Addiction to technology

Is addiction to technology something we should worry about?

Social Media Phone GIF by Jimmy Arca

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Shopaholics or cleptos…gamblers and porn addiction. Food and drink.

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No, I think there just needs to be more public awareness around it. It’s your body, do what you want with it. If you’re addicted to watching videos of how to make sandwiches, should I care? Or do you mean addiction to technology as in buying a new phone every year?

It’s not technology that scares me, it’s the content on certain technologies that some individuals get addicted to that scares me personally.

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Personally, my biggest concern is how DEPENDENT on technology everything has become.

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Also a good point, I guess you could consider our dependence on technology as an addiction. We are dependent on tech to feed us, cloth us, heat our homes etc. What happens if the power is out for a couple weeks?

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Please expound on what you mean by “addiction to technology “.

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Here’s my guess by way of example…

I would say my brother-in-law and his partner are certainly addicted to technology. For starters, they always have to get the latest phone as soon as it hits the market. He has literally stood in line overnight before in order to obtain the latest i-phone. Next, their entire house is connected to their Alexa (or Surie, or whatever the hell they are called). Light switches, wall plugs, door locks, heating and cooling, television, and so forth. Basically, if electricity is involved, they have it under the control of some form of voice and/or remote control. Cameras in just about every corner of their house, inside and out. (Yes, all hooked into “The Net”.) Latest biometric watches that they pretty much rely on to tell them when to shit and piss. If they are both home, the television is on, and they are both sitting in the living room on their phones. No talking. They “communicate” using their phones, even though they are in the same room. Sounds like a couple of Millennials, right? Nope. Both these guys are in their forties. And I doubt either of them could survive more than a month without their electronic gadgets. If that is not addiction, I’m not sure what is. It’s disturbing.

Edit for short circuits.

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As usual, you hit the nail on the head. I don’t think I could go without things like television, xbox, cellphone, electric heat, kitchen appliances, or my car. I wouldn’t know how to survive.

I don’t want to go here… The well is too deep and no one wants to read a wall of text. “Behavioral Addictions” are IMO BULLSHIT. An addiction becomes an addiction when you pretend that you have lost control over your own behavior. I toss a whole lot of shit into this category, (Kleptomania, Alcohol consumption pre-dependence, Drug use pre-dependence, nail biting, hair pulling, compulsions of all kinds, sex, masturbation,) and anything else a person pretends not to have control over.

Some people love playing the victim and pretending they are out of control of their lives. They are looking to be rescued from themselves. I am a fan of letting them crash and burn. (Tough Love). I have no empathy for people who create their own problems and then whine about it. Anyone who did the shit they do would be in the same situration. It’s like a guy going to the doctor and saying “Doctor, doctor, it hurts when I poke myself in the eye.” And of course the doctor replies, “Then stop doing it.” It really is that simple. However, the health industry will get you to spend millions on cures for a disease they have invented. All one really needs to do is wake the fuck up and take charge of their life.

EDIT > I’m nicer than this sounds in a therapy session, but fuck, there is a bottom-line to the bullshit one tells themselves. (And everyone should treat the psychological community with the same skepticism they treat religion.) I am the modern version of a witch doctor. I tell stories that shape reality and make people feel better.

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lol porn & sex aren’t addictions anyway. People do those because they enjoy it…A LOT. :joy:

Qualifying my previous comments about psychology, just in case there are any doubters out there. This is my chosen field of study and I really have come to the conclusion that I am a 21st Century Witch-doctor / Shamon / who happens to be very good at spinning yarns.

" Have you heard the phrase “replication crisis?” It refers to the grim fact that, in a number of fields of science, when researchers attempt to replicate previously published studies, they fairly often don’t get the same results. The magnitude of the problem depends on the field, but in psychology, it seems that something like 40% of studies in top journals don’t replicate. We’ve been tackling this crisis with our new project, and this newsletter explains one of our key ideas.

This is a sample of what goes on in the field and there are all sorts of woo woo theories that come and go. Psychoanalysis is a big one that is laughable today. Other theories that have gone the way of ‘FRAUD," anything regressive, hypnotism, at least half the shit in Neurolinguistic Programming, **The Rorschach test, house tree person, play therapy, or any other highly subjective test.’ People leave psych programs believing in their pet theory, whatever it is, and like religion, they use it to frame their existence.

I think I was very lucky. I went to a school that treated every theory we learned as “A Magical Kingdom.” In this magical kingdom, these are the truths. When you visit other magical kingdoms, you must operate with other truths. Mixing or confusing the truths would get you killed in a real magical kingdom but in school, it just got you an ‘F.’ Once you entered a paradigm and began making an assessment, you had to stay in that paradigm. (This is excellent knowledge for sounding official when billing insurance companies for services.) It has nothing to do with what is really going on in a session. I have been long convinced that the best thing a therapist can do in a session is simply show up as a human being. Do you know how hard it is to just be human? It does take practice.

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One would hope it’s a life-long endeavor.

:roll_eyes:

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There is always something to learn! The hard part is setting all the bullshit aside to hear the lessons.

I, also, am in the Behavioral addictions are bullshit camp.

If the very idea of addiction exists in the way society and our legal and medical systems picture it then free will has been abolished indeed. (Notify philosophers: their long debate on this matter is at an end.)

AA, for example, begins by asking it’s members to admit they have no control over themselves.

The definition of the word according to the American Society of Addiction Medicine is, for that matter: “Addiction is a primary, chronic disease of brain reward, motivation, memory and related circuitry. Dysfunction in these circuits leads to characteristic biological, psychological, social and spiritual manifestations. This is reflected in an individual pathologically pursuing reward and/or relief by substance use and other behaviors.”

In short, there is assumed to be little to no place for conscious choice when it comes to being addicted, leaning very heavily toward ‘zero choice.’

And because this premise, in my observation, seems to be taken for granted in so many circles, the normal rule of demonstrating a position by a chain of reasoning seems to only apply to those saying its bullshit.

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This is insanely true. Since the redefinition of ‘alcoholism as a disease model’ there has been a steady statistical depression in the amount of responsibility people are willing to take for their own neurotic and compulsive actions.

Now, I don’t know why this is, but I woke up this morning and for no reason at all, that I am aware of, I began thinking of depression. The thought came to me. Depression is Narcicism. “It’s the same thing.” (Okay, I’m not counting it as an actual belief but the similarities …???"

If I look at depression as self-absorbtion of the self as being all important, fascinating things begin to happen.

  1. A high sense of self-importance. My depression is all that matters. I am too depressed to do this or that. (Normal people wake up feeling like shit, turn off the alarm clock, shower and go to work anyway.) We know we will feel better or worse during the day, and it’s just ‘one of those days.’ But to the depressed person, how they feel,'self-absorption in their feeling state - over which they have no control, is all that matters." That is narcissistic.

  2. They feel they deserve special privileges and treatment: Yep. They should be exempt from the things the rest of us have to do. I’m depressed, you have to understand. Wallowing in depression is a powerful tool for getting others to do your bidding.

    • Expect to be recognized as superior even without achievements. (Superior? Does special count?) Same as above. I have special circumstances that you have to understand. It’s not my fault.
    • Make achievements and talents seem bigger than they are. Oh my god, leave me alone, I tried to get over this. I walked around the block yesterday. I went to the store, You don’t know how hard this is.
    • Be preoccupied with fantasies about success, power, brilliance, beauty or the perfect mate. (If only I wasn’t depressed …)
    • Believe they are superior to others and can only spend time with or be understood by equally special people. (You don’t know what this is like… You can’t understand, You have never suffered like this…)
    • Be critical of and look down on people they feel are not important. Similar to the above. Who are you to tell me what to do? No doctor or health care professional
      has ever been able to help me. They don’t know what they are doing.
  3. Expect special favors and expect other people to do what they want without questioning them. ("I can’t do it.) One of the most powerful people in the world is a person suffering from depression. They get people to do everything for them.

  4. Take advantage of others to get what they want. (Same as above.)

  5. Have an inability or unwillingness to recognize the needs and feelings of others. (It’s all about understanding me, my symptoms, and my depression.)

  6. Be envious of others and believe others envy them. (Envious of others? Certainly. If it weren’t for depression, I could… Others envy them? I think this is the one point I can not argue.

  7. Insist on the best of everything… Okay… just insisting on assistance. I don’t see a lot of complaining about the quality of assistance though it certainly happens.

So, Depression as a Narcissistic Personality Disorder… Interesting because it has ramifications for treatment. What do you think?

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Interesting points, Cog. I suspect some may be valid. Isn’t there, though, data indicating cases of depression rooted in biological causes?

Not sure what type of “depressed” people you’ve dealt with…

I don’t think so. While there’s no single cause of depression, most experts believe there’s a combination of biological, social, and psychological factors that contribute to depression risk . I think the risk goes up in families with histories of depression but like alcoholism, most people suffering from it come from families where it is not present. The cause is not known. Treatment tends to be medical and psychological.

One fascinating fact about depression is that exercise and social involvement can cure it in some cases and significantly decrease the symptoms in others. I have an old article that I really like. “The Myth of Clinical Depression.” Let me see if I can pull it up. The study is old but I really like what it has to say. (Can’t find it. Might be on the home computer. Here is an article about the medical model)

No evidence that depression is caused by low serotonin levels, finds comprehensive review. After decades of study, there remains no clear evidence that serotonin levels or serotonin activity are responsible for depression, according to a major review of prior research.

“Many people take antidepressants because they have been led to believe their depression has a biochemical cause, but this new research suggests this belief is not grounded in evidence.”

AND yet SSRIs are effective in treating depression and anxiety disorders.

There are degrees of sadness to depression and stress to anxiety. Some are short term and “life events” (ie death in family, moving, divorce, etc) and some are chronic or physical (medicines for disease conditions or the diseases themselves).

FOR example: Most of the serotonin found in your body is in your gut (intestines). About 90% of serotonin is found in the cells lining your gastrointestinal tract. It’s released into your blood circulation and absorbed by platelets. Only about 10% is produced in your brain.

How do you think Crohns may effect this hormone production? Jogging sure in fuck doesn’t create it :smirk:

Perhaps narcissists can get depressed? So CAN empathetic humans who don’t wallow in self-pity and absorption.

Edited to add: layman’s understanding (food, exercise play apart)

I think that kids become addicted when they have access to an I-phone. Every where we go, restaurants, grocery stores, etc. you see kids with their faces glued to their phones.