With the rise of new technology, there are the critics. The skeptics. The ones who believe that your iPhone will melt your brain. To what extent have smartphones influenced us? How has it changed our social development?
On the stage of Macworld in 2007, Steve Jobs introduced the original iPhone as “an iPod, a phone, and an internet communicator.” Soon after, tech companies surrendered to Apple’s grasp on the market because of their innovative ideas. According to TIME Magazine, the iPhone was a status symbol and the foundation of what a smartphone should accomplish. In 15 years, we’ve been able to see the effects of such a powerful device.
“While it offers many opportunities for positive and rewarding uses, there are also clear negatives to the smartphone,” wrote Heidi Hackford in her contribution to the Computer History Museum. “People can become addicted to constant connection and feel powerless and depressed without it.”
Since 2010, iPhone users trickled down from adults to children. Being the oldest of five siblings, I have seen the difference in childhood between each sibling. For example, my younger sister started looking more mature than I did when I was her age. The same has gone for my brothers.
Katie Webb, 21 years old and a full-time college student at Utah State University, understands this difference. She has also seen the first-wave effects of the iPhone and is part of the iGen, a group of children that knew a childhood without a smartphone and entered Junior High with one.
“The people I followed I wasn’t actually friends with I think that shows what I thought social media was even before high school,” said Webb. “You’re supposed to post things that show your identity. You’re supposed to make yourself seem desirable or presentable … for me, (social media) wasn’t something that I did for fun, it was something that I did because I felt I was supposed to.”
I remember this clearly in the mid-2010s. Social media was viewed as a portfolio of your life at the mercy of the internet. It was a game, a comparison, but that mindset has shifted in the last 5 years.
“It’s more just for the fun of it,” explained 14-year-old Esther Facer. “Some of my friends ask why I don’t post and it’s just like I don’t really care. I think it’s more about your personality than your age. Most of the personalities of our age group look at social media as a joke than serious like people your age did when they were younger.”
Why was my experience so different than hers? Zhaocai Jiang, a psychologist who led a study for BMC Psychiatry based on screen time, found that the adverse effects of screen time apply to everyone, but are amplified due to personality traits and self-control. He believes the more we give in screen time, our self-control is negatively impacted. And this is much worse for those with obsessive tendencies.
Technology is viewed as negative and addictive by a large portion of the media.
“There’s not a single exception,” said Jean M. Twenge in her editorial for The Atlantic. “All screen activities are linked to less happiness, and all non-screen activities are linked to more happiness.”
While this is proven to be true, Vicky Capua commented that perhaps it is a double-edged sword. Capua explained that technology is a powerful tool and its results are dependent on how you use it. Webb also felt we should put some of the responsibility on ourselves.
“It’s going to be better for the people who have a different mindset of how they look at social media and that’s what going to affect their children,” Webb explained.
Whether it’s the fault of big-tech incentives or self-discipline, a common parenting goal is to make our children’s generation a happier one, even with invasive social media.
“It’s time for us to consider another possible explanation for why our kids are increasingly disengaged,” said Alexandra Samual in her editorial for Jstor Daily. “It’s because we’ve disengaged ourselves; we’re too busy looking down at our screens to look up at our kids.”
I have studied the ramifications of screen time, started a conversation with others, and looked at my own habits. In doing so, I can better understand those who believe that “the iPhone will melt your brain,” as well as the argument that our outcome is dependent on us.
As I watch my siblings grow up, keep in contact with childhood friends, and set my own boundaries with technology, I understand that screen time will continue to evolve. The world will revolve around it. After all, innovation is one of humanity’s strengths.
Ultimately, we are social creatures and we need each other. Society can reach to understand the effects of screen time while creating a better world for the future generation. Although a predicament, smartphones are a powerful tool, and it’s up to us how we use it.
Isabelle Justice 