Apple shareholders push for study of phone addiction in children • Hacker News Board

Re: Apple shareholders push for study of phone addiction in children

#111

Post by musage » Mon, Jan 08, 2018, 6:20 AM UTC

mistercow wrote: post #96

musage wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But we're soley not operating on "extreme suspicions because something is new" here. The letter does cite some studies, for starters. And you're mixing up "haven't always borne out exactly as predicted by the most worried people" and "have never borne out". There was a time when using x-ray machines in shoe shops seemed totally benign, like a fun, useful thing. Suspicions about that "new thing" as well as others were…

>The letter does cite some studies, for starters. Sure, but surely these suspicions would exist anyway. The fact that we're probably thinking about this because of some bias is important to note, because that bias is likely to continue affecting people's thinking moving forward. >And you're mixing up "haven't always borne out exactly as predicted by the most worried people" and "have never borne out". I don't think I…

> doesn't necessarily mean that "new things kids like are especially likely to be bad" is a good heuristic

That heuristic is a strawman. Who employs it? Quote someone, I doubt you can. And then there's the countless new things kids like that nobody on the planet says a peep about, how do those figure in?

As for "heuristics", consider the notion that if kids like something new and untested en masse, they themselves may not be able to discern what is going on, so adults need to pay attention. Full stop, that's before getting into the actual signs that this particular issue might not be all peachy.

A study is just a study. You can hardly fearmonger about Apple sponsoring studies that skew the results against mobile devices. So why does this thread even exist? Because FUD exists, and even though this isn't FUD, it needs to be pre-emptively countered by false assurances in the form of memes?

Last but not least, it's not as if "let's study X" is how it used to be said... so to imply the equation "let's study X" == "X is of the devil for sure!" shouldn't slip under the radar the way it does.

Re: Apple shareholders push for study of phone addiction in children

#112

Post by scotty79 » Mon, Jan 08, 2018, 6:24 AM UTC

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #90

thomastjeffery wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If my parents had limited my amount of time spent using a computer or paying video games, I would never have gone down the path that led me to here. I have extended family who have done this, and the difference is palpable.

Me too, but back then, computers required much more intellectual work to get some satisfaction out of them. Today, you can just consume intensively on an iPad, and never learn anything about computers.

I have a childhood friend who played as much on the computer as I did. He even wrote some simple games himself (as I did) but he is not a software developer now and I am. You can give hundred kids lego technic and most of them won't become engineers.

Re: Apple shareholders push for study of phone addiction in children

#113

Post by chc » Mon, Jan 08, 2018, 6:25 AM UTC

thomastjeffery wrote: post #82

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Limiting device usage electronically or physically is a far cry away from snooping on your kids’ browsing or messaging histories. As far as intrusions go, this is a level 0. As a kid, we were limited by technology, so no limits were needed (SMB just wasn’t that replayable, and the TI/99 was even worse). Perhaps the solution to creativity here is to simply give your kids older computers to play with.

If my parents had limited my amount of time spent using a computer or paying video games, I would never have gone down the path that led me to here. I have extended family who have done this, and the difference is palpable.

I don't think that's so certain. My parents did limit the amount of time we could spend playing video games (IIRC two hours a day) and I still ended up here.

Re: Apple shareholders push for study of phone addiction in children

#114

Post by dwaltrip » Mon, Jan 08, 2018, 6:29 AM UTC

thomastjeffery wrote: post #82

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Limiting device usage electronically or physically is a far cry away from snooping on your kids’ browsing or messaging histories. As far as intrusions go, this is a level 0. As a kid, we were limited by technology, so no limits were needed (SMB just wasn’t that replayable, and the TI/99 was even worse). Perhaps the solution to creativity here is to simply give your kids older computers to play with.

If my parents had limited my amount of time spent using a computer or paying video games, I would never have gone down the path that led me to here. I have extended family who have done this, and the difference is palpable.

It's hard to draw vast conclusions from a few anecdotes.

My parents limited video game time, and I think they were right to do so. I still managed to become a (fairly skilled, I hope) software developer.

Re: Apple shareholders push for study of phone addiction in children

#115

Post by LastZactionHero » Mon, Jan 08, 2018, 6:31 AM UTC

iamthirsty wrote: post #74

hilyen wrote: post #73

They should be pushing for a study on neck injury / muscle strain on smart phone use. Millennials and the next gen after are going to pay dearly from injuries from bending their necks/heads down for years and years looking at their phones.

I've recently made an active effort to combat this — now I mind my posture almost obsessively.

What have you done, or what change have you made to keep posture in mind?

Re: Apple shareholders push for study of phone addiction in children

#116

Post by astura » Mon, Jan 08, 2018, 6:33 AM UTC

krisives wrote: post #84

thisisit wrote: post #81

I sometimes wonder how much of this is actually on the parents as well? I see some of my co-workers handing phones with some games to distract their child. Previously we had smaller toys - plastic etc, now it seems phones are an easier go to medium.

15 years ago it was called "VCR parenting" now we call it "tablet parenting" - People live hard and complex lives, so I'm not going to make judgment on a single parent trying to provide for their kids being unable to be a full-time entertainer as well. The good news is technology and apps are making it easier for parents to be better with less effort (which may sound harsh but is how life gets better overall)

Big difference. VCRs aren't portable. Tablets allow a kid watching a low quality YouTube video at full volume while eating at a restaurant(!) - I've seen this multiple times. You can't pull a VCR out of your pocket mid conversation.

Re: Apple shareholders push for study of phone addiction in children

#117

Post by rickycook » Mon, Jan 08, 2018, 6:33 AM UTC

ashleyn wrote: post #42

ModernMech wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've seen versions of several of these ruin people's lives very close to me. For example, I knew someone who played WOW to the detriment of his schooling, health, and social life. WOW is another product that is explicitly engineered to be addictive. The difference between then and now is cell phones and social media are consumed at a scale that affects almost everyone, to a degree that hasn't been seen before. It's w…

Soudns like a parenting mishap to me.

to be honest, this happened to me and i don’t blame my parents at all.

looking back on it, how were they to understand the difference between wow and everything else i played? it’s all the same to them.

we had frequent fights about how long i spent playing, when they’d ask me to do things in the middle of a raid (multi player coop thing; up to 40 players back then). in my head, it was incredibly important to me. now, i realise how stupid that was.

most people i think don’t realise how games can effect people mentally. to his day, 10 years later i still have dreams about my character sitting in a void, alone, asking me to come and play.

this is serious addiction, and you can’t blame parents for not understanding it.

Re: Apple shareholders push for study of phone addiction in children

#118

Post by seanmcdirmid » Mon, Jan 08, 2018, 6:35 AM UTC

scotty79 wrote: post #112

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Me too, but back then, computers required much more intellectual work to get some satisfaction out of them. Today, you can just consume intensively on an iPad, and never learn anything about computers.

I have a childhood friend who played as much on the computer as I did. He even wrote some simple games himself (as I did) but he is not a software developer now and I am. You can give hundred kids lego technic and most of them won't become engineers.

But some will. And not all those that play with them creatively will become engineers. Also, some kids who just consume iPad content will become programmers, but not because of the device. Some kid who never saw a computer before will also be men one.

That’s just how statistics work.

Re: Apple shareholders push for study of phone addiction in children

#119

Post by kriro » Mon, Jan 08, 2018, 6:50 AM UTC

dragonsky67 wrote: post #10

1950's Can we have a study of Comic Book addiction in Children. 1960's Can we have a study of Television addiction in Children. 1970's Can we have a study of Dungeons and Dragons addiction in children 1980's Can we have a study of Console game addiction in Children. 1990's Can we have a study of Computer game addiction in Children. 2000's Can we have a study of Internet addiction in Children. 2010's Can we have a stu…

The WHO actually defines addiction to video games as a (psychological) disease now in their ICD. Not sure if the new list is in effect already, my last update was "will be on the 2018 list".

I vaguely remember the Jonathan Blow video where he talked about Facebook games and how gaming companies hire psychologists to make sure that skinner rat feeling is maximized. It was pretty disturbing at the time, these days tons of games seem to be "optimized" this way. My guess is higher addiction rates are a logical conclusion. Looking at some Pokemon Go players or WoW players gives me enough anecdotal evidence to think one can get addicted t games quite quickly. Why one would expose children to this psycho-lab unsupervised...I don't know.

Re: Apple shareholders push for study of phone addiction in children

#120

Post by krisives » Mon, Jan 08, 2018, 7:08 AM UTC

trothamel wrote: post #106

For the record, these shareholders seem to control about 0.2% of apple stock.

Also consider that most big players in the game have very little incentive to reduce screen-time in a meaningful way. The more time spent on devices consuming media the more they sell from their App store.