Most of know that sitting in front of a computer for prolonged periods is bad for your body. A new book titled Your Brain on Nature argues that computers may also be lowering our IQ, making us less empathetic, and more narcissistic.
Authors Eva Selhub and Alan C. Logan argue the following:
- IQ may be lowering. James Flynn discovered that IQ rates were increasing about three to five IQ points per decade in the 20th century, due to better nutrition, schooling, health care, and other social factors. Unfortunately, according to Selhub and Logan, studies from different developed nations have reported a decline in IQ starting in the late 1990s. With the explosion of all things wireless—smartphones, computers, tablets, and video consoles—we’re inundated and distracted to the point that it affects our ability to comprehend information. Here’s an excerpt from the book: “In the course of a 40-minute study period, a simple texting exchange (less than three minutes) will slash a student’s word recall in half.” Another example: a single e‑mail interruption will consume about 24 minutes for the average worker.
- Narcissism is skyrocketing. A recent study compares narcissistic attitudes in students between 2009 and 1994. Based on the answers the students provided, 89 percent more students appear to be more narcissistic than in 1994. High levels of narcissism appear to be correlated with frequent daily visitors to Facebook. Narcissism is a psychological condition characterized by an inflated sense of self-worth and decreased empathy.
- Empathy rates are decreasing. Many of us in North America are using social media to connect with co-workers and friends. Yet for all this online connectedness, we’re apparently not any more caring. In one study, the authors cite that “scores of empathetic concern…have dropped 49 percent since 1980.”
- More screen time may lead to higher rates of death. In a 2011 study of more than 4,500 adults followed over several years, total screen time was associated with a 52 percent higher risk of death.
Talk about a wake up call. I frequently spend more than eight hours per day in front of a computer. To mitigate this sedentary time, I try to walk or run several times a week. If this research is correct, I may be further curtailing my time online.
I have worked as a
It’s fascinating to think we might have reached a point at which human intelligence becomes self limiting. Human’s become smart enough to invent computers. Computers give us the ability to process large amounts of data, which is necessary to further intellectual progress. Using computers all day is therefore essential to further intellectual progress. Using computers all day makes you dumb. We have reached intellectual terminal velocity.
On the other hand, a more prosaic explanation may be that IQ test are culturally biased (as we have know for a very long time) and that the tests are simply measuring out of date indicators that no longer correlate well to intelligence in a digital age.
Similarly, it may be that the increase in narcissism could be attributed to the self esteem movement in the schools, which is basically an educational philosophy designed specifically to inculcate narcissism, and/or to the increased prevalence of one-child families, which are notorious for producing offspring with an exaggerated sense of entitlement.
Thanks Mark for your comment! I recently read that most North American families are only having one child, instead of two. It will be interesting to see how the prevalence of one-child families may influence our society in the decades to come.
The increase in IQ scores in the 20th century was due to better performance in spatial thinking, e.g. being able to rotate geometrical shapes in space, while scores for general knowledge, vocabulary, and basic arithmetic showed little or no improvement. Flynn wrote, “If IQ gains are in any sense real, we are driven to the absurd conclusion that a majority of our ancestors were mentally retarded.” He later theorized that the increased scores were due changes in education, technology, and economic advancement, causing abstract reasoning to became more mainstream and more aligned with the thought processes of the original developers of the IQ tests.
Computers are powerful tools but it is how we use them that can cause us to be “dumb”. Constant interruptions by e‑mail tools disrupt our ability to sustain the deep thought necessary to comprehend complex ideas, search engines obviate the need to store facts in our heads, and web-pages with hyper-links discourage linear thinking. Even for this blog, Robert has had to shorten the length of his postings to suit the majority of “netizens”. Tablet computers are now posed to outsell desktop computers, and they are used only to consume information, not create it.
I make my living by thinking, by designing and building complex computer systems, and am no Luddite. I have turned off my Outlook e‑mail notifications, I schedule blocks of time during the day where I can concentrate and focus my attention, and I avoid multi-tasking. I also found I was spending more of my time on the ‘Net reading about my interests rather than pursuing them, and so I limit my surfing time to less than half-an-hour a day. We don’t have let computers have a negative effect on our IQs if we are aware that they can do so only with our complicity.
Scary statistics! I try to get up every hour or so when working and I have been walking daily since I got a dog two months ago. I feel a lot better, but I do enjoy being on-line to stay in touch with my family, friends and neighbors, playing crosswords and reading. I also love watching movies on-line, but try to keep that pastime to a couple of movies a week.
Hi Ann,
Thanks for your comment!
Robert