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Is technology harmful to mental health essay
Psychological effect of technology
Psychological effect of technology
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Technological advancement has come with a price—our focus. Maggie Jackson in her article “A Nation Distracted” explains that technology has promoted a culture of distraction in America. First, the author explains that technology is causing us to engage in more multitasking, which leads to more time spent on completing our tasks. Second, the author notes that studies show that youth and children are adept at using technology, but are deficient in their critical thinking skills, and properly investigating and using the internet. I feel that the author makes an important point when discusses technology is leading to widespread distraction in our society. However I feel that mindfulness might be a way to address this issue because allows us When I come home from a tiring day at work, I lie down to rest, but soon after my iPad and iPhone both start ringing to alert me of emails, text messages, phone application updates, and others responding to my social media statuses. So, I take nearly an hour to respond to read and respond to my emails and text messages. Next, I log into my social media accounts (i.e. Twitter and Facebook) and check my notifications, respond to these notifications, and usually someone sends me a message via Facebook, and a long conversation commences. Afterwards, I might spend an hour playing a game called Bubble Witch Saga on my iPhone, thinking that I have to keep playing to achieve level 700—I am only on level 112. By the time I escape all these distractions, I noticed that I haven’t called my girlfriend and I haven’t eaten dinner or completed any house chores. My example confirms the author’s point about how many people are unfocused and distracted as a result of technological distractions. Despite the constant distraction and sad state of our focus, I feel that one important way of addressing this issue is practicing mindfulness. This means that we focus exclusively on one task, including all the minor details – avoiding any outside distractions. I learned in my reading and writing class that people who practice mindfulness can increase their ability to focus, and even reduce their stress. Therefore, I feel that people can start embracing a mindful mindset
As human beings, it is becoming more of a second nature to us to multi-task. As the world is technologically advancing more and more every day, there are becoming more distractions. Social-media is flourishing, reality TV show ratings are going up, and humans even unintentionally check their phones every two minutes. In this day of age, multi-tasking is proving to promote inefficiency rather than productivity.
Technology is getting more and more advanced. It is impressive that what back in the day people would make an extra effort to study, work, or to leave a certain habit. Mark Bittman mentions “It takes different formats for different people, and you have to build up to it; you can’t run five miles if you’ve never run at all (page 3).” Everyone needs courage to fight this addiction and if we preserve, we might defeat this horrible situation. In my personal experience, I’ve always said if you want something, you must give something in return. If we want peace, we need to absent ourselves from making any bad decision. If we want to take vacations, we will need to give time and get money at work. In this case if we want to be free from this terrible addiction, we need to put apart any electronic device little by little. Although, many people think that it is not necessary to leave our phones apart to have peace, other people who have practiced different methods to find inter peace affirms that putting any technology apart had a huge impact in their lives. Even though, Mark Bittman it is not a spiritual person, he found personal peace by making time to relieve his soul. If we give ourselves some more personal space and practice the beautiful hobby of a virtual break, we will find ourselves in a better
In the article, “Multitasking Can Make You Lose…Um…Focus,” Alina Tugend centralizes around the negative effects of multitasking. She shows that often with multitasking, people tend to lose focus, lack work quality, have an increase in stress, and in the end she gives a solution to all these problems. Tugend conveys her points by using understandable language, a clear division of subjects, and many reliable sources, making her article cogent.
In the article,“Multitasking is actually kind of a problem for kids and adults” by Hayley Tsukayama the author went into detail about how parents and their children view their personal media habits. One of the ways that the parents and children viewed their media habits as was feeling the need to respond to texts and notifications immediately. “More than 1,200 parents and teens surveyed, 48 percent of parents and 72 percent of teens said they felt the need to respond to texts and notifications immediately, almost guaranteeing distractions throughout the day” (Tsukayama). This article can be connected to “The Epidemic of Media Multitasking While Learning” both of the articles discussed the different factors of media multitasking among individuals. The article from The Washington Post website gave great insight on multitasking and rather it is bad for students when it comes to learning. I believe that the issue being discussed is very relevant because if students are easily distracted by technology while in their learning environment it results in them not learning
In “Attached to Technology and Paying a Price” (part of the New York Times’ “Your Brain on Computers” series), journalist Matt Richtel details technology’s effects on an actual family and recounts their experiences. Although Drs. Restak and Samuel are both widely respected in their individual fields, Mr. Richtel’s journalistic career has been almost exclusively devoted to studying technology’s impact on our lives and attention, and his views are voiced loudly throughout his work, even though they are not explicitly stated. In the course of reading “Attention Deficit”, it can feel at times as if Dr. Restak had come to the conclusion that technology is damaging to our brains and our personal lives long before putting pen to paper, then proceeded to search for evidence to back up his viewpoint.
This insight correlates with the above insight in that I often use homework, which is productive, as a distraction for homework that is more pressing. In addition to using homework as a distraction, Facebook, texting/Snapchat, and side conversations are also distractions that occur on a regular basis. I found that during the time I reserve for more important things, such as homework or spending time with others, I will absentmindedly pick up my phone and become distracted for an extended period of time. It may start with simply replying to a text message and then somehow, I end up on Facebook and its an hour later. The detracts from my flourishing because I am not longer giving my full attention to the things that matter, completing assignments which is helping me work toward my greatest good, or contributing to building my relationships, for the same reason. Something that I have done to combat this form of spiritual apathy is to delete Facebook off my phone and keep my phone on silent, unless I am anticipating a phone call. I feel like for the few short days I have been implementing these things, I already feel more present in my relationships and tasks. I complete tasks faster because I do not have several “breaks” from the habit of checking my phone, and the time that I spending with my family and friends is of greater quality because if I lead by example of keeping my phone
Google defines distraction three ways, but before I could read through them all, the google image of the 2016 Doodle Fruit Games caught my attention, and I had to click on it. Distractions are everywhere. From phones to computers to televisions and the Internet, disturbances make up daily life. The real question is not how to avoid these disturbances as they surround our life. Rather, the question is: Can these distractions be defined as hysteria and madness, as interruptions and hindrances, or as amusement and entertainment?
He observes that his mind has been changing with the use of the internet and that computers are diminishing his capacity for concentration and contemplation (Carr 315). He effectively expresses his feelings that longer attention spans are being replaced by more instant-gratification demanding mindsets. It’s with these newfound mindsets that Carr expresses concern that the human psyche is becoming little more than robotic algorithms incapable of reflection, deep critical thinking, problem solving, or imagination (Carr 327). Furthermore, Carr’s concern with how technology affects our ability to think has been echoed in research specific to
Body #1: Digital technology and social media are damaging our daily routine. In the article “The risk and rewards of being an adolescent in the digital age” by Madeline J. George and Candice L Odgers they say, “4 out of 5 adolescent mobile phone owners report sleeping with there phones in or near their bed.” This statistic really proves to us that these phones are really damaging our daily routine because we are so addicted to our phones we can’t stop being around them. Digital technology and social media are starting to slowly take over our lives and are now becoming additional distractions to our daily lives because we are so focused on them and not the things that are going on around us. Lev Grossman also talks about this in his article, when he states that he is also putting in too much time into his phone also. The reason he says this is because his phone is set to update his emails once every sixty seconds so he won’t miss out
Electronics can cause us to be distracted, and the results of these distractions cause many problems toward our lives. The author of “Is Google Making us Stupid”, Nicholas Carr, acknowledges the fact that we can’t do any deep thinking with the distractions that technology provides. He explains, “Deep thinking, scientists have discovered, happens only when our minds are calm and attentive.” On technology our minds aren’t calm and attentive. Therefore, we can’t do deep thinking. The author also addresses the fact that when we are distracted, we don’t understand as much, we learn less, and we remember less things. The text “Attached to Technology and Paying a Price, “ by Matt Richtel offers another reason we should shut down our screens, and
One problem that results from cellular technology is distraction. Cellphones, which have evolved to smartphones no longer, are ...
As part of this assignment I had to summarize the article Brain, Interrupted. This article discussed how technology can be a distraction, but through research it was concluded that you can train your brain to expect the distraction, even when you don’t know when it is coming. I agree with the part of technology causing distractions and I have yet to trained my brain to expect these distractions.
Technology is a terrible joy that has been implemented into our modern society in order for people to create memories, communicate and, to prosper. The use of technology is on the rise causing people to disassociate themselves from the real world which can cause a strain on relationships and the environment. In Richard Restak’s Attention Deficit and Alexandra Samuel’s Plug In Better: A Manifesto both these articles explain the negative impacts that technology has on our minds, the effect it has on our surroundings as well as giving us insight as to why we should disconnect from technology. Due to the constant urge to use technology we yield to set boundaries in which we become heavily involved with what we do online rather than focusing on
A beautiful commercial, “Disconnect to Connect”, which was made by Thailand DTAC Company, shows that there are many people always focusing on their cell phones. The commercial shows a man ignoring his girlfriend who is walking with him on the beach, another man neglecting his friends who are playing piano, and a father overlooking his children who are playing around. Then, they smile and find the happiness of life after they turn off their digital devices. These things happen constantly around us every day. Nowadays, the functions of digital devices are stronger, and our eyes and fingers contribute more time on it. There is no doubt that the digital devices make our life more convenient and easier because people can connect with each other immediately. Nonetheless, people should not spend too much time on digital devices for three main reasons: having less face-to-face communication, depriving people’s brains of needed downtime, and negatively influencing people’s health.
way that can be a distraction, will be set aside and focus only on what is important.