Growing Up Digital Wired For Distraction Summary

Lauren Shinozuka, author of the article “The Dangers of Digital Distractedness,” illustrates in her work the havoc that has been brought upon Millennials by social media. Young adults have grown to be addicted to any sort of social outlet, whether it is via cell phone or laptop; and as a result have long forgotten the importance of face-to-face interactions. The technological age is well underway; and for many, there seems to be no way to reverse the social damage that has already been done. Although there are some perks to this age of technology, such as being able to easily navigate through Web pages and using smartphone apps to make daily life easier, Shinozuka asserts that more and more dependence on the Internet and less dependence on

In “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” Nicholas Carr argues that easy access to information on the internet causes a shorter attention span, and makes people incapable to solve problems unassisted. According to Carr, typical readers have become lazy because of being spoiled by the access of thousands of sources of information that can be found on the internet. Rather than reading a book, or doing thorough research on a subject, the reader will commonly answer a question by searching for it on the internet. This method not only diminishes the attention span, but also comes off as lazy due to the fact that the reader won’t put in the time and effort it takes to actually learn a subject.

In the article, Attached to Technology and Paying a Price by Matt Ritchel, Kord Campbell’s family is an example of a family who is addicted to their devices. In the afternoon, the squad all completes in a video game showdown. They all sit around the TV, playing a video game on their Wii. Their youngest daughter has an ipod touch, and all she does is use it. She also has a laptop. Researchers worry that “digital stimulation like this creates attention problems for children with brains that are still developing.” When we start to use the device over and over, it becomes a routine. Not only is it a routine, it could be considered to be a habit to keep checking things over and over again. For example, somebody who relies on their emails for their job checks their email constantly. This could be up to 50-100 times a day, something clearly too much and to distracting from the outside

They argue that the way they’re thinking is changing, how their “concentration… starts to drift after two or three pages” and that modern technology doesn’t push them to commit to a certain informational source long enough because “research… can now be done in minutes” (Source 4). The internet seems to have all the answers, which generally shortens the time needed to spend on an activity thus limits the room to think critically. And in this case, not only does it ruin our contemplation but also our concentration and patience because we expect the internet to feed us information. However, this is not all true because the “digital world lowers barriers to self-directed learning” (Source 3). There are many “new forms of media” people can explore with and use to carry out their interests, and they become more involved with their peers when they can learn from each other.

In the article, “Growing Up Digital, Wired for Distraction,” by Matt Richtel, the author establishes the main idea that technology can distract students from their schoolwork and priorities, leading to poor grades in school. To begin, Richtel explains to the reader that technology is bad for teens brains, leading them to focusing less in school. In the text, it explains that, “developing brains can become more easily habituated than adult brains to constantly switching tasks — and less able to sustain attention. ”(Par. 5)

He argues, the internet is affecting our ability to concentrate by saying, “My concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety, lose the thread, and begin looking for something else to do. I feel as if I’m always dragging my wayward brain back to the text” (Carr 1). The internet forces the brain to divert its attention from the the task in front of them, which causes concerns about education and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder also known as

In his essay, “Is Google Making us Stupid,” Nicholas Carr addresses the fears that many people share about the World Wide Web: that it is rerouting our brains, making it difficult to concentrate effectively. Carr uses personal experiences about his loss of concentration that has become more evident after using the internet. Rather than reading texts in-depth, our brains have become accustomed to skimming over information. Carr’s view on technology is that by relying on knowledge that we are being handed, we are becoming humans with artificial thoughts. He fears the internet could be a monster living in our homes. He is afraid of technology making us an indolent race. I think that the internet can make us lazy, but that doesn’t necessarily correlate to becoming “stupid.” Carr only focuses on the negative altercations that the internet has on our lives. Due to this, he comes off as oblivious to the transformation that we are undergoing with this new technology. The internet is making us change our focus from absorbing time consuming information. Instead, we have shifted our attention to learning information in a timely manner. Over the years, more ways to access the internet have emerged, opening up a whole new world for us. Instead of socializing and working in print, we are delving into a “visual world.” Alternatively, we are being introduced into being able to personally create, develop and consume information. Hearing information from a teacher is being substituted for

Students may easily lose their attention and concentration with easy access to such incredibly rich store of information. With such new technologies as television, internet and social networks, people nowadays tend to multitask more often as they have easy access to large amount of information. However, such easy access may sometimes be a distraction. Study report “Your Brain on Computers” shows that heavy multitaskers perform up to 20% worse on most tests compared to performance of light multitaskers. Working efficiency of people, who multitask, are claimed to be significantly lower. The same is with concentration. As a result, they are not engaged in working process. Students tend to be easily distracted with this situation. For example, combining doing homework with operating on Twitter, phone or YouTube results in poor engagement of a student into deep thinking process, according to Winifred Gallagher, who is the author of Rapt. He also points out that nowadays high school and college students have decreased capacity of serious thinking because of multitasking and distraction. Moreover, Tyler Cowen, economist and famous blogger, claims that nowadays information tends to come in shorter and smaller portions and that explains why our generation encourages short reading. Since online information is always presented in short written passages, the web prevents user from concentration and contemplation. As an illustration, Nicholas Carr, the speaker at MIT and Harvard,

Carr’s premise is that the Web is interfering with our ability to focus on lengthy material. On the contrary, the internet is actually aiding our ability to focus on reading. This holds true for younger children, who are known as the digital natives in our generation. In a research conducted by The National Center for Education shows that “by altering the mode of reading material from traditional paper-based reading to online reading,” the interest of elementary school children increased (Wright 367). Because children of the 21st century are surrounded by technology, they are more likely to gear towards digital media for their mode of learning. Contrary to Carr’s view that the internet “is chipping away [the] capacity for concentration and contemplation,” these children are more likely to read and focus as a result of

Carr begins his essay by introducing readers to the idea that, although the Internet can be quite helpful, it may be the leading cause in the lack of concentration skills this generation possesses. He begins by explaining how in recent years, he experienced great difficulty in dealing with his shortened attention span, the same way his “literary type” friends have (93). By drawing on few experiences other than his own, Carr begins to group everyone into the same category, therefore creating a hasty generalization

In the article “Growing up digital, wired for distraction” by Matt Richtel, he clarifies that the main idea is that there is too much time on electronics and it isn’t helping in school or at home.

Lauren Shinozuka wrote “The Dangers of Digital Distractedness” for a class assignment. She is a college student that lives in the world of technology and internet. Her idea to address how dependent the world has become on technology without even realizing it. Lead her to her own evaluation of her life and how technology has changed how she deals and interacts with people.

Over the years, technology has increased in usage within many ways and has caused successful changes in a person’s lively routine. However, technology has evolved since the very beginning which concern has grown over the negative effects of its excessive use. Nicholas Carr’s article “Is Google Making Us Stupid” addresses the tendency of technology to create a sort of mental laziness where people look for instant answers rather than thinking for themselves. Daphne Bavelier, C. Shawn Green, and Matthew W.G. Dye have written in “Children, Wired: For Better and for Worse” on the transient and persistent effects of technology on children, particularly in terms of media exposure of television, movies, and video games. Additionally, Matt Richtel, writer for The New York Times, states in “Attached to Technology and Paying a Price” that the tendency of the brain to respond to immediate stimuli has a negative impact on the average user, ranging from disinterest to daily tasks to the risky behavior of texting and driving. Ultimately, these three articles agree that regardless of potential conveniences of heavy technology use, the tradeoff is something to be strongly considered.

As stated by the author Sue Ferguson in the article “How Computers Make Our Kids Stupid,” computers and the internet distract students from real learning, which is evident by the poor academic achievement associated with excessive and improper use of computers and internet (Ferguson 2). This view is supported by a massive study conducted by University of Munich economists Thomas Fuchs and Ludger Woessmann in November, 2004, with a subject pool of 174,000 15 year-olds in reading, 97,000 each in math and

Thousands of websites are distracting students from studying time. In an experiment at Cornell University, students who used internet-connected laptops during a lecture did much worse on a subsequent test than students who did not use the internet (Carr, 2010). It indicated that using the internet in class impacts students’ attention span (2010). Distractions can take attention away from learning. In fact, using the internet does not promote study efficiency, but wastes time.