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Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

arstechnica.com

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Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#481

Post by vouaobrasil »

astura wrote: post #396
vouaobrasil wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if technological "addiction" is not like real drug addiction, it is something strange. People constantly checking, scrolling without any real purpose. There's some sort of conditioned behaviour in it that has some facets of addiction.

How do you know they don't have a purpose? Seems like you're projecting your insecurities on strangers.

A lot of people have the same feeling about technology. I personally regulate my technological use fairly stringently. I almost never carry a smartphone with me for instance. It's got nothing to do with personal insecurities. I'm just interested in contributing to a more critical discussion on technology.

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#482

Post by qwertox »

derwiki wrote: post #460
qwertox wrote: post #431

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I’ve seen kids not even 3-4 years old already hooked to smartphone screens. Even toddlers around 1 year old with an smartphone mount in their stroller. Now imagine that they would not be engaging with silly YouTube videos, but with an AI trying to get them to interact with them in order to learn to speak, to learn about the world. Things which parents can't dedicate enough time to. Then also give the kids ideas for…

Sounds like “A Young Lady’s Illustrated Primer” by Stephenson

Thanks. I started with Snow Crash and disliked the style and parts of the content so much that I ditched it and never bothered to read any other book from him. Maybe I should try that one then.

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#483

Post by iteria »

ghaff wrote: post #446
cluckindan wrote: post #420

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mid-90s were 30 something years ago. Perhaps the US was a little slow to develop in this front compared to Europe.

Maybe, though that would surprise me a bit. My first personal webpage was probably around 1996 or 1997--and I assume that was fairly early for that sort of thing. As I said, I had been using BBSs for a while and also accessed usenet and FTP sites somewhat later. (I would have only had access from work to the Internet for quite a while.) For most people, it probably wasn't until MySpace and the like and the populariza…

AOL. In the late 90s, I was in the chat rooms, by the early 00s me and my friends would swap between AIM and text messaging depending when texts were free. Kids definitely had an online presence, but it wasn't like the mid-00s and after when social media rose up.

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#484

Post by jader201 »

qwertox wrote: post #477
jader201 wrote: post #439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please no. While what you describe may be better than YouTube/TV, there is no replacement for development through human interaction and contact. Let’s not give parents another excuse to have devices babysit/raise their children. EDIT: and if your post is being upvoted -- and it seems to be -- I hope it's by people that don't have children, and will later realize how bad of an idea this is once they do have children.

> there is no replacement for development through human interaction and contact. The issue was that he has seen these kids being entertained by smartphones. This kind of implies that they were not in daycare or any other position where they could interact with humans, unless the parents wanted to interact with them, which they obviously didn't (or couldn't, for whichever reason). That was the context.

See my response to your sibling post.

The parent post is throwing AI at the problem. The solution isn't to improve technology to make it better at parenting/babysitting our children.

The solution is to replace technology with humans.

> This kind of implies that they were not in daycare or any other position where they could interact with humans

I'm not sure where it is ok for children, particularly early developing children, to not be around other humans, or humans that can't or don't want to interact with the children. If that's the case, that's another problem altogether.

If people are having children just to have them raised by technology/AI, I hope they realize that before having children and reconsider.

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#485

Post by UncleMeat »

qwertox wrote: post #431
tirant wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I fear the (negative) impact of our current technological drugs goes beyond the impact of traditional drugs. I’ve seen kids not even 3-4 years old already hooked to smartphone screens. Even toddlers around 1 year old with an smartphone mount in their stroller. Main impact on kids is lack of socialization, lack of emotional regulation and a complete impact on their capabilities to keep their attention. Those used to b…

> I’ve seen kids not even 3-4 years old already hooked to smartphone screens. Even toddlers around 1 year old with an smartphone mount in their stroller. Now imagine that they would not be engaging with silly YouTube videos, but with an AI trying to get them to interact with them in order to learn to speak, to learn about the world. Things which parents can't dedicate enough time to. Then also give the kids ideas for…

We could already have extremely high quality children's educational content via videos. But instead the ecosystem is dominated by garbage that can draw engagement rather than enrich.

Why would AI be any different? I'd expect AI content for babies to be garbage because the incentive structure is exactly the same as it is for noninteractive videos.

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#486

Post by TomK32 »

FireSquid2006 wrote: post #435
TomK32 wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The improved treatment, and acceptance, of ADHD is certainly one key element here. I hope we continue to support kids if they show symptoms of any psychological disorder. Here's a 2018 study following kids into adulthood and questioning them on their substance abuse: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5985671/ My brother is one of those really bad cases, while I got my diagnosis just recently; never had more th…

We can take a good thing too far (and probably are at that point). ADHD is being overdiagnosed and medication is being overprescribed, especially in young men.

Over-diagnosis would mean we'd see a lot of kids and adults being diagnosed with ADHD despite being normal/typical. Granted ADHD shows in a spectrum of symptoms but I can't find any study that systematically re-tested patients to find over-diagnosis.

There might be clinicians who diagnose ADHD much more freely than others and whose verdict might not withstand the critique of a more experienced clinicians, but that can happen with any other disease, especially when it's still being studied and not every doctor has learned about it during his medical education. Just look at the speciality of psychiatrists near you, you might for 10 times more for depression than for ADHD. Despite both having the same prevalence and depression often being a comorbidity of ADHD.

Over-prescribed medication, well it is a problem because of the myth that Ritalin would help studying but at least here in Austria it there's enough hurdles to get a prescription. And the meds alone won't fix ADHD.

What we know from studies are under-diagnosis in women and the severe effects an undiagnosed ADHD can mean for a person. What we also know from studies is the under-diagnosis of girls, only in adulthood the gender-ratio of late diagnosis is almost even. Please don't talk ADHD down, it's too severe and we have a hard enough life already without being told by others that suddenly everyone has ADHD...

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#487

Post by MikeRichardson »

athrowaway3z wrote: post #234
vouaobrasil wrote: post #6

I wonder if the new drug of choice is actually technology. In some ways I think that the addiction to technology has some similar mellowing effects as drugs. Some research indicates that smartphone addiction is also related to low self-esteem and avoidant attachment [1] and that smartphones can become an object of attachment [2]. The replacement of drugs by technology is not surprising as it significantly strengthens…

It does replace a demand of people who want to mellow out. The same tech completely disrupts how drug-use spreads as well. There is nobody to offer a first hit if you're hanging out online. --- Though I would caution taking tech as _the_ cause. Things like demographics and the general zeitgeist shouldn't be ignored. Maybe the kids are really into DARE.

> There is nobody to offer a first hit if you're hanging out online.

Silk Road/etc.?

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#488

Post by pnut »

vouaobrasil wrote: post #6

I wonder if the new drug of choice is actually technology. In some ways I think that the addiction to technology has some similar mellowing effects as drugs. Some research indicates that smartphone addiction is also related to low self-esteem and avoidant attachment [1] and that smartphones can become an object of attachment [2]. The replacement of drugs by technology is not surprising as it significantly strengthens…

I like this idea, but we are nowhere near a point of diminishing returns. We are about to experience the wholesale obsolescence of the economic value of human labour, which means in practical terms, no stupid jobs just to have a place to live, intelligent robots cleaning your house etc

If anything, buckle up. Going surfing every day or crotchet may become a perfectly legitimate life aspiration.

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#489

Post by lfmunoz4 »

oortoo wrote: post #18

Another aspect here I think is the generalized fear and anxiety present in young people. Having spoken to some family members in the 15-18 age bracket, the message they seem to be receiving is that they are without a future... they won't be buying homes, they won't be getting high paying jobs, and that the system is not going to work in their favor. I think people of this age are uniquely feeling mortal and vulnerabl…

Good point, most people I know who refuse to do drugs (psychedelics) is due to fear

Re: Decline in teen drug use continues, surprising experts

#490

Post by pitpatagain »

kasey_junk wrote: post #400
abduhl wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With the proper mix of retirement accounts, options, and futures contracts it can. It can offer even more leverage if you want.

The bigger win is the government subsidies and tax breaks. You need very little on hand cash to get a very low interest rate. Much lower than asset loans at equivalent levels of wealth.

There is little tax break for home ownership currently with the SALT cap + high standard deduction. You get some break if you have a large enough mortgage or high enough interest rate but it has been very nerfed.
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