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Almost half of British teens feel addicted to social media – study

theguardian.com

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Re: Almost half of British teens feel addicted to social media – study

#41

Post by cj »

ethanbond wrote: post #21
reedf1 wrote: post #7

When did we lose the moral authority to make things illegal for minors? I believe in 50-100 years it will be a worldwide scandal that these skinner boxes were ever given to children let alone adults. AI optimised attention slideshow that likely drains you neurochemically and disrupts your reward circuitry the same way heroin or ecstasy does? On paper this shit should clearly be regulated.

One contributing factor is the surprisingly recent meme that corporations exist solely for the benefit of their shareholders. It’s a totally ahistoric and obviously antisocial meme that gets repeated like it’s gospel, even by otherwise intelligent people. This perspective should be literally laughed at and made fun of as a moral system suitable only for the greediest and most myopic among us.

Interesting article on this topic:

https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2019/02/11/towards-accountab...

Re: Almost half of British teens feel addicted to social media – study

#42

Post by vidarh »

aeraea wrote: post #3

[dead]

They've also not talked to any kids and tried to ascertain which proportion of the kids involved 1) see it as a problem, and/or 2) exhibit behavior that suggests it might be a problem. It's pure speculation until they've actually asked follow-up questions. An article about the results of Dr Rich, quoted towards the end, sounds like it'd have had far more meat on it, but given it's The Guardian they'd lose the hook of it being about "almost half of British teens".

Re: Almost half of British teens feel addicted to social media – study

#43

Post by Swizec »

ImAnAmateur wrote: post #9

> “Social media research has largely assumed that [so-called] social media addiction is going to follow the same framework as drug addiction,” said Turner. Orben’s team and others argue that this is likely to be oversimplistic and are investigating whether the teenagers cluster into groups whose behaviour can be predicted by other personality traits. > It could be that, for some, their relationship is akin to a behav…

> Instead of simply abstaining from using my phone, I put time into activities

My relationship with social media, even HackerNews, really clicked when a meme (oh irony) said: ”You’re like a tiger in a cage. You know how they pace in circles when their enclosures lack enrichment? That’s you bouncing around apps on your phone”

Haven’t quite figured out how to reliably stop that, but it’s true that when there’s enough enrichment, I can go days forgetting that my phone and the internet even exist.

Re: Almost half of British teens feel addicted to social media – study

#44

Post by andy_ppp »

vidarh wrote: post #33
andy_ppp wrote: post #6

Can we switch social media off for 8 hours per day, 9-5pm maybe. I think it would make everyone happier and I bet nobody would miss it.

I would miss it. I would also make it a matter of principle to refuse if someone tried to force a shutdown on us - I've got my Mastodon and Lemmy instances, and if we were to have to go underground, we'd go underground.

I am actually not convinced the people chatting on Mastodon or Discord are addicted in the same way as YouTube and Twitter.

How about this instead, no algorithmic feeds for any 8 hours of the day you choose, so if you want a more peaceful evening you select 7pm-3am and your feed is just people you follow ordered by when they first posted.

Re: Almost half of British teens feel addicted to social media – study

#45

Post by vidarh »

andy_ppp wrote: post #44
vidarh wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would miss it. I would also make it a matter of principle to refuse if someone tried to force a shutdown on us - I've got my Mastodon and Lemmy instances, and if we were to have to go underground, we'd go underground.

I am actually not convinced the people chatting on Mastodon or Discord are addicted in the same way as YouTube and Twitter. How about this instead, no algorithmic feeds for any 8 hours of the day you choose, so if you want a more peaceful evening you select 7pm-3am and your feed is just people you follow ordered by when they first posted.

No thanks. No way. I'm working on adding algorithmic feeds to my Mastodon instance because it's the biggest issue I have with Mastodon. It's also making me spend more time because I have to scroll through a bunch of stuff I have no interest in to see the stuff I want to see.

Put another way: To me, your statement boils down to telling me I should be less social. These kinds of places are the social contact I grew up with - starting with BBS's in the early 90's onwards - and where I've met and keep in touch with most of the people I know.

I have no problem accepting some people have problems controlling their social media use, but at the same time to me talking about limiting or shutting it down is about as authoritarian and restrictive as enforcing curfew. In fact, more so - it'd affect me more negatively than being forcibly locked in my own house 8 hours a day.

Re: Almost half of British teens feel addicted to social media – study

#46

Post by ethanbond »

ndsipa_pomu wrote: post #31
ethanbond wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One contributing factor is the surprisingly recent meme that corporations exist solely for the benefit of their shareholders. It’s a totally ahistoric and obviously antisocial meme that gets repeated like it’s gospel, even by otherwise intelligent people. This perspective should be literally laughed at and made fun of as a moral system suitable only for the greediest and most myopic among us.

Isn't it an inevitable part of Capitalism though? If the directors of a corporation start acting to not maximise the shareholders profits, they'll soon be replaced or the corporation bought out by more ruthless/sociopathic people.

The emergence of this idea definitely is guaranteed, but the dominance of it isn’t. There are many countervailing forces that can and should be used, including regulation. One of the forces that I’m advocating for, as I believe it is undervalued and underutilized, is pushback at the cultural level. It is absolutely possible to build truly thriving businesses that include more stakeholders than just shareholders. Costco is a canonical large cap example, but of course there are millions of small businesses who serve their communities much more holistically.

Re: Almost half of British teens feel addicted to social media – study

#47

Post by ethanbond »

cj wrote: post #41
ethanbond wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One contributing factor is the surprisingly recent meme that corporations exist solely for the benefit of their shareholders. It’s a totally ahistoric and obviously antisocial meme that gets repeated like it’s gospel, even by otherwise intelligent people. This perspective should be literally laughed at and made fun of as a moral system suitable only for the greediest and most myopic among us.

Interesting article on this topic: https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2019/02/11/towards-accountab...

Very interesting indeed! Thank you for sharing.

Re: Almost half of British teens feel addicted to social media – study

#48

Post by reedf1 »

tenebrisalietum wrote: post #28
reedf1 wrote: post #7

When did we lose the moral authority to make things illegal for minors? I believe in 50-100 years it will be a worldwide scandal that these skinner boxes were ever given to children let alone adults. AI optimised attention slideshow that likely drains you neurochemically and disrupts your reward circuitry the same way heroin or ecstasy does? On paper this shit should clearly be regulated.

Overdramatic. Social media may be bad but it is not like heroin or ecstasy. Engaging in moral panics, on the other hand, seems to provide a high to some individuals just like heroin or ecstasy. Let's regulate them instead.

Are there no valid moral panics? Are you a moral anti-realist?

Re: Almost half of British teens feel addicted to social media – study

#49

Post by deemster »

nonethewiser wrote: post #30
ImAnAmateur wrote: post #9

> “Social media research has largely assumed that [so-called] social media addiction is going to follow the same framework as drug addiction,” said Turner. Orben’s team and others argue that this is likely to be oversimplistic and are investigating whether the teenagers cluster into groups whose behaviour can be predicted by other personality traits. > It could be that, for some, their relationship is akin to a behav…

This is the solution for a lot of behavioral problems. The instinct is to do the bad behavior less, but the solution may instead be to do something else more.

A nail is driven out by another nail, habit is overcome by habit - Erasmus

Re: Almost half of British teens feel addicted to social media – study

#50

Post by amenhotep »

i_am_jl wrote: post #11

>‘We’re not saying the people who say they feel addicted are addicted,’ said Georgia Turner, a graduate student leading the analysis Is it common to question the validity of self-identified addictions to other substances or behaviors? Is it common for people who aren't gambling addicts to say things like "I feel like I'm addicted to gambling"? I suppose that the lead on the study doesn't want to overstate their findi…

Social media addiction is a meme (in the technical, mind virus sense), gambling addiction isn't.

I don't know if this is what the study authors were thinking, but I see it as a bit like not taking people's word for it that they're gluten intolerant. It is a real thing and people do know that they have it, but also it's a trendy thing and there are a lot of people trying to convince you that you have it when actually you're perfectly normal.

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