The effects of technology: What we know for sure

by Richard L. Weaver II

Nobody questions the omnipresence of technological innovations. All you need to do is look around to see cell phone usage, listen to television advertisements, or watch the changes in cellphone bells and whistles in newspaper advertisements. According to one 2008 study reported at HarrisInteractive in an essay, “Cell Phone Usage Continues to Increase,” it says, “Almost nine in ten (89%) of adults have a wireless or cell phone. This represents a significant increase from 77 percent in October – December 2006 when The Harris Poll conducted a similar analysis.”

When Barack Obama became President and because of a habit developed before his ascension, he popularized and widely advertised the BlackBerry, and in a section of Newsweek (February 16, 2009), called “Technology,” online at Newsweek.com, the essay by Sharon Begley called, “Will the BlackBerry sink the presidency?,” reported on the potential effects of technology (i.e., the BlackBerry), but, in doing so, clearly identified the essential problems everyone encounters through the use of the BlackBerry and similar technologies (e.g., pop-ups, e-mail alerts, calendar reminders, and instant messages — “the most intrusive and ubiquitous pre-BlackBerry technologies,” according to her). Begley suggests there are 21 million BlackBerry users (and the number is rapidly increasing because of the President’s free promotion).

It is important to understand these problems simply because understanding is the first step in trying to overcome, compensate for, or eliminate them. Of course, you may choose your technology over having these problems (or, because you like the escape!), but at least you will be aware and sensitive. From just a cursory examination, they make good sense. Let’s call them — only for the purposes of identification — distraction/interruption, the myth of multitasking, and creative inhibition.

The distraction/interruption element isn’t guesswork. This has been widely confirmed by experts in cognitive psychology and human-machine interactions. They have labeled it “distraction overload.” Does it matter to you that you cannot focus exclusively on any thought or perception for long? Does it matter to you that you cannot work straight through to completion on anything? That’s fine, of course, if the tasks you are involved in do not require your full attention — commitment of your entire brain. As Begley notes, “How damaging an interruption is depends on when it occurs” (p. 37).

In a study led by Brian Bailey of the University of Illinois, it was discovered — again, what I would call affirmation of common sense — that (in Begley’s words), “If you answer the BlackBerry’s call at natural breakpoints, you’re much more likely to be able to take in the e-mail and then resume what you were doing without that ‘where was I? ’ brain lock’” (p. 37). But, what happens when there are no natural breakpoints?

Gloria Mark, professor of informatics at the University of California, Irvine, found that average workers (in Begley’s words), spend “only 11 minutes on any given project before being interrupted and asked to do something else. IT workers have it worse, switching attention every three minutes, on average” (p. 37).

The President has certainly raised the social and cultural cachet of the BlackBerry, and it has been nicknamed CrackBerry for good reason. It is far more seductive than any e-mail alert ever was. “The ‘I have to be reachable,’ mantra is irresistible, and it makes everyone feel not just important to others (any others) but essential to their survival. When the light comes on or the BlackBerry beeps or buzzes, people stop everything they are doing to worship at its temple.

So, the BlackBerry impairs higher cognitive functions such as decision making and problem solving. In a 2007 study by scientists at Microsoft Research and the University of Illinois, they found it takes people 15 minutes “to productively resume a challenging task when they are interrupted (Begley’s words)” (p. 38). That is the time it takes to reactivate memory and refocus cognitive resources. In the meantime, according to a scientific study in Finland in 2004, the interruption can create memory loss and decreased memory accuracy.

There is more going on, too, than interruptions. People will often claim that along with responding to their BlackBerry they can surf the Internet, listen to a conversation, watch television, respond to e-mail messages, answer letters, or engage in other projects or activities at the same time — multi-tasking. This is something else we know for sure. It cannot happen.

The key to understanding this myth is in the phrase: “Only one thing can be predominant in your attention span at any one time.” Psychologists have long known that what appears like giving partial attention to a variety of things “is actually rapid-fire switching of attention among tasks (Begley’s words)” (p. 38). Why is this an important point to understand? Because you are not, and cannot, absorb information from a variety of sources at the same time. Depending on how much is going on, you switch your attention. And depending on how important any single stimulus is, you switch slowly or rapidly. What this means is that you are going to miss some information. You cannot get all aspects of a conversation while attending to your BlackBerry. In this state of mind (when multi-tasking), “you don’t process information as fully and are not using your frontal lobe effectively” (Begley’s words), says Mary Czerwinski of Microsoft Research. The only way to resolve this is to put the BlackBerry down and listen with all your attention.

Disruptions or interruptions plus the problems created by multi-tasking are two issues about which we know for sure. A third issue is creativity. Creativity requires that the brain brings together unrelated facts and thoughts, and this often occurs during mental downtime even daydreaming — when problems are not commanding conscious attention. A BlackBerry commands continuous conscious attention (that, along with other technologies). In a study conducted by Teresa Amabile of Harvard Business School, she found, in Begley’s words, “that fragmentation of attention . . . impeded creativity” (p. 38).

Whether it is the disruption or interruption that causes the problem, the quick switching between various tasks when momentary attention to one thing and then another can create information or input gaps, or the negative effect it can have on creativity, the one thing we know for certain is, technology such as BlackBerry use can have detrimental effects — sometimes serious ones. Many addicts or constant users have discovered the key: turn it off during crucial times, because it impairs concentration and can make you miss key information.
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At YahooAnswers, there are a number of different answers to the question, “What are some negative effects of technology on people's mental abilities?,” that should give people who rely on various forms of technology pause. At the very least, they should make you think about your choices.

Rhett Smith, a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist Associate, offers a great perspective and sound advice in the essay entitled, “Affirmation: One of Technology’s Negative Effects on Your Marriage and Family.”

This is a short, enjoyable essay, “MIT Sloan study asks: Does BlackBerry equal 'CrackBerry' or career essential?,” in which the authors, Sarah Foote, MIT Sloan School of Management, and Michelle Choate, MIT Sloan School of Management, citing the work by Melissa Mazmanian, a doctoral student at the time, state, “What she has found to date is that BlackBerry use has a large impact on the workplace landscape, affecting expectations of work turnaround, employee availability, personal interactions and the increasingly rare notion of free time. Of course, like society in general, many of the people in the research study claim they have become "addicted" to using their BlackBerrys--thus the moniker ‘CrackBerry.’”
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Copyright March, 2009 - And Then Some Publishing L.L.C.