Notes

How Technology Affects Our Youth
Recently I was invited to speak at our local senior high school as part of their "Great American Teach-in," an application held within Florida whereby guests are asked to speak to the students on a number of subjects. Among my business related articles caught the eye of an area teacher and I was subsequently asked by the Business/IT Department to come directly into make some remarks regarding business and technology. Additional info was entitled "Our Changing Times" which discussed how technology affects us as human-beings. It was my argument that technology comes with an adverse effect on our mental acuity and productivity in this country. I conducted two consecutive classes of approximately 50 high school juniors each. Both sessions were interesting.

I began with an extremely brief description of my company and our methodologies for system design, data base design, enterprise engineering, and project management. Basically, I needed to establish myself as a credible businessman who had extensive experience available and IT world. I then reviewed the cultural and technical changes I witnessed during the last 40 years. I even earned some old mainframe magnetic tapes, printer wheels, and plastic templates used for flowcharting.

I then discussed how technology affects us as human beings. It really is my contention that technology has conditioned us to be intolerant of inefficiencies and limitations thereby causing us to think faster, virtually, also to multitask. Consider it; we don't like to wait in traffic, we wish information at our fingertips, we be prepared to be able to listen to any song or watch any movie whenever we're in the mood, we want to enter and out of hospitals, we want instant food, instant pictures, instant credit, instant money, instant everything. We drive faster and talk faster because we've been conditioned to do so.

To illustrate the idea, I quoted some references; first, Dr. Mack R. Hicks, writer of "The Digital Pandemic," who demonstrated how technology alters the minds of impressionable youth. So much so, linked with emotions . exhibit the same robotic mannerisms of the technology they use that is not conducive for grooming socialization skills. Hicks basically argued that technology is a genuine threat to the human spirit.

I next referenced the task of Dr. Glenn Wilson, a psychiatrist at King's College London University, who in 2005 was hired by Hewlett Packard to research the result of technology at work. During his study he found that workers distracted by calls, e-mails and texts suffer a greater lack of IQ than if they'd smoked marijuana. The IQ of these juggling messages and work fell by an average of 10 points - equal to missing a complete night's sleep and more than double the four-point fall seen after smoking pot. The drop in IQ was a lot more significant in men.

These studies surprised the students. To stress the idea further, I asked the students how they received their news. Out of 100 students, only 4 read a newspaper, a couple first got it from an app on the iPhone and virtually none watched the evening news. Interestingly, a handful said they got their news from Jon Stewart on "Comedy Central." Obviously, I found it rather disturbing that students were out of touch with the world's ever-changing events and considered Jon Stewart a credible source for unbiased journalism. Whereas adults are generally upset with politicians, the economy, jobs, military conflicts, etc., our young people are rather apathetic. I don't think parents even talk to them around the dinner table, which I found rather disturbing. Fortunately, this specific group of students will not be old enough to vote in the 2012 election; but if they did, I'm confident they could be easily swayed.

As students in the late 1960's we obviously didn't have every one of the elegant technology as is available today, but we all knew that which was going on on the globe. Everyone browse the daily newspaper and weekly news magazines, watched nightly news, paid attention to radio, and discussed it over lunch or making use of their parents. We all knew about the War (Viet Nam), the protests, major accidents and catastrophes, elections, the various assassinations, etc. In the event that you didn't stay on top of recent events, you were considered a dullard. Not today. In fact, I acquired the uneasy feeling that you will be an oddity in the event that you follow the news headlines today.

Attempting to understand their dependence on technology, I asked the High Schoolers if they could live without their smart phones. All except one said they believed they could manage. The main one exception wouldn't budge, even when I pushed her to defend her position. In her mind, the telephone was her lifeline to her friends and social life. Without it, she was lost.

In the summary portion of my presentation I admonished the students to develop a feeling of history, not only American history, but history pertaining to their chosen career path. I told them this was needed so they wouldn't commit the same mistakes we made and understand why we made certain decisions over time. I challenged them to resist the temptation to go on "automatic," in order to avoid repetition; avoid stagnation; to question the status quo, and THINK (a vintage IBM expression).

I have no idea how successful I was at getting my points across. Some students looked as apathetic as a lot of adult programmers I've taught through the years. The teachers appeared to appreciate my presentation and explained so. I also had a few students thank me for the presentation afterward, shook my hand, and asked a few questions. I don't believe I batted 1.000 with the kids that day, but easily got them to at least start considering things, then I believe I made a hit.

Keep the Faith!

Tim Bryce is really a writer and management consultant situated in Palm Harbor, Florida.
http://www.phmainstreet.com/timbryce.htm

He can be contacted at: [email protected]

Copyright � 2011 Tim Bryce. All rights reserved.
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