The effect is absolutely that strong, even on adults. My anecdata in IT overwhelmingly supports that claim. Be it educational institutions, large enterprises, SMBs, or just Mom and Dad with their cell phones, the proliferation of distraction boxes has reduced critical and rational thinking abilities that are foundational elements of learning. After all, why try to reason out what you could just look up online? And if you can get the answer somewhere quicker, well, now you can also skim Twitter or Instagram with the time you saved.
During my brief stint working IT for private schools, with their SMARTBoards in every classroom, Meraki APs blanketing their 300 year old campus structures, and Chromebooks in the hands of every student, the feedback I got was that students hated having technology always with them (to the point of breaking their Chromebooks on purpose), while teachers would deliberately not report broken technology (like their SMARTBoards) so they could force kids off of electronics and into a textbook or journal. Despite the often adversarial relationship of students and teachers, both cohorts acted unconsciously towards the same outcome of less technology.
This early experience has also informed my perspective on the role of technology in the workplace as a force amplifier rather than mandatory toolset. It’s why I’m often fiercely resistant to any “new” technology coming in that doesn’t solve a problem we’ve already identified, as blindly expanding the IT estate just adds to the noise of the enterprise and detracts from the signals important to business.
Even the younger folks (20-30) I find community with outside of tech spaces bemoan the over reliance on technology in general. They aren’t luddites by any stretch of the truth, and they love BlueSky and Instagram and TikTok and all the usual social spaces where their friends are, but they’ve engaged in more active resistance to technology as a necessary component in everything they buy. This same cohort is often an ally at work, because they seek to push products or solutions that remove technology interactions from the daily grind through automation, rather than dragging in the latest toys like we (millennials) did.
During my brief stint working IT for private schools, with their SMARTBoards in every classroom, Meraki APs blanketing their 300 year old campus structures, and Chromebooks in the hands of every student, the feedback I got was that students hated having technology always with them (to the point of breaking their Chromebooks on purpose), while teachers would deliberately not report broken technology (like their SMARTBoards) so they could force kids off of electronics and into a textbook or journal. Despite the often adversarial relationship of students and teachers, both cohorts acted unconsciously towards the same outcome of less technology.
This early experience has also informed my perspective on the role of technology in the workplace as a force amplifier rather than mandatory toolset. It’s why I’m often fiercely resistant to any “new” technology coming in that doesn’t solve a problem we’ve already identified, as blindly expanding the IT estate just adds to the noise of the enterprise and detracts from the signals important to business.
Even the younger folks (20-30) I find community with outside of tech spaces bemoan the over reliance on technology in general. They aren’t luddites by any stretch of the truth, and they love BlueSky and Instagram and TikTok and all the usual social spaces where their friends are, but they’ve engaged in more active resistance to technology as a necessary component in everything they buy. This same cohort is often an ally at work, because they seek to push products or solutions that remove technology interactions from the daily grind through automation, rather than dragging in the latest toys like we (millennials) did.