Category Archives: Observations

Conclusions drawn from market research based on personal experience.

Impact of Live TV Coverage on Conflict Management and Relief Efforts

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CNN EffectAlmost two decades ago, UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali warned, “Television has become part of the event it covers. It has changed the way the world reacts to crises.” He was referring to television broadcasts from war zones like Bosnia and Somalia. Real-time satellite coverage (often referred to as the CNN Effect) had essentially changed the role of journalists from reporters to participants.

Boutros Boutros-Ghali was arguing that instantaneous, global broadcasts of atrocities put pressure on governments “to do something quickly.”

Nik Gowing writing in the UK-based The Independent raised the question, “But is this true? Does television really influence foreign policy?” For four months, he stepped back from the daily pressures of TV news reporting. He interviewed more than 100 diplomatic, military, and foreign-policy decision makers in the U.S. and Europe to test the conventional wisdom that images transmitted ‘live from the battlefield’ drive foreign policy decisions.

When he began the project, he felt that television coverage did drive foreign policy. After the interviews, he wasn’t so sure. He concluded that:

“Television’s new power should not be misread. It can highlight problems and help to put them on the policy agenda, but when governments are determined to keep to minimalist, low-risk, low-cost strategies, television reporting does not force them to become more engaged.”

Walter Strobel, a White House Correspondent for the Washington Times, like Gow, interviewed many foreign policy makers and military leaders. He published his findings in an article for the American Journalism Review. Like Gow, he concluded that “The CNN Effect is narrower and far more complex than the conventional wisdom holds.” He continues:

“To say that CNN changes governance, shrinks decision making time and opens up military operations to public scrutiny is not the same as saying that it determines policy. Information indeed has become central to international affairs, but whether officials use this or are used by it depends largely on them.”

The controversy over the CNN Effect continued for several years. In 2000, Peter Jakobsun from the University of Copenhagen’s Institute of Political Science studied the phenomenon and published his findings in the Journal of Peace Research. He titled the study, “Focus on the CNN Effect Misses the Point: The Real Media Impact on Conflict Management is Invisible and Indirect.” Jakubsen analyzed media coverage before, during and after violent conflicts. He concluded that:

“The media ignores most conflicts most of the time. The coverage of the pre- and post-violence phases is negligible at best and only a few armed conflicts are covered in the violence phase. As focus and funds follow the cameras, the 1990s have witnessed a transfer of resources from more cost-effective, long-term efforts directed at preventing violent conflict and rebuilding war-torn societies to short-term emergency relief. Selective media coverage also contributes to an irrational allocation of short-term emergency relief because coverage is determined by factors other than humanitarian need. This invisible and indirect media impact on Western conflict management is far greater than the direct impact on intervention and withdrawal decisions that the debate over the CNN effect focuses on.”

Jakubsen felt that real-time, satellite media coverage of conflicts contributes to “an irrational allocation of resources.” He observed that  resources are channeled from long-term development and regeneration projects to short-term emergency relief by media-inspired demands that funds be given to emergency ‘X’ one month and emergency ‘Y’ the next. During his study:

  • Official development assistance provided by The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) fell by more than 20% in constant dollars, and reached its lowest point in 45 years when measured as a percent of members’ gross domestic product.
  • By contrast, the funds provided for humanitarian relief by OECD members rose more than five fold.
  • Statistics from the UN Consolidated Inter-agency Humanitarian Assistance Appeals showed that appeals for emergencies covered by the media were far more successful than appeals for forgotten emergencies.

My Take

Live 24-hour news coverage of international crises seems to have had little effect on public policy. The biggest impact, according to Jakubsen is that more effort seems to be focused on dealing with the results of conflicts than preventing them in the first place.

New technologies always have unintended consequences. This seems to be one of the less foreseeable. But decades later, little has changed. Less than three months ago, a mass shooting of elementary schoolchildren in Newtown, CT, riveted the nation’s attention. Now, the cameras have moved on and so has the debate over how to prevent the next mass shooting. The lead story on tonight’s national news was the weather.

Media Proliferation, Creativity and Change

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Today, I’d like to talk about how media proliferation affects creativity – specifically, how media proliferation has increased the availability of information which fuels creativity. This creativity can, in turn, foster change which fosters more media proliferation – forming a continuous feedback loop that leads to exponential growth in the rate of change.

Model for the Creative Process

Perhaps the best book ever written on creativity, The Act of Creation by Arthur Koestler, describes a model for how new ideas come into being. Koestler called this process bisociation. Bisociation occurs when two previously unrelated planes of thought suddenly intersect. In his book, Koestler gives us hundreds of examples of how this process worked for the most creative people in history.

The geometric plane below represents the beginning of a creative person’s  search for solutions. He/she explores what they already know looking for answers. However, the answers they find will, by definition, be expected and not creative.

 

However, this exercise serves a purpose. It eliminates expected solutions and prepares the subconscious for the moment of inspiration. Koestler visualizes what some people call the “Aha” or “Eureka” moment as the sudden bisociation of a new plane of thought.

Bisociation

Sudden Bisociation of Previously Unrelated Thoughts

Bisociation usually happens at times when we allow our thoughts to stray after a frustrating search of known solutions – as when browsing through a library, walking past a shop window, flipping channels, or singing in a shower. A chance encounter, a fleeting thought, a random comment, or an unexpected experience suddenly connects two previously unrelated planes of thought.

Without first having wandered through the wilderness of known solutions, the mind would never recognize the solution as the solution. The mind would see it as just another in a long stream of random, unrelated ideas.

This model works in a wide variety of creative endeavors – from the arts to comedy and even science. My experience agrees with Koestler’s. Several things increase the chances of creative success:

  • Tightly defining the problem/issue
  • Thoroughly embedding it in the subconscious mind by exhaustively searching for solutions
  • Stepping away from problem
  • Voraciously consuming information on other topics

The more we know and the more we experience, the greater the chances for bisociation. Said another way, “Chance favors the prepared and well-stocked mind.”

Media Proliferation Fuels Creativity

This brings us back to media proliferation. Today, more information surrounds more people than at any other time in history. Newspapers, bookstores, radio, TV, libraries, and the Internet bring the world to us through computers, laptops, tablets, smartphones, and more. We swim in information every day.

Media proliferation fuels creativity by increasing the chances for bisociation of ideas. It’s no accident that an exponential increase in information availability has coincided with a geometric increase in change. Each fertilizes the other in a continuous loop.

Now pardon me while I focus on some business issues and then let my mind wander.

Communities Now Defined by Interests as Much as Geography

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We live in a transitional age. Perhaps for the first time in human history, communities are now defined as much by interests as they are by geography.

Of course, interest groups existed before digital media. Scientists, clergy, physicians, industrialists, government leaders and other elites formed interest groups that transcended local communities. But for the average person, communities were defined by geography, or at least had roots in geography. Cultures, customs, dress, sports, taxes, voting,  language, transportation, markets and more all depended on “where.”

We identified ourselves by city, state and (more recently) country. Survival and civilization depended on binding ourselves together with those physically close to us. Usually, the first questions asked after meeting someone were:

  • Where are you from?
  • Where do you live?
  • Where do you work?

But the advent of the Internet began to change that. Now the first question asked is likely to be: What are you interested in?

The rapid rise of electronic forums, special interest groups, chat-rooms, social networks, dating sites, and more enabled people to reach out to others around the world who shared unique interests – regardless of geography.

Shared interests form a more powerful bond than mere proximity.

BlackManWorldMapI have a reclusive neighbor that I’ve seen twice in twenty years. To tell you the truth, I’m not sure I would recognize him if I met him on the street. However, I correspond daily with people all over the world who share my interests. I have more fun with them than most of my neighbors. I have deeper discussions. I feel for them. I share their pain in the same way that members of a church support each other in times of need.

Rather rapidly, humans are beginning to re-align themselves. Interests can now easily transcend geographic boundaries. We can easily reach out to like minded people on almost any topic, regardless of where they live in the world. The implications for government are profound.

  • Individuals who share narrow or unique interests can quickly find each other, form groups and gain recognition. This could have a splintering effect on political systems.
  • Those dissatisfied with unjust regimes can coordinate large protests and even bring down governments, as we have recently seen in Africa and the Middle East.
  • More people are becoming world citizens with global awareness. Nation states could be replaced by something larger, just as city states were replaced hundreds of years ago by nation states.
  • An electoral process based on geographic representation could become obsolete.

Should we apportion congressional seats on a non-geographic basis to ensure representation for gays, pacifists, and a woman’s right to choose?

This idea seems far-fetched, but 50 years ago, so did the idea of gerrymandering congressional and city council districts to ensure representation for Blacks and Latinos. Thanks to the awareness brought about by mass media, we’re already apportioning representatives according to interests, not just geography, on a limited basis. How much further will this trend go with digital media?

Television Affective Disorders

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Yesterday, I discussed screen fixation and its relationship both to attention deficit disorder and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Today, I’d like to focus on several affective disorders. Psychologists have described seasonal affective disorder (S.A.D.) – depression related to shorter winter days. I have personally noted several other widespread affective disorders related to television viewing. Together, they fall under the general heading of T.A.D. (television affective disorders).

couplewatchingtvinbedAny woman who has ever tried to tear her boyfriend or husband away from Sports Center at 2 a.m. has experienced a malady called Male Affective Disorder (M.A.D.). Male symptoms include restlessness, decreased libido, excessive consumption of Doritos, general irritability when distracted, high blood pressure during fourth quarters, and loud, uncontrolled outbursts of verbal epithets when referees make idiotic calls.

These, in turn, create F.A.D. (Female Affective Disorder). F.A.D. symptoms in the female include cold shoulders, a hyperactive grumble gland, pouting, elevated temper, door slamming, excessive re-reading of Jane Eyre, sleeping at the opposite end of the house, tightly crossed legs, excessive consumption of chocolate, and expensive trips to Tiffany & Co.

In extreme cases, both M.A.D. and F.A.D. have been known to enrich divorce lawyers. Physicians urge intervention before this happens. The only known cure is for the female to confiscate the remote before the male becomes fixated on the screen and distract the male by hiding the remote in her bra.

This can sometimes lead to B.A.D. (Bedtime Affective Delight). As the male attempts to recover the remote, he playfully tears clothes off the female. This focuses his attention fully on her. Symptoms include heavy breathing; flushed cheeks; racing hearts; heightened arousal; spontaneous clutching; sudden, uncontrolled release of tension; prolonged snuggling; and deeper-than-normal sleep followed by Sports Center at 4 a.m.

M.A.D., F.A.D. and B.A.D. represent proof positive that television can affect relationships in both negative and positive ways. As these phenomena are so widely observed and well documented in households across America, I see little need for further study.

Screen Fixation and Attention Deficit Disorder

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While searching for information about the relationship between ADD and different types of monitors, I came across a touching story in the New York Times. Published in 2011 by Perri Klass, M.D., the article titled “Fixated by Screens, but Seemingly Nothing Else” began with the story of boy whose teacher thought he had attention deficit disorder. The teacher urged the boy’s mother to have him tested: “He can’t sit still … He’s always getting into trouble.”

The mother felt her son could not have attention deficit disorder because he could sit for hours concentrating on video games. The physician had heard it all before. He said, “Sometimes parents make the same point about television: My child can sit and watch for hours — he can’t have A.D.H.D.”

“In fact, a child’s ability to stay focused on a screen, though not anywhere else, is actually characteristic of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. There are complex behavioral and neurological connections linking screens and attention, and many experts believe that these children do spend more time playing video games and watching television than their peers.”

But researchers, the article continues, are still trying to determine whether the screen fixation is a cause or an effect of attention disorders.

Some researchers, according to Klass, feel that flickering screens may reward the brain by releasing the neurotransmitter dopamine and therefore attract children with deficit disorders. The brains of these children may be deficient in dopamine and they are, in effect, self-medicating with video.

Other researchers fear video may cause deficit disorders. Klass says, “Some studies have found that children who spend more time in front of the screen are more likely to develop attention problems later on.”

He cited a 2010 study in the journal Pediatrics. It found that viewing more television and playing more video games were associated with subsequent attention problems in both schoolchildren and college undergraduates. The theory goes something like this. In video games, the need to keep responding rapidly in order to win creates hyper-alertness that makes the real world seem under-stimulating by comparison.

My Take

Regardless of the cause/effect question posed above, these studies show that exposure to television and video games can affect brain chemistry over the long term. These visual mediums have the power to affect how we feel, how we think, and how we interact with those around us. Tomorrow, I will write about several affective disorders related to television usage that I have personally observed and documented.

Ramifications of Decline of Trust in Media

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SkepticJournalists have historically performed a watchdog function over the three main branches of government. The executive, judicial and legislative branches check the power of each other. Journalists watch over them all on behalf of the public and provide an additional check … or so the theory goes.

A 2012 poll by Gallup, Media Use and Evaluation, showed that trust and confidence in the mass media to report the news fully, fairly and accurately has reached an all time low. It peaked  in 1976, the year after Richard Nixon resigned the presidency following the Washington Post investigation into the Watergate Scandal, but as the Gallup chart below shows, trust has been declining since then.

Gallup concluded:

“This is particularly consequential at a time when Americans need to rely on the media to learn about the platforms and perspectives of the two candidates vying to lead the country for the next four years.”

“Americans’ high level of distrust in the media poses a challenge to democracy and to creating a fully engaged citizenry. Media sources must clearly do more to earn the trust of Americans, the majority of whom see the media as biased one way or the other.”

In this second, separate survey that you can see by following the link above, Gallup also  found that 60 percent of Americans see the media as biased, with 47% saying the media are too liberal and 13% saying they are too conservative. Republicans trust news media least, but curiously, Gallup found that they pay the most attention to national news.

My Take

For the moment, the lack of trust in news media seems to have caused people to become more vigilant rather than less engaged. However, one wonders when the switch will flip.

When people start to tune out, we are on the most slippery of slopes. We will lose the ultimate check-and-balance in society – an informed electorate.

Erosion of Trust in Information Fosters Polarization in Politics

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A familiar thread running through many of these posts is trust. A good friend who is a very successful businessman once told me that “If you don’t have trust, you don’t have a business.” I have come to believe that saying with all my heart and soul. I think every copywriter, reporter and CEO should have it tattooed on his or her navel.

Trust is the currency of communication.

TrustWhen we don’t trust the information someone is sending us, we don’t trust him, her or them. This merely seeks to divide us. We may win elections or business deals with bad information, but we lose something larger – the relationships upon which long-term success is built.

Recent surveys indicate that the credibility of advertising and media (Pew, Gallup, Neiesen, Lab42 studies) is severely eroding. Both have fallen to about 25 percent. Said another way, three in four people automatically discount what they read, see or hear through the media, whether it’s programming, news, or advertising. By the way, that also is roughly the same percentage of people who falsify information on social media profiles.

How can we restore trust?

A good place to start is over in that far corner of the ring called truth and fairness. If you don’t believe “truth” is obtainable because it is too subjective, then let’s strive for fairness and balance.

I asked several friends, “what would you do to restore trust in the sources of information?” Here are some of the suggestions:

  1. Stop exaggerating to make your point. Yes, exaggeration sometimes gets attention. But it undermines acceptance.
  2. Acknowledge limitations of your information or knowledge.
  3. Be honest, open and fair. Don’t try to twist the facts to make a point. Selective regurgitation is not the way to get the gist of something right.
  4. Don’t withhold information that materially changes the meaning of something.
  5. Support your case with specifics. But don’t misrepresent their meaning to suit your ends. We’ve all seen too many election ads that take quotes out of context to twist the true meaning of what someone said. We’ve all seen too many people waving documents that purport to prove something is true when it is false.
  6. Cite original sources. Do your research. Don’t repeat rumors. And don’t just trust what a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend said. By the time something is filtered through a newspaper reporter who is quoted in a blog which is reposted in a tweet and then distributed in an email rant, the original meaning may have been lost. I had a conversation with my barber before the last election in which he claimed “Obama is a known communist.” Hmmmm. I thought he was a Democrat. So I asked the barber what made him think that. “Somebody wrote a book about it. Everyone knows it.” “What’s the name of the book?”  “I can’t remember.” “Well, can you tell me one thing he’s done that is communistic?” No response.
  7. Make it clear what is fact and what is your opinion of the facts.
  8. Acknowledge different sides of an argument and hold all sides to the same standard of truthfulness. Try to illuminate, not obfuscate. Nothing is more frustrating than when someone doesn’t acknowledge your point of view, but keeps spouting sound bites to make his or her point of view. This does nothing to advance the discussion, but leads to isolationism and gridlock.
  9. Don’t repeat falsehoods, even in jest. A surprising number of people get their news these days from “comedy news shows” that blur the distinction between fact and fantasy.
  10. Be suspicious of ad hominem attacks and avoid generalizations. Treat the other side with respect.

Counterfeiting the Currency of Communication

The partisan pursuit of self-interest often gets in the way of these principles. Unfortunately, when people cross these ethical lines, they undermine the trust that binds people together. People begin to trust only those that share their world view. Compromise is victimized. Politics become polarized. Winning arguments by counterfeiting the currency of communication is a prescription for disaster. The government won’t let people counterfeit its currency. Why do so many human beings willingly counterfeit their own?

Living Inside the Filter Bubble: How Search Features Reinforce Your View of the World

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Today’s post is a corollary to my last one about how search engines can help perpetuate misinformation. In that post, I cited psychiatric research that showed how people tend to disbelieve information that disagrees with their view of the world. Today’s post is about how web technologies can filter out information that disagrees with their view of the world … before they even see it.

PrintImagine your significant other always agreed with you. “Fat chance,” you say.

Now imagine your kids always agreed with you. “You’re dreaming.”

And your boss. And your co-workers. “Get real!”

And all registered voters. “You’re losing touch with reality.”

Could be we all are … if we rely on many search features of popular web sites.

Results Tailored to Your Likes

Search algorithms limit information presented to users based on factors such as location, language, past click behavior and search history. This process progressively filters information over time as search features get to know your likes and dislikes. As a result, users become separated from information that disagrees with their viewpoints, effectively isolating them in their own cultural or ideological bubbles. This phenomenon has been dubbed “the filter bubble.”

The term was first used by Eli Pariser who wrote a book on the topic, The Filter Bubble: How the Personalized Web is Changing What We Read and How We Think. Examples:

  • Personalized search results
  • Personalized news streams
  • Personalized shopping

Logical consequences of living in a technology-created, self-perpetuating bubble:

  • You get less exposure to conflicting viewpoints
  • You become isolated intellectually
  • You become closed off to new ideas, subjects and important information
  • You get the impression that your narrow self-interest is all that exists
  • Your outlook narrows

In an example related by Pariser, a broker searched Google for “BP” and got investment news about British Petroleum, while an activist got information about the Deepwater Horizon incident in the Gulf of Mexico.

According to Pariser, filter bubbles can undermine civil discourse (we’ve seen plenty of that in lately) and make people more vulnerable to “propaganda and manipulation.” In 2011, the Economist quoted him as saying:

“A world constructed from the familiar is a world in which there’s nothing to learn … (since there is) invisible autopropaganda, indoctrinating us with our own ideas.”

The flip side to the intellectual isolationism argument is, of course, convenience. How many of us would use search engines if they fed us pages in languages we didn’t understand, led us to pizza places a thousand miles away, or pointed us to information that never seemed relevant.

Some people question the extent to which filtering actually takes place. But Google recently introduced an option to let people opt out of filtered searches. This development happened after a new browser called duckduckgo proudly touted it’s unbiased, filter-free searches. I smell smoke.

How Search Engines Can Help Perpetuate Misinformation

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Before we get into this, I want acknowledge that search engines put a world of relevant information at our fingertips and that they help people find answers faster than ever before. They’re great. I love ’em. I use ’em. But I also see a dark side to them.

Ask anyone a question. If they don’t know the answer, in all likelihood, they will Google for it from a smartphone. Voila! answers! Are they accurate? Are they true? These are much bigger questions.

searchforanswersA frequently quoted book, Prioritizing Web Usability (2006) by Jakob Nielsen, claims 93 percent of Web searchers never go past the first page of results. Yet Google and other search engines often return millions of pages.

At one time, an army of professional authors, editors, reviewers, librarians and fact checkers helped verify and screen information before dishing it up to readers. Today, that verification process applies to only a tiny fraction of all the information put online. Anyone can self-publish anything. “No experience necessary” often equates to “no truth or accuracy required.”

Limitations of Search Engines and Human Brains

Search engines simply report all references to a phrase on the Internet; they make no attempt to determine the truth or accuracy of claims. Yet most people assume the truth of something published. Why?

A 2012 report called Misinformation and Its Correction: Continued Influence and Successful Debiasing published in the journal of the Association for Psychological Science by Stephan Lewandowsky, Ullrich Ecker, Colleen Seifert, Norbert Schwarz and John Cook of the Universities of Western Australia, Michigan and Queensland[1] concludes that, “Cognitively, it is much easier for people to accept a given piece of information than to evaluate its truthfulness.” (Comment: this is especially true when search engine results stretch to thousands or millions of pages.)

The Stickiness of Misinformation

This fascinating report surveys academic literature relating to why we believe certain things we read or hear – even though they may be false. It begins with a discussion of several public policy issues, such as health care reform, vaccinations, and justifications for wars. It also discusses why misinformation is “sticky,” i.e., how hard it is to correct misinformation once it becomes rooted.

According to the report, disinformation in the U.S. healthcare debate peaked in 2009 when Sarah Palin used the phrase “death panels” on her Facebook page. “Within five weeks,” the report continues, “86% of Americans had heard the claim and half either believed it or were unsure about its veracity.”

Mainstream news media and fact-checkers reported that Palin’s characterization of provisions in the proposed law was false. But even today, four years later, a Google search for the term yields 35,800,000 results (in 0.16 seconds)! A scan of the first 20 pages of posts in the Google search revealed:

  • A few were dedicated to exposing “the myth” of death panels, including (to be fair), the very first post in Wikipedia.
  • Most posts conflicted with each other, i.e., a large number claimed the law would create “death panels” and a large number claimed it would not.
  • A large percentage was posted within the last few months, indicating that many people are trying to resurrect the term or keep the debate going, and that the authors of the paper are correct – misinformation is sticky.

Existing Beliefs Influence Belief in New Information

Determining the validity of information requires hard work and an open mind. The problem, say the authors of the Misinformation report, is that most people don’t seek information that contradicts their view of the world. Said another way, they tend to like information that supports their view.

Even when directly confronted with retractions and conflicting facts, many people cling to their original beliefs by saying something like, “Well, we’re all entitled to our opinions.” In fact, say the authors, conflicting information often serves to strengthen belief in  erroneous information.

How The Search for Truth is Getting More Difficult

Think of the Internet as a giant information archive. When topics such as healthcare become politicized, social networks, blogs and circular references turn the Internet into an echo chamber. Millions of references can accumulate in days as people report on reports of other reports, filtering information and putting their own spin on things along the way.

While search engines dutifully record the location of information, they can’t help us determine the truth of it. The sheer volume of conflicting information that they present makes the search for truth like looking for diamonds in a garbage dump.

[1] Click here to learn more about the Authors of Misinformation Report.

“A rape for my appetizer, a mass murder for my entree and a nuclear crisis for dessert!”

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shutterstock_83392015So whatever happened to the days when you could eat at a restaurant without a half dozen televisions distracting you. Last week, after getting up at 4 AM one day and working frantically to meet deadlines all morning, I lunched at an Asian restaurant. The food came with a heaping helping of CNN, Headline News, local news, ESPN, soap operas and more. As I waited for my order to arrive, the televisions bombarded me with stories about:

  • A mass shooting of school children
  • An ex-cop allegedly turned cop killer
  • A large increase in gun sales
  • The rape and slaying of a child
  • A serial arsonist
  • The North Korean nuclear threat
  • The Iranian nuclear threat
  • The War on Drugs
  • The War on Terror
  • The War on Afghanistan
  • Alleged sexual abuse by priests
  • The doping crisis in cycling
  • Brain injuries in football
  • An approaching asteroid big enough to wipe out all life on earth

With those, I had a side order of a Cialis commercial – “Just so I could be ready for the moment” when my main course arrived.  The main course was a flambé of “Johnny left Sally after Sally had Jimmy’s baby” on a soap opera.

Frankly, this menu of the world’s woes left me with a little heartburn. Instead of miso soup, I got my fill of misery. To cap off the experience, the Muzak was turned up so loud I could barely hear my luncheon partner. We were forced to  stare at a panoply of pain scrolling across screen after screen. I wonder if this is what it’s like to live inside a depressed person’s head – inescapable, recurring videos reminding you of pain everywhere you turn.

To google for answers! In 2012, the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking published a study called Media Multitasking Is Associated with Symptoms of Depression and Social Anxiety by Mark W. Becker, Ph.D., Reem Alzahabi, B.S., and Christopher J. Hopwood, Ph.D. from the Department of Psychology at Michigan State University.

The researchers found that media multitasking was associated with higher depression and social anxiety symptoms. They say:
“The unique association between media multitasking and these measures of psychosocial dysfunction suggests that the growing trend of multitasking with media may represent a unique risk factor for mental health problems related to mood and anxiety.”

The researchers noted that spending too much time in front of screens can mean less time spent on social activities when people deal with each other face to face. (See Rick Janacek’s post yesterday, “Texting: The Death of Conversation?”)

While the researchers found a high correlation between media multitasking and depression/anxiety, they did not determine whether multitasking caused the symptoms or whether already-depressed-and-anxious people were simply turning to multitasking for distraction.

How many people engage in media multitasking? A survey by Nielsen released in December of 2012 showed that 36 percent of those between 35 and 54 used a tablet while watching television, and that 44 percent of those between 55-64 did the same. Approximately 40 percent of Americans now use smartphones and tablets while watching TV. Tweeting about TV rose 29 percent in just the first six months of 2012.

In 2009, the Los Angeles Times reported on researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and Harvard Medical School who looked at the media habits of 4,142 healthy adolescents. They calculated that each additional hour of TV watched per day boosted the odds of becoming depressed by 8%. This is important because this age group spends on average more than 7 hours per day with media, and more than 10 hours per day when multitasking is factored in. The researchers described several possible explanations.

  • TV watching reduced time for organized after-school activities and other pursuits thought to reduce the risk of depression.
  • TV watching displaced sleep, an important factor in emotional growth.
  • Programs and ads may have made teens feel inadequate and stirred feelings of depression.
  • Exposure to violent, disturbing images may depress people.

This brings us back full circle to my lunch at the Asian restaurant in Houston. Researching this topic reminded me of a much different experience I had decades ago at a Japanese restaurant in Chicago called Azuma House. Upon entering Azuma House, one was greeted by the tranquil sounds of running water and a bamboo flute. You were then led to a private, quiet dining room and served by gracious hostesses in kimonos whose ritual bows made you feel like a king or queen. The atmosphere helped people connect with each other all night long as sumptuous course after course was served.

It was a welcome retreat from the pressures of the workaday world. My, how times have changed! It’s kind of depressing.