The year we found out about our addiction to technology

At the end of 2020 I downloaded an application that measured how long I used my cell phone. It’s called Moment. The result was terrible. I realized something that I had not even imagined.

I was spending between six and seven hours a day in front of the phone screen. I was so surprised that I started researching to write a fairly long article that was originally published in the Mexican magazine Qué Pasa and later raised by Revista Anfibia. They called me from various radios, it was picked up by other means and those things that happen when you touch on an issue that affects many people, but the most interesting thing was that in 2020 the world realized that there was a problem with telephones. Not for nothing Moment has seven million users and there are many applications that try to help users detoxify: Forest, Freedom, Space, Off the Grid or AntiSocial are just some of the most famous.

It was not me who spent a lot of time in front of the screen considering myself an addict, but millions of people around the world. Even friends told me that they had started to measure the time they used their phone and found that it was a lot more than they expected. Little by little, the phone became the first thing we look at when we get up and the last thing we look at when we go to sleep. Quitting during the day is as difficult as quitting for those who do. It is even more complex because, unlike cigarettes, we cannot completely stop having a smartphone without affecting our lives in some way.

And as time went by, scientific research began to emerge that showed that using it a lot generates depression, that using it to take photos and videos reduces the memories we have of the experiences captured and others spoke of the risks generated by having it on the desk while we work or on the nightstand when we sleep. Worst of all, we don’t even really know the long-term results this overuse can bring because we are the first generation to face this situation.

Adam Alter, an American social psychologist that I was able to interview for the Qué Pasa article, explains it very well in his book called Irresistible, where he talks about addiction to devices:

Half the developed world is addicted to something, and for most people that something is behavior. We’re hooked on our phones, email, video games, television, work, shopping, and exercise, and a long list of other experiences that exist thanks to rapid technological growth and sophisticated product design. […] What we do know is that the number of immersive and addictive experiences is increasing at an accelerating rate, so we need to understand how, why and when people first develop them and then escape behavioral addictions. Our health, happiness and well-being depend on it.

This is why technology companies decided to do something about it. There were even major investors asking them to closely monitor what they were doing because things were getting out of hand. This is how features such as Screen Time were born in iOS 13 and Digital Wellbeing tools in Android, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and practically everyone who had a dirty ass for having developed products designed in a conscious way to hook us and keep our limited time in her hands. The account is quite simple: the more time we spend using their products, the more ads we see and the more money they get.

Is it going to get worse? Some experts think so, like Alter:

Behavioral addiction is still in its infancy and it is very likely that we are still at the base of the mountain, well below the peak. Truly immersive experiences, such as virtual reality headsets, have yet to go mainstream. When we all own a pair of virtual reality glasses, what is it that will keep us tied to the real world? If human relationships suffer in the face of smartphones and tablets, how are we going to withstand the tide of virtual reality experiences? Facebook is barely a decade old and Instagram is half. In ten years, a series of new platforms will make Facebook and Instagram look like old curiosities.

It is clear that we cannot see the future nor can we determine if what Alter says is true, but the logical thing is that technology and the experiences related to it continue to advance as has happened until now and, at least, we should start thinking about what to do next to that advance. No one is proposing to flush the cell phone down the toilet. In our pocket we have a device within reach that allows us to be in constant contact, inform ourselves, play games, read and basically whatever comes to mind. It is hard to imagine an invention that has transformed things so much in such a short time. But it seems great to me that we are living the moment in which, at least, we have realized that we are much more in front of the screen than we even imagined.

Perhaps what you should do is find a healthier middle ground. Not being constantly glued to the cell phone, talking at dinner and not running when a WhatsApp message or an email arrives, leaving it out of the room when we go to sleep and grabbing a book for a change. I imagine it and break out in a cold sweat, but maybe it’s part of the detox.