Technology at the point of smart phones slid from enabling people to do things with ease to trying to shape their behavior. Cookies were the road to that before.
hello! :D
i've been exploring the smallweb recently, from smallfish to spacehey (if that counts as part of it?) and it's quite great! i much prefer distancing myself from the coreweb. i've deleted tiktok, reddit, facebook, etc! i'm reading more as well as educating myself on topics of interest such as sociology, cognitive psychology, and cognitive neurology!
i feel like i'm already beginning to think clearer and live more in the present. i've found it much easier to close my eyes and just... exist. i'm not sure if it's meditation i've been doing exactly but lying down, just breathing, rather than scrolling has been pleasant. i've genuinely been resting my brain. the idea of tiktok and such seems much more overwhelming to me now, as that's how it is really.
today, i read a couple studies about tiktok. i believe the statistic was 48% of teenagers would use tiktok whenever and wherever they could. only 3% said they'd watch it a couple times a month. it is crazy when you think about it. it's crazier to think of how normalised it is.
what i read was scary. one study (summarised) said teenagers get addicted to tiktok primarily due to their self-control not being strong enough. i'm assuming this is due to the prefrontal cortex, i believe it was, being 45% developed at 16. at 25, it is 80% developed.
during the brain's development, what processes are used are strengthened. the ones that are not are weakened. so, watching tiktok as a teenager for 7+ hours a day changes the way the brain develops. the prefrontal cortex isn't strengthened as it should be which causes brain fog, inattention, and impulsivity if i remember correctly. the brain becomes wired to be good at however it's used, i suppise you could say. so, their brain's get good at scrolling mindlessly.
the scariest part to me is that tiktok (and other social media apps and sites) are all using big amounts of data to predict people's content preferences. all these apps and sites are taking advantage of psychology and how the brain works to make teenagers and people in general get addicted without realising.
like, wow. i already knew but ‐ i don't know - now i'm reading about it and the brain, it's really hitting me how messed up that is. it's crazy how that never used to not feel off to me. now, i'm put off by a site that asks to store cookies. it's crazy how everybody knows it yet are okay with it and are okay with being tracked, analysed, etc.
reading about all this is fascinating and horrifying in the same breath.
[[ i just want to explicitly state here that i could be wrong on all these facts. i am just practicing recalling the information i have read today. i may be wrong in parts of this post. if so, please do correct me!! ]]
Technology at the point of smart phones slid from enabling people to do things with ease to trying to shape their behavior. Cookies were the road to that before.