With the advance in technology these days, more and more children, teenagers, and adults can't help but get their hands on the latest gadgets such as the new model of iPhone or the latest gaming console. There are many types of technology addiction, some people can be addicted to gaming, computers, internet, iPods or MP3 players and maybe even their own TV. While some of these advancements in technology may seem great, everything comes with a price. In the bigger picture, these wonderful, new products aren't as great as they may seem; they are causing many problems in today's society. For example, it makes getting your hands on illegal music, games, movies etc. so much easier, it may make people more distracted and make them procrastinate more. But there's one problem that's spreading like wildfire; technology addiction.
Technology addiction is defined as an excessive use of technology. This excessive use may lead to some people becoming more angry, tense, or depressed, it may have negative impacts on their behaviour such as lack of sleep, becoming anti-social, lying, having trouble in their school or workplace or they may have fatigue. It's so serious that psychologists have said that it has some of the same effects that gambling and drugs have on our brain. Some examples of problems might be:
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A teenager or child, who has almost always had fantastic grades, has been having trouble concentrating in school and has had their grades drop drastically because they've been watching too many TV shows instead of doing homework.
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An adult stayed up until 3am to finish watching a whole season of her favourite show and has had many near-collisions with cars on the way to work.
These are just some negative effects that technology addiction can have. It's affecting people in many different ways that we may or may not see.
Technology addiction is a becoming a problem in today’s society and is becoming viral. In an article written by Amanda Lenhart in 2005 it said: “The number of teenagers using the internet has grown 24% in the past four years and 87% of those between the ages of 12 and 17 are online.”
If that happened in 2005, what’s it like now? With the rising rate of advancements in technology these days there’s no telling how out-of-hand this addiction problem will get. Technology among teenagers is really disrupting the effect on children’s learning. According to a new research published by Cranfield School of Management, 39.3% of 11-18 year olds that were approached in a survey said that using text language had a negative effect on their English, mostly in spelling. A lot of the students (59.2% of them actually) also admitted that they copied and pasted lots of information from the internet into the schoolwork without even making an attempt to read it or change it. And almost a third of those children also thought that it was acceptable to do even though they knew that it was plagiarism. Some addicts even think that using technology is more important than interacting with people face-to-face.
Instead of just affecting people academically, this fast-spreading addiction also affects people socially and in their health. It alters how someone’s brain functions immensely. Researchers have compared normal brain scans with brain scans of people with IAD and found that there was damage to the "white matter fibres" that are responsible for connecting emotional processing, attention, and decision making parts. So basically, if there's damage to you white matter fibres in your brain, you will find it harder to concentrate, focus, and affects your emotional processing which means that it makes your feelings operate oddly than "normal" people (to put it simply).
Studies show that at least 64% of people spend about 4 hours on the computer daily. Watching television has also been linked to making the rates of diabetes and obesity going up. Some effects of tech addiction may be:
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It affects people in their work, making them procrastinate or unable to concentrate.
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School, makes them less social, less focused in their schoolwork.
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It may affect their relationships with friends or family or make it harder for them to make new friends.
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They may experience loss of sleep
Technology addiction is not “just a phase”. It’s real, it’s happening, and it’s spreading like a virus. But there is something you can do to help those who are affected, even if that person is yourself.
Before you start trying to just head straight in, let me tell you; IT'S NOT THAT SIMPLE! So the first thing you must do if you're trying to help someone is to have them admit that they have a problem or else it's not going to work as well. If they can admit to just that then you can start the process by taking the problem on face-to-face. Here are some tips that can possibly help:
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Choose outdoor activities instead of technology
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Limit your use of technology
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Set aside some treading time
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Create DIY projects for yourself
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Ask others to help you with your problem
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Make time limits when using your technology
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Set aside some electronic-free time
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Make a list of things you could do instead of being on your device and try to do them in your spare time.
Here are some other sites that can help those with technology addiction:
Andrea Tejada