home environment construct (β = 0.200, p < 0.01), interest motivations (β = - 0.156, p < 0.05), and employment motivations (β = 0.217, p < 0.01) are statistically significant however, home environment and employment motivation show a positive influence on computer self-efficacy, supporting hypotheses H4 c, H7 a and interest motivations show a negative influence on computer self-efficacy where we expected a positive influence, rejecting H6 c.

The model explains 31.1% of students' academic achievement. Enjoyment attitudes (β = - 0.162, p < 0.05), employment motivations (β = 0.183, p < 0.05), computer use (β = 0.257, p < 0.05), loneliness (β = - 0.150, p < 0.05) and mother's education (β = 0.135, p < 0.05) are statistically significant in explaining academic achievement, supporting the hypotheses, H3 b, H7 b, H11 , H13 and H16 . We reject respective hypotheses H5 b and H6 b respectively, despite school environment (β = - 0.246, p < 0.001) and interest motivations (β = - 0.159, p < 0.05), being statistically significant, because we suggested that school environment and interest motivations would positively influence academic achievement, and the results observe a negative influence. Educational attitudes (β = -0.003, p > 0.05), home environment (β = 0.100, p > 0.05), computer confidence (0.105, p > 0.05) and parental marital status (β = 0.067, p > 0.05) show a non-significant effect on explaining academic achievement, rejecting H1 b, H4 b, H10 and H15 . The moderation effect of computer self-efficacy in employment motivations (β = 0.108, p < 0.05) is statistically significant, supporting H12 . The moderation effect of family size on school environment (β = 0.141, p < 0.05) and on computer use (β = - 0.233, p < 0.01) is statistically significant, supporting H14 a and H14 b.

Table 2 summarises the research hypotheses results. We can conclude that 17 of the 25 proposed hypotheses were supported.

Table 2

Research hypotheses results.

Notes: n.a. - not applicable; ∗ significant at p < 0.05; ∗∗ significant at p < 0.01; ∗∗∗ significant at p < 0.001.

5. Discussion

This research model contributes to and extends the literature review on computers and academic achievement. This study relates academic achievement with loneliness, family and computer-related variables such as computer confidence, computer self-efficacy, computer attitudes, computer learning motivations and computer learning environments.

The results show that educational and enjoyment computer attitudes positively influence computer confidence, while stereotype attitudes negatively influence it. We expected this negative relation regarding stereotypes since there are the same results regarding stereotypes on gender and age ( Punter et al., 2017 ), although similar results concerning stereotypes on computer users have not yet been found. As for the influence of attitudes on academic achievement, educational computer attitudes do not have a statistically significant relationship with academic achievement. On the other hand, enjoyable computer attitudes have a significant negative impact on academic achievement, which leads us to conclude that there is no relation between computers as an educational tool and academic achievement. In fact, apart from some specific high school vocational courses oriented to computing skills, most classes happen in a classic lecture setting and rely mostly on textbook manuals as learning tools, which can help explain the results regarding educational computer attitude. However, using computers for recreational purposes negatively influences students' academic achievement, as similar results have already been observed - students who play more video games have a lower achievement ( Tang and Patrick, 2018 ). Two possible reasons can explain this phenomenon. First, because young adults are so engaged and skilled with technology use for game playing and social media that they do not make the best use of these skills for academic purposes, for instance ( Gurung and Rutledge, 2014 ) and second, because excessive use and multitasking can lead to distractions and lack of time to study ( Rashid and Asghar, 2016 ).

The construct computer use, measured as the frequency of use, positively impacts computer confidence and academic achievement. Thus, the greater the use of computers, the more confident students are while using them, and so the more use of the computer, the better the performance achieved. Several other studies contradict the negative influence verified between school environment and academic achievement ( Bayrak and Bayram, 2010 ; Carle et al., 2009 ; Murillo-Zamorano et al., 2019 ). However, this can be explained by the rapid development of computer technology and the massive use of computers at home compared to the lack of use at school due to schools' technology being obsolete, and students preferring the home environment.

The results demonstrate that computer use works as a full mediator for home environment and academic achievement since there is no relation between home environment and academic achievement, contrary to another study ( Fairlie et al., 2010 ). However, with computer use as a mediator, we suggest that the home environment influences academic achievement when computer use increases since there is a positive relation between home environment and computer use ( Hsu and Huang, 2006 ), i.e., students who use a computer at home have better results. Also, computer use works as a partial mediator for the school environment and academic achievement. Hence, we suggest that, although the use of computers at school already directly (but negatively) influences students' performance, computer use mediates this relation positively. This effect is likely due to the fact that even though there is an effort to implement digital transformation in the education sector, there is still a lack of computers at schools: most students do not have easy access to computers in school (high schools in Portugal have an average 4.2 students per computer), but those who use them benefit on their grades. These results allow us to confirm our second contribution, the investigation of the mediation effect of computer use between the factors identified and academic achievement. The mediation results are shown in Table 3 .

Table 3

Hypotheses testing on mediation.

Note: ∗ |t|> 1.96 and p-value = 0.05.; ∗∗ |t| > 2.57 and p-value = 0.01; ∗∗∗ |t| > 3.291 and p-value = 0.001.

Regarding motivations, interest motivation impacts computer use positively, as concluded by other similar findings ( Rohatgi et al., 2016 ), i.e. the more interested students are in computers, the more they use them. Nonetheless, it negatively influences academic achievement and computer self-efficacy, concluding that the bigger the interest motivation, the more the use of computers but the lower the achievement and the computer self-efficacy. These two negative relations are quite controversial compared to the literature. However, it may mean that the more interest in computers, the more use for recreational purposes, negatively impacting academic achievement ( Rashid and Asghar, 2016 ). The more interest students have in computers, the more knowledge of using the devices, and the perceived efficacy starts to decrease. Thus further research is needed to draw any conclusions on this.

Computer confidence has a strong positive effect on computer self-efficacy, meaning that the perceived computer self-efficacy increases when the confidence in the device is higher, as stated in similar findings ( Hatlevik and Bjarnø, 2021 ). Although, we cannot conclude there is a relation between computer confidence and academic achievement. All the previous results allow us to reflect on the influence that the computer-related variables studied have on the student performance, contributing with data for future research and confirming our first contribution of the study.

The loneliness construct, used as a measure of coronavirus effects, negatively influenced academic achievement, as expected. While students were in lockdown having remote classes, without any presential contact with their school, teachers, and colleagues, the feeling of loneliness and isolation negatively impacted their performance indeed, as observed in our results. These results confirm our contribution to understanding how the COVID-19 pandemic influences students’ academic achievement. Recent studies found negative impacts of loneliness ( Roy et al., 2020 ) on students, demonstrating the importance of cooperating with colleagues ( Torres-Díaz et al., 2016 ). However, there are yet no results of the direct impact of loneliness deriving from the pandemic on academic achievement.

There are three moderation hypotheses using family size and computer self-efficacy. From the family size moderator, we can conclude that family size influences the relation between school environment and academic achievement. In Figure 3 , we can see that when the family size decreases, the negative impact the school environment has on academic achievement increases, suggesting that the smaller the family, the students tend to have worse grades when studying in a school environment. Regarding family size in the relation between computer use and academic achievement, shown in Figure 4 , when the family size decreases, computer use is more important to explain academic achievement because when the family is small, students need to use the computer more to achieve better results. Relating to the computer self-efficacy moderator, in Figure 5 , it impacts the relationship between employment motivations and academic achievement positively, meaning that the better students perceive their computer self-efficacy, the stronger positive impact employment motivation has on academic achievement. This effect can be explained due to the increase of technological jobs: students who feel more capable in their computer skills (with a higher computer self-efficacy) and are more motivated to pursue a technological career have higher academic achievement. These results allow us to confirm our second contribution, the investigation of the moderation effect family size and computer self-efficacy.

Structural model (variance-based technique) for academic achievement.

In this study, we found that marital status does not have any effect on academic achievement, but mothers' education has a positive impact on students' achievement, reinforcing the literature ( Abosede and Akintola, 2016 ).

5.1. Practical implications

Academic achievement is a widely topic studied because there is an ongoing concern for understanding the factors that lead to better academic achievements. Since students practically depend on computers for school nowadays, we tried to relate the most studied computer variables in the literature with academic achievement, expecting results that answer the gaps identified in the literature. To our knowledge, no study has yet provided a conclusion on the influence of loneliness provoked by the COVID-19 pandemic on academic achievement, neither of interest and employment motivations on AA. Moreover, there is no consensus in the literature on the influence of the use of computers for fun and academic performance. We can contribute to the literature with the answers to these questions: students who feel lonely have worse academic achievement, students motivated by an interest in computers have worse academic achievement and students motivated by the expectation of having a good job have better grades. Also, enjoyable computer attitudes negatively influence academic achievement, so the students who find the computer a good tool for recreational purposes have worse grades.

Contrary to the literature, we found that computer confidence does not influence academic achievement; apart from this, we concur with the available results published by other researchers. There are clear positive implications on using computers in education, and consequently, in students' outcomes. Therefore, teachers and parents should encourage using computers in adolescents' education to improve their school performance and future.

5.2. Limitations and further research

The present study has some limitations that point to future research directions on the role of students' academic achievement and its predictors. First, the data collected does not have sufficient diversity in country dispersity and gender balance since most participants were girls hailing from Portugal. Also, better results can be obtained with a more significant sample. Secondly, the fact that we are going through a pandemic forced schools and students to attend classes online, which on the one hand, is an advantage because it provides the opportunity to study loneliness deriving from the pandemic. On the other hand, it could bias the students' answers to the questionnaire and the subsequent results because their opinion on computers could have changed during home-schooling compared to the usual previous schooling method since the literature is related to regular presential school attendance.

In further research, other factors regarding loneliness should be studied to understand the impact of coronavirus on students' lives better, comparing pre-pandemic and pandemic daily computer usage. Other factors such as addiction to technology should be analysed.

6. Conclusions

This study proposes a theoretical model on the influence of several computer factors on the academic achievement of high school students. The results, in general, empirically support the literature in similar findings. The proposed conceptual model explains 31.1% of academic achievement. We found that students who use computers for recreational purposes or feel that a computer is a tool to "pass the time" or play games are those who have the worst grades. We can conclude this through the negative relation between enjoyment attitudes and academic achievement. Nevertheless, there is no relation between students who perceive computers as an educational tool and their academic achievement. We believe this conclusion results from how teenagers use their computers and smartphones excessively, not prioritising the use for school, leading to the observed results. Our results also show that there are still stereotypes about who uses computers most. Respondents believe that peers who play sports do not have the same likelihood of using computers excessively, and those that frequently use computers are not sociable. This mindset leads to less confidence in computers.

A significant conclusion was found regarding the computer use environment, though the mediation effect of computer use. When students use the computer at home, they need to use it frequently to influence their academic achievement, but when students use the computer at school, it will influence their academic achievement positively independently of the frequency of use. However, the frequency of computer use itself influences academic achievement. As we expected, the feelings of loneliness associated with the coronavirus negatively influence students' academic achievement, an important new conclusion in the literature. The moderation effect on family size allows us to conclude that students with a smaller family tend to have worse grades when studying in a school environment and need to use computers more to have better school results than those in larger families. Moreover, the moderation effect on computer self-efficacy lets us conclude that students who perceive better computer self-efficacy, have better grades and academic achievement is influenced by employment motivation.

Declarations

Author contribution statement.

Sofia Simões: Conceived and designed the experiments; Performed the experiments; Analyzed and interpreted the data; Contributed reagents, materials, analysis tools or data; Wrote the paper.

Tiago Oliveira: Conceived and designed the experiments; Analyzed and interpreted the data; Contributed reagents, materials, analysis tools or data; Wrote the paper.

Catarina Nunes Analyzed and interpreted the data; Wrote the paper.

Funding statement

This work was supported by FCT (Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia) under project DSAIPA/DS/0032/2018 (DS4AA).

Data availability statement

Declaration of interests statement.

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Additional information

No additional information is available for this paper.

Appendix A. Constructs table

Notes: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10 Range scale from 1 (Strongly Disagree) to 5 (Strongly Agree); 8 Range scale from 1 (Never) to 5 (Everyday); 11 Ordinal Scale (Hardly ever, some of the time, often); 12 Ratio scale from 0 to 20 (number); 13 Nominal scale (number); 14 Nominal scale (married, divorced, in a domestic partnership, widowed, other); 15 Ordinal scale (less than high school, high school or equivalent, bachelor's degree, master's degree, doctorate, other); 16 Ratio scale (number); 17 Nominal scale (male, female).

Appendix B. Descriptive statistics, correlation, composite reliability (CR), and average variance extracted (AVE)

Note: Values in diagonal (bold) are the AVE square root.

Appendix C. Outer Loadings and Cross-Loadings

Appendix D. Heterotrait-Monotrait Ratio (HTMT)

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Ielts essay # 1222 - negative impacts of children playing computer games, ielts writing task 2/ ielts essay:, nowadays many people have access to computers on a wide basis and a large number of children play computer games., what are the negative impacts of children playing computer games what can be done to minimize the bad effects of children playing computer games.

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• PTE Sample Essay 19 – The Use of Computer

Using a computer every day can have more negative than positive effects on your children. Do you agree or disagree? Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience. 

Technology, for the past few decades, has been the driving force behind mankind’s progress by leaps and bounds in almost every field. Technology, along with the information which it brings, has become an integral part of not only adults but children are also becoming avid users of computers, handheld devices and other gadgets. Although the new generation is becoming more aware of day to day happenings, access of everything brings divergent results as well.

Firstly, abuse of computers by youngsters has led them to waste their time on needless tasks rather than using computers in an efficient way. Facebook and other social media sites have played a devastating role in harming the overall working of an effective society. Children now like to spend hours of their precious time posting and reading useless material. They have access to every kind of information, which is causing children to view restricted content as well.

Secondly and more importantly, computers have barred children from engaging in physical activity as well. Children now prefer to limit themselves in their rooms and want to be lost in the fantasies of the online world. This leads children to be ostracized from today’s social happenings and is turning them into social outliers. I know many of my friends who play games, engage in digital social gatherings and wasting their useful time in mind numbing activities

Changes, in fact mind boggling ones, are taking place at societal level, where the balance of a child’s growth is being seriously challenged. This can be averted through proper control and dedication of parents towards their children. Useful things can become detrimental if employed at a wrong stage.

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Negative Effects Of Computers And Computer Use On The Environment

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