By Jonathan Haidt (summary by Jeffrey Bush)
- Social media has made people to be “forever elsewhere.” Even when people are not
on their phones (in class or listening to you), they are mentally in the metaverse. - The first generation that went through having Internet in their hands (early 2010’s)
became more anxious, depressed, and self harming. - Studies show that the same year young people began using social media (smart
phones), they began having a harder time connecting with other humans. - The increase of suicidal thoughts and threats increased shortly after smart phones
and Internet became readily available. - Physical play for children is like work for adults. They need to play to learn and know
how to interact with others, with life, and with situations. - The simple fact of playing will teach children more than information and instruction.
- Experience, not information, is the key to emotional development.
- Play-based childhood, not phone-based childhood, will teach and develop a child.
Though smartphones can be great, they become experience-blockers. - We are overprotecting our children in the real world while under-protecting them
online. If we really want to protect our children, we should delay their entry into the
online world and send them outside into the real world to play instead. - There is no way to live without conflict; happiness cannot be reached by removing all
triggers from life. - For physical development, children need physical play and physical risk taking.
Virtual games offer no risk taking. For social development, they need friendships,
which are embodied. - Children must face setbacks, failures, shocks, and stumbles in order to be prepared
for life. Overprotection interferes with this and makes them more likely to be fragile
and fearful as adults. - Fearful parenting keeps children on home base too much, and prevents them from
growing strong and developing the dis-attachment they need to survive in life. - Teens that spend time on social media are more prone to anxiety, depression, and
other disorders while teens that spend time with others (such as team sports and
religious communities) have a better mental health. - A 2014 study conducted by Highlights magazine on children ages 6-12 reported that
62% of children say their parents are often distracted by their phones while spending
time with them. - Cell phones have connected us to everyone around us while disconnecting us to
those closest to us. - Sleep deprivation, caused largely because of smartphones and screens in the
bedroom, have caused a growing amount of mental illnesses. - People cannot really multitask, they just switch attention from one thing to another
while losing attention span in the meantime. - Studies show that ADHD is much more present with those addicted to video games
than anyone else. - Girls that spend five hours a week on social media are three times more likely to be
depressed than others. - During Covid, there was a spike in people going to doctors thinking they had
Tourette’s syndrome. Doctors confirmed they did not have it, and began to call it the
mass social media induced illness. - Around the world, there’s a problem with girls having a social media addiction and
guys having an internet gaming disorder. - Video games have made it easier for boys to retreat to their bedrooms instead of
maturing in the real world. - Studies have found people that play on teams and are with a community are happier
than those that stay alone. Humans are embodied, a phone-based life is not. - Our phones drown us in quantity while reducing quality.