Do we really need a Techie Anonymous thanks to the "deluge of data" constantly attacking us (or being invited in by us)?
"Scientists say juggling e-mail, phone calls and other incoming
information can change how people think and behave. They say our
ability to focus is being undermined by bursts of information.
These play to a primitive impulse to respond to immediate opportunities and threats. The stimulation provokes excitement — a dopamine squirt — that researchers say can be addictive. In its absence, people feel bored.
The resulting distractions can have deadly consequences, as when
cellphone-wielding drivers and train engineers cause wrecks. And for
millions of people like Mr. Campbell, these urges can inflict nicks and
cuts on creativity and deep thought, interrupting work and family life.
While many people say multitasking makes them more productive, research
shows otherwise. Heavy multitaskers actually have more trouble focusing
and shutting out irrelevant information, scientists say, and they
experience more stress.
And scientists are discovering that even after the multitasking ends,
fractured thinking and lack of focus persist. In other words, this is
also your brain off computers.
'The technology is rewiring our brains,' said Nora Volkow, director of
the National Institute of Drug Abuse and one of the world’s leading
brain scientists. She and other researchers compare the lure of digital
stimulation less to that of drugs and alcohol than to food and sex,
which are essential but counterproductive in excess.
Technology use can benefit the brain in some ways, researchers say.
Imaging studies show the brains of Internet users become more efficient
at finding information. And players of some video games develop better
visual acuity."
However...
"The nonstop interactivity is one of the most significant shifts ever in
the human environment, said Adam Gazzaley, a neuroscientist at the University of California San Francisco.
'We are exposing our brains to an environment and asking them to do
things we weren’t necessarily evolved to do,” he said. “We know already
there are consequences.'”