Scientists ask: Is technology rewiring our brains?

[+Gary7 Subscriber²]

Source

NEW YORK (AP) - What does a teenage brain on Google look like? Do all those hours spent online rewire the circuitry? Could these kids even relate better to emoticons than to real people?

These sound like concerns from worried parents. But they're coming from brain scientists.

While violent video games have gotten a lot of public attention, some current concerns go well beyond that. Some scientists think the wired world may be changing the way we read, learn and interact with each other.

There are no firm answers yet. But Dr. Gary Small, a psychiatrist at UCLA, argues that daily exposure to digital technologies such as the Internet and smart phones can alter how the brain works.

When the brain spends more time on technology-related tasks and less time exposed to other people, it drifts away from fundamental social skills like reading facial expressions during conversation, Small asserts.

So brain circuits involved in face-to-face contact can become weaker, he suggests. That may lead to social awkwardness, an inability to interpret nonverbal messages, isolation and less interest in traditional classroom learning.

Small says the effect is strongest in so-called digital natives - people in their teens and 20s who have been "digitally hard-wired since toddlerhood." He thinks it's important to help the digital natives improve their social skills and older people - digital immigrants - improve their technology skills.

At least one 19-year-old Internet enthusiast gives Small's idea a mixed review. John Rowe, who lives near Pasadena, Calif., spends six to 12 hours online a day. He flits from instant messaging his friends to games like Cyber Nations and Galaxies Ablaze to online forums for game players and disc jockeys.

Social skills? Rowe figures he and his buddies are doing just fine in that department, thank you. But he thinks Small may have a point about some other people he knows.

"If I didn't actively go out and try to spend time with friends, I wouldn't have the social skills that I do," said Rowe, who reckons he spends three or four nights a week out with his pals. "You can't just give up on having normal friends that you see on a day-to-day basis."

More than 2,000 years ago, Socrates warned about a different information revolution - the rise of the written word, which he considered a more superficial way of learning than the oral tradition. More recently, the arrival of television sparked concerns that it would make children more violent or passive and interfere with their education.

Small, who describes his modern-day concerns in a new book called "iBrain: Surviving the Technological Alteration of the Modern Mind," acknowledges he doesn't have an open-and-shut case that digital technology is changing brain circuitry.

Still, his argument is "pretty interesting and certainly provocative," although difficult to prove, says brain scientist Tracey Shors of Rutgers University.

Others are skeptical. Robert Kurzban, a University of Pennsylvania psychologist, said scientists still have a lot to learn about how a person's experiences affect the way the brain is wired to deal with social interaction.

Life in the age of Google may even change how we read.

Normally, as a child learns to read, the brain builds pathways that gradually allow for more sophisticated analysis and comprehension, says Maryanne Wolf of Tufts University, author of "Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain."

She calls that analysis and comprehension "deep reading." But that takes time, even if it's just a fraction of a second, and today's wired world is all about speed, gathering a lot of superficial information fast.

Wolf asks what will happen as young children do more and more early reading online. Will their brains respond by short-circuiting parts of the normal reading pathways that lead to deeper reading but which also take more time? And will that harm their ability to reflect on what they've read?

Those questions deserve to be studied, Wolf says. She thinks kids will need instruction tailored to gaining reading comprehension in the digital world.

Some research suggests the brain actually benefits from Internet use.

A large study led by Mizuko Ito of the University of California, Irvine, recently concluded that by hanging out online with friends - sending instant messages, for example - teens learn valuable skills they'll need to use at work and socially in the digital age. That includes lessons about issues like online privacy and what's appropriate to post and communicate on the internet, Ito said.

Rowe, the 19-year-old, said he and his buddies often debate whether technology might actually be bad for you. That includes kicking around the argument that computer use makes people socially inept.

Of course, he added, "we spend a lot of time on the computer and still have totally normal and perfect social lives."

[Green_Eye]

No.

[spenser.d]

Of course, he added, "we spend a lot of time on the computer and still have totally normal and perfect social lives."

Winner.

-Spenser

[+Gary7 Subscriber²]

Winner.

-Spenser

More than 2,000 years ago, Socrates warned about a different information revolution - the rise of the written word, which he considered a more superficial way of learning than the oral tradition. More recently, the arrival of television sparked concerns that it would make children more violent or passive and interfere with their education.

Some say that violence on TV contributes to crime rates.

[spenser.d]

Some say that violence on TV contributes to crime rates.

And? They say it, but nobody's been able to prove it. Many studies have found no link, and the one's that have found a link can't prove that violent television causes more aggressive behavior. It could be the other way around, or there could be other factors altogether.

Either way I don't see what that has to do with what I quoted and what I implied. The majority of people that use technology have perfectly normal social lives.

-Spenser

[+Gary7 Subscriber²]

And? They say it, but nobody's been able to prove it. Many studies have found no link, and the one's that have found a link can't prove that violent television causes more aggressive behavior. It could be the other way around, or there could be other factors altogether.

Either way I don't see what that has to do with what I quoted and what I implied. The majority of people that use technology have perfectly normal social lives.

-Spenser

Not according to the Psychiatrist that said:

There are no firm answers yet. But Dr. Gary Small, a psychiatrist at UCLA, argues that daily exposure to digital technologies such as the Internet and smart phones can alter how the brain works.

When the brain spends more time on technology-related tasks and less time exposed to other people, it drifts away from fundamental social skills like reading facial expressions during conversation, Small asserts.

You implied that what you quoted was the Winner. The good Doctor above does not concur. Maybe this is why most teenagers talk in Text Language. BMBF. ...etc.

[spenser.d]

You implied that what you quoted was the Winner. The good Doctor above does not concur. Maybe this is why most teenagers talk in Text Language. BMBF. ...etc.

And I take the good doctor's word into account, but it's part of going into psychology to question things. One doctor saying something like this does not make it true. He even stated that there aren't firm answers yet. I'm not even sure he ran a true empirical study. It sounds more like conjecture. Just because something looks like it might be true doesn't make it so even if a psychiatrist says so (and he doesn't really say so).

-Spenser

[Skulltrail-old]

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[primexx]

Studies like this just assume that it has to be a good thing to comprehend non-communicative "language". My question is: why? It's arguably better to communicate directly what you're thinking so other people know exactly what you want, than to play guessing games which introduce a plethora of misunderstanding.

[+Gary7 Subscriber²]

And I take the good doctor's word into account, but it's part of going into psychology to question things. One doctor saying something like this does not make it true. He even stated that there aren't firm answers yet. I'm not even sure he ran a true empirical study. It sounds more like conjecture. Just because something looks like it might be true doesn't make it so even if a psychiatrist says so (and he doesn't really say so).

-Spenser

Psychiatry is not an exact science. Any Psychiatrist will tell you that. I am just stating my own observations. My teenage Daughter never talks on the phone, all of her communications is through IM's . There is less one on one relationships going on today as compared when I was growing up and had to either call someone or actually leave my house to go visit them. I actually had real friends and not just "Internet Friends". This is just some Doctors opinion, it will take years to determine if he is right. If you talk to three different Psychiatrists you will probably get three different or varying opinions.

[spenser.d]

Psychiatry is not an exact science. Any Psychiatrist will tell you that. I am just stating my own observations. My teenage Daughter never talks on the phone, all of her communications is through IM's . There is less one on one relationships going on today as compared when I was growing up and had to either call someone or actually leave my house to go visit them. I actually had real friends and not just "Internet Friends". This is just some Doctors opinion, it will take years to determine if he is right. If you talk to three different Psychiatrists you will probably get three different or varying opinions.

I'm not sure what the disagreement is about anymore. I'm just saying anecdotally as a 21 year old male who uses the internet to chat a hell of a lot with friends and who knows a lot of people who do the same, that myself and all of the rest of them that I know have real friends and lead perfectly fine social lives. It's very difficult to escape a real social life when attending school whether it be college or before college.

-Spenser

[+Gary7 Subscriber²]

I'm not sure what the disagreement is about anymore. I'm just saying anecdotally as a 21 year old male who uses the internet to chat a hell of a lot with friends and who knows a lot of people who do the same, that myself and all of the rest of them that I know have real friends and lead perfectly fine social lives. It's very difficult to escape a real social life when attending school whether it be college or before college.

-Spenser

There is no disagreement. I am comparing how it was back in the 50's which you cannot do as you were not around then. Yes attending College is sociable. Times have changed and so did the form of communications for the better or worse. The use of the Net has brought the world closer together which is a good thing.

[rpgfan]

Technology changes our lives, but I don't think it runs them (I hear there's a thing called drugs that'll do that).

After all, emoticons/smilies are simply used to express something that can't be expressed with words, though sometimes they can be used to convey the intent of something that might be read incorrectly.

For example, if I'm correcting what one user said because it was incorrect, it might sound like I'm yelling "You're doing it the wrong way, idiot!!" when really I'm saying "This is the correct way; do it this way, and your family won't turn into frogs."

OK, so that was a bad example... XD

Honestly though, this article is just a bunch of scientists with hypotheses. Has anything conclusive been found after all of the studies they've done? It doesn't appear to be that way.

I do think that using certain technologies while doing certain other things is dangerous (texting while driving anything (bicycle, motor vehicle, horse and buggy) comes to mind rather quickly).

However, I doubt that technology itself is screwing with us. We're doing exactly what Apple has told us to do since...forever? - we're thinking differently.

Gimme a cookie now...

I :heart: cookies!

[ATGC]

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