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How Depressives Surf the Web

nytimes.com

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Re: How Depressives Surf the Web

#81

Post by plf »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #3

Fascinating stuff. Just today I was looking at the 30-40 tabs I bring up each time I start Chrome and I was wondering: doest having all this data in front of me help me remember to do various internet chores? Or does it get in the way? Better still, is it a sign I'm actually experiencing some other condition that shows itself in my context-switching? I think there's something to this. Having said that, I found this w…

I'm curious, did Newton name Newton's law himself or did other people do that for him? Did Gantt name his diagrams? Isn't it a bit vain to name a law with your own name?

Re: How Depressives Surf the Web

#82

Post by nosse »

Atropos wrote: post #64

I disagree with all the negative comments here, if I understand the article correctly, they found a correlation like "IF you are depressed, THEN you might anxiously check your emails all the time'' They arent saying this internet use pattern makes you more likely to be depressed (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modus_ponens#Justification_via_... ) In my personal case, I have bipolar depression and I have gone throug…

I have one depressed friend. Anytime I visit him, it eventually turn into a Youtube party. This tendency is by far worse than with any of my other friends.

I'd love to track my personal wellbeing, right now my only metrics are "am I hooked to some flash game or not" and "did I go jogging this week or not". Tracking my web surfing could give something in like "it seems you're having a lousy afternoon" which would be more handy because I might snap out of it.

Re: How Depressives Surf the Web

#83

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

zaptheimpaler wrote: post #42
electromagnetic wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be simple to create a program to log the usage and recommend the user seek counselling, without having to log thousands of peoples internet usage. I don't get why 1) everyone has to be HAPPY , and 2) why the high ups seem so intent on making sure we're HAPPY . Here's reality: life can be utterly fucking shitty. People get depressed. Then you get over it and life goes on and eventually someone will die, or yo…

in many cases, depression is a mental disorder, not just the opposite of happiness. It's often caused by easily correctable physiological problems. In these cases, it makes sense to correct the underlying factors. In addition, a huge percentage of college students report being depressed. I still disagree with monitoring peoples internet activity, but for privacy reasons, not the reasons you mentioned.

Huh? Any chance you could supply me with some citations for the easily correctable physiological problems that cause depression?

This is not snarky, I am genuinely interested, if a little unbelieving.

Re: How Depressives Surf the Web

#84

Post by [deleted] »

billpatrianakos wrote: post #22

I was shocked that they threw in the part about developing an application to alert people that they may be depressed. This is the one amd only study on this and they have the nerve to pitch a software idea at the end? Honestly, at this point using their application to detect early signs of depression is like going to a phrenologist or getting your palms read - and taking it seriously. There needs to be more studies w…

[deleted]

Re: How Depressives Surf the Web

#85

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

pnathan wrote: post #57
_delirium wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a major problem with many (maybe even most) psych studies. I don't think anyone who's thought about it at length really thinks these kinds of populations of convenience ("recruited N students at my university") are a good way to do science, but they are... convenient, so they keep getting used. At some schools, psych students have to participate in a certain number of studies for credit, which makes it easier…

A comment I've heard before from a psych researcher is that psych research at universities is the really the research into undergrads taking psych courses...

This is very, very true. In fact, Heinrich et al wrote a wonderful paper decrying this very problem.

humancond.org/_media/papers/weirdest_people.pdf

Unfortunately, its not going to change, because of the pressures on academics to publish, publish, publish inclines them to take full advantage of these samples of convenience.

Its actually even worse, because the majority of psych papers are based on American psych students, so there's not even much of a good geographic spread in the ridiculously limited samples psychologists use.

Re: How Depressives Surf the Web

#87

Post by kijin »

readme wrote: post #59
kijin wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> without having to log thousands of peoples internet usage. > why the high ups seem so intent on making sure we're HAPPY. You just rediscovered the age-old correlation between a desire for totalitarian control and a preoccupation with superficial happiness. The theory is that the best way to ensure that existing structures of power and domination remain in place in perpetuity is to ensure that everyone is happy. Bec…

Very insightful. I have to point out one little oversight though: > Seriously, we need depressed folks, autistic folks, OCD folks, and all these other kinds of people in our world in order for progress to happen. Happy people won't fix what they don't think is broken! It almost sounds like you're implying that people are either happy, or have one of n classifiable psychological disorders. The reality is that the diso…

Thanks for catching that oversight, I didn't intend to imply that people with currently acknowledged mental disorders are unhappy. Hey, I'm an aspie and I'm not terribly unhappy about it, either. But I sure am dissatisfied (i.e. unhappy) with the way the world around me is.

The kind of happiness that "higher ups" want to propagate, on the other hand, often involves accepting the status quo and just trying to fit in.

Re: How Depressives Surf the Web

#88

Post by atto »

vidar wrote: post #66
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #3

Fascinating stuff. Just today I was looking at the 30-40 tabs I bring up each time I start Chrome and I was wondering: doest having all this data in front of me help me remember to do various internet chores? Or does it get in the way? Better still, is it a sign I'm actually experiencing some other condition that shows itself in my context-switching? I think there's something to this. Having said that, I found this w…

What is in those 30-40 tabs? I am genuinely curious!

I do this as well. Right now, I have 41 open, which is about normal. At work, I have another 50 or so open.

I primarily use tabs as a "live bookmark", both positive ("remind me to look at this later"), and negative ("I don't want to deal with this now, but should later"). I usually browse non-linearly, where I go through an entire page opening interesting links in new tabs before moving on. Thus, I end up with tons of tabs that, by default, stay open. I usually do a quick clean up every few days.

A sample:

1) JavaScript cheat sheet. I've been needing to brush up.

2) A recipe that I want to try soon.

3) Ask HN page on best Git GUI for Windows. We're switching to Git at work, and most developers use Windows, so I need to find something that will make the transition easier.

4) "How to Read Mathematics". I'd normally add this to Pocket and read on my Kindle, but I also want to send it to old professors.

5) A couple tabs for a pair of prescription sunglasses I'm considering buying,

6) My side project's Trello page.

7) Several pages with design ideas for my side project (both JS and CSS)

8) Long Ask Reddit threads I wanted to die off before I read them.

9) A couple blog posts I've been wanting to read, but not long enough to add to Pocket.

10) Links that I've opened after seeing HN's homepage. etc.

http://i.imgur.com/Plmzb.png

Re: How Depressives Surf the Web

#89

Post by kaybe »

plf wrote: post #81
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #3

Fascinating stuff. Just today I was looking at the 30-40 tabs I bring up each time I start Chrome and I was wondering: doest having all this data in front of me help me remember to do various internet chores? Or does it get in the way? Better still, is it a sign I'm actually experiencing some other condition that shows itself in my context-switching? I think there's something to this. Having said that, I found this w…

I'm curious, did Newton name Newton's law himself or did other people do that for him? Did Gantt name his diagrams? Isn't it a bit vain to name a law with your own name?

At the very least, it will earn you 20 points on the crackpot index: http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/crackpot.html

Re: How Depressives Surf the Web

#90

Post by electromagnetic »

kijin wrote: post #87
readme wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very insightful. I have to point out one little oversight though: > Seriously, we need depressed folks, autistic folks, OCD folks, and all these other kinds of people in our world in order for progress to happen. Happy people won't fix what they don't think is broken! It almost sounds like you're implying that people are either happy, or have one of n classifiable psychological disorders. The reality is that the diso…

Thanks for catching that oversight, I didn't intend to imply that people with currently acknowledged mental disorders are unhappy. Hey, I'm an aspie and I'm not terribly unhappy about it, either. But I sure am dissatisfied (i.e. unhappy) with the way the world around me is. The kind of happiness that "higher ups" want to propagate, on the other hand, often involves accepting the status quo and just trying to fit in.

I think you accidentally highlighted a problem our society, at least our media, tries to portray in that "depression is a mental disorder". You only have to see the commercials for anti-depressants to see this.

The world becomes very easy for government when you can lump every unhappy or disgruntled citizen as having a mental disorder, so you can medicate and silence them.

Governments are in the very uneasy position of being who the peasantry get angry at. Feudal lords understood this danger very well. The middle-eastern and north-african dictators have been learning this. How long before our own politicians have to learn this lesson before we get our fair and responsible government back?

It won't take guns to topple our government. It will take people protesting. If you can unite a fraction of a populace, you can topple industries and topple governments simply by orchestrating where your dollars go. Want an end to walmart and their policies? Get 10% of their shoppers to start buying from Target or whomever who treat their workers better, or support local communities better. If it happens country wide, walmart has too much equity sunk into brick and mortar that they can't rapidly restructure. 10% less income from stores across the board mean stores taking losses, means stores breaking even. Lay off staff and you lose more customers. Close stores, and you lose more customers. Even if you close stores, it's going to be 6 months to a year to get the equity back into working capital.

If 10% of the population with held taxes. That's 230 billion dollars in unpaid taxes. Governments will change quickly when you can't do anything to penalize these people. Fine them? They wont pay, and there's way too many to effectively jail, and if you do you lose even more taxes from what they would spend on food and goods.

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