Hooked to the Net

By Sam Watermeier

The computer is like electronic cocaine.

While that may seem like the kind of hyperbolic intro a college student like me would write to grab attention, it is actually the exact description of cyberspace uttered by Peter Whybrow, the director of the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA.

Experts like Whybrow assert that the Internet is infecting us like an addictive drug, "fueling cycles of mania followed by depressive stretches."

While these cycles are certainly visible, most people probably wouldn't take them seriously, treating the notion of Internet addiction the same as the one that TV rots our brains.

Apparently, though, there is actually proof out there that the Internet is changing our brain matter. In a study published last year (and cited in this article), Chinese researchers linked Internet addiction to "structural abnormalities in gray matter," specifically shrinkage of 10 to 20 percent of the brain responsible for processing of speech, memory, motor control, emotion, sensory, and other information. And the more time the surveyed brains engaged with the Internet, the more they showed signs of shrinkage.

Studies like this are still in the chicken-or-the-egg phase in the sense that brain scans don't reveal which came first — the Internet abuse or the brain changes. But many clinicians contend that a link exists between Internet use and impulsive behavior and also that the rise in OCD and ADHD diagnosis is positively correlated to technology use.

A 1998 Carnegie Mellon study linked Internet use over a two-year period to loneliness and depression. Skeptics of the study complained about its lack of range and diversity, specifically the fact that all the subjects lived in Pittsburgh. In the years since that study, numerous other studies have duplicated the Carnegie Mellon findings and expanded them, showing that the more people go online to find comfort, the worse they will feel, as the web displaces sleep, exercise, and face-to-face interaction — all of which contribute to our well-being. Scholars at Case Western Reserve University even correlated heavy social-media use to suicidal thinking. (Isn't that reflective of drug use — something with an initial mood-elevating appeal leading to self-destruction?)

As stated in the hyperlinked article above, "if Internet use is unhealthy, it's clear that many Americans don't want to be well." Most of us stare at a screen for at least eight hours a day. Considering one of the early flags for addiction was spending more than 38 hours a week online, we are all addicts now.

If the Internet is a drug, everyone is doing it. Internet use is encouraged. We're on the Internet right now! The trick is to avoid abusing it. 

Be sure to tune in to 91.3 this Saturday from 11 to noon when Media Matters will further explore the implications of Internet use.

Clicks Away from Happiness

By Sam Watermeier

In his book, "The Paradox of Choice," psychologist Barry Schwartz perfectly summarizes the way I'm sure we all feel when we park ourselves in front of some form of media to find fulfillment. "We are free to be the authors of our own lives, but we don't know exactly what kind of lives we want to write," Schwartz states.

Media gives us writing prompts, so to speak — and enticingly simple, easy prompts for that matter. Countless commercials tell us, “Do ____, and you will be happy.”

In other words, the media — particularly self-help media — has turned us into satisficers, leading us to settle or tunnel-focus on one path to happiness rather than embrace the multitude of routes to it (like maximizers). At least it has had that effect on me. 

When it comes to how I can feel better about myself, I tend to focus on big, tangible goals rather than taking each day at a time and being the best I can be from moment to moment. In other words, I don’t do what maximizers do in terms of considering all possible aspects of my life that I can work on to improve my well-being. Over the past five years or so, I have been almost entirely focused on three goals — getting published, losing weight, and establishing romantic relationships.

In my pursuit of these goals, I basically did what Schwartz suggests in “The Paradox of Choice” — focusing my time and energy on choices in my life that mattered most to me and thereby letting many other opportunities pass me by. However, in hindsight, I think I let too many opportunities pass. For example, when I dabbled in newspaper work, I sacrificed my personal life for a professional one, even to the extent that I took my work with me everywhere, talking about almost nothing but my writing with family and friends.

Although this complete focus on my professional identity was a comforting distraction from my less comfortable personal identity, it prevented me from engaging with other aspects of myself and those around me. Friends’ eyes glazed over when I spoke as if I was dictating an article. “Sam, relax. You sound like a newspaper,” they often said. And they seemed even more frustrated when I beat myself up over not meeting expectations with my writing. I wasn’t myself around people; I was always rehearsing to be the ideal form of myself. And that rehearsal, that distance from the moment, made connections difficult.  

Losing weight isolated me more. I put so much time into shaping up to be more socially confident that I forgot to work on actually socializing, which would have helped even more when it came to starting romantic relationships.
                                                                                                

After all this work — building my creative, professional identity, improving my appearance, etc. — I'm finally in the position I thought I needed to be in to successfully establish romantic connections. But during all this time spent on doing what I thought would make others approve of me, I forgot to explore what I approve in myself. And it's quite difficult to form strong connections with people when you don't feel comfortable connecting with yourself.

I didn’t realize that people already saw good in me, that I had intangible qualities. I thought I needed some tangible thing to be happy with myself and other people. (At least that’s what I thought when I saw ads for eHarmony and Special K.) Those ads create too much pressure and unrealistic expectations. A self-esteem boost from some product or endeavor should be a secondary side effect, not the primary motivation for jumping into anything. We need more ads like the one below, ads that remind us of our inherent potential and encourage us to embrace it rather than making us feel like we have to construct it.

While satisficing may be a good way to avoid the stress of excess choice, I’ve realized that it can also be detrimental. We live in a world that tells us all we need to do is find a career or lose weight or get a girlfriend to make us happy. It’s not that simple. The key to happiness is much less tangible. It’s about feeling comfortable with yourself first, even before you head over to eHarmony or hit the gym. But learning to love yourself isn’t as easy — or marketable — as popping a pill or the notion of quickly choosing a flattering outfit. When those actions don’t work, it’s a relief to know that there are other choices out there, other paths to happiness that we can traverse. What the media doesn’t tell us is that it’s a hard road. Happiness is not just a click away.   
                                                         

Sticks, Stones, Words, and Weapons

By Jillian Jenée

Have you ever heard of a word that can be so powerful that when people hear it, they would react as if God or the devil himself tossed it in the air and hit it with a baseball bat straight towards them? Believe it or not, such words actually exist. They are referred to as “God Terms” or “Devil Terms” depending on what type or reaction (good or bad) they cause people to have.

According to persuasivelitigator.com, God terms are “words that have an inherent potency in identifying what you support.” Devil terms are the complete opposite.

Words such as freedom, health, safety, control, guarantee, truth, happy, discover, win can all be described as God terms. These are the kinds of words that often make people feel secure or like they are about to get ahead in life. They excite them in the best possible way. As soon as people hear them, they seem to stop whatever they are doing, whether changing their kid’s diaper, sitting on the commode, or cooking Sunday dinner.           

Communism, pedophile, dangerous, uncertain, scarce, change, terrorist are considered to be devil terms. They spark sort of an alert alarm off in a person brain the moment the word hits the air and people immediately start to panic.

Why is it that a single word can strike such strong reactions from a human being? And why as human beings do we let them? Most importantly, how do we overcome these words and stop them from controlling our lives?

Whoever said words will never hurt us obviously never saw this infamous attack ad from the 1988 presidential election. Behold how George H.W. Bush destroyed opponent Michael Dukakis in one fell swoop here, with just a few phrases, particularly "weekend passes." 

This kind of ad proves how words are sometimes mightier than weapons. What kind of language do you respond to most strongly? What are your God and Devil terms, the words to which your response reveals what kind of person you are? What is the most memorable "spin" you've seen put on certain phrases, like "weekend passes?"

TV: A Tall Tale

By Sam Watermeier

 
Painter Steven James explained art best. "Nature is larger than life, and that's the way art should be." Cultivation theory founder George Gerbner would argue that nature is larger than life because art made it seem that way.

According to the cultivation analysis, heavy television viewers (who watch more than four hours a day) are more likely to see the social world as a reflection of the one depicted on TV. But if the social world is like the one on TV, wouldn’t we see less people glued to their computers?

In this age of passive online communication, TV allows us to vicariously experience more upfront, honest expression. Take the HBO series “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” The hero Larry David says the kinds of things most of us only feel comfortable expressing anonymously on the internet. 

 

Impure thoughts are funny on TV because they're usually unexpressed in real life, David says. Therefore, the social world isn't what we see on TV, as Gerbner’s theory suggests about the way people perceive it. Rather, television provides an idealized version of it. Even reality TV is essentially a fantasy or an amplification of the everyday. Surely women don't bicker as viciously all the time as they do on "The Real Housewives."

David says he never worries about crossing the proverbial line because that's what viewers expect him to do, especially on HBO. It's his responsibility to express what they cannot, to be a vessel for their frustrations. The nature of TV is that it is a special dimension, giving its inhabitants a sense of power to do things others normally wouldn’t in real life.

It's troubling to step back from a show like "Curb Your Enthusiasm" and realize you and most others around you are not as open and honest as Larry David's character. As Pablo Picasso said, "Art is a lie that makes us realize the truth."

Apparently, David’s blunt honesty is bleeding over into more objective television as well. Even so-called "fair and balanced” news television is clearly becoming a myth, moving from a "just the facts, ma'am" approach to more theatrical and opinionated entertainment (e.g. "Morning Joe," "The O'Reilly Factor," etc.) There's a reason why people turn to the tube instead of other sources in the world outside of it — the reason being that television provides sensational spectacle. As soon as something is filtered through a camera, it loses a sense of raw reality and becomes something more exciting — a funhouse reflection of it.

Our world will never completely be like the one on TV, as Gerbner suggests, because the very nature of television is larger than life. When heavy watchers see it as a reflection of their world, they are idealizing, imagining a reality that is as big and exciting as the art of television.