In discussions of the internet, there is a lot of controversy over the consequences of society’s increased digital use on our brain. One particularly polarized area of this argument is how the architecture of the internet affects our brains compared to print and oral communication. Nicholas Carr claims in his essay “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” that internet use causes our minds to atrophy. Kathleen Fitzpatrick demonstrates support for the opposing argument that the internet positively transforms the way we interact with literature in her essay “Reading (and writing) online, rather than on the decline.” In my own view, it is the individuals responsibility to resist against an internet designed to deprive us of self-control.
I was aimlessly perusing the web when I saw the first article. Before I first read that abstract, I had no idea that cognitive psychology would be right up my alley. That abstract was as far as I would read though, because I quickly got diverted to another article when the paper mentioned neuroeconomics. Although everything I was reading was all under the decision-making umbrella, I ended up jumping from abstract to abstract, retaining only a superficial knowledge on a number of relatively disparate subjects. Carr describes this type of literary consumption as “power brows[ing] horizontally through titles.” Human minds were never designed for sustained, deep thought, so they naturally gravitate towards the “power browsing” Carr describes, but deep thought can be developed through avoiding frenetic, fast thinking. As our society becomes more integrated into the digital world, it becomes increasingly difficult to practice deep thought. This is where the dichotomy of the issue reveals itself. As the academic world merges with the internet, the cornerstone of academia – deep thought – gets stripped down.
Kathleen Fitzpatrick argues that the community the internet brings outweighs the side effect of fractured mental ability. She is not completely wrong. The internet allows for a diversity of thought that was impossible in print literature. Different platforms on the internet, such as twitter, do allow for conversation, despite not traditionally thought of as academic mediums. She states that “the significance of [these communities] should not be underestimated.” And these communities are significant in what they can accomplish. For example, many social campaigns find resounding success on social media, and many thought provoking discussions can be found on blogs. And as far as the tendency to power browse, that is the individuals responsibility, is it not? Ideally we would benefit from the best of both worlds: academics would fully absorb and spend time with a diverse selection of literature.
Unfortunately for us, all human minds were designed, as miraculous as they are, with flaws. These flaws are consistent among everyone. They include the tendency to take shortcuts and preserve energy through preconceptions, biases, and instant gratification. Most of the time, these tendencies work out for us. They are the result of evolution, a tool made to help us save our energy and focus on the problems that matter. The internet is designed to take advantage of these fundamental human tendencies. In my neuroeconomics example, the instant gratification from jumping between abstracts prevented me from spending time and thought with a single case study.
All of this is the result of a single psychological phenomenon. Humans are massively susceptible to what psychologists call “primes”: unconscious triggers that affect how people act. It is in the best interest of the companies who run the internet to prime visitors to respond to instant gratification. These primes keep people online longer, equating to more profit for companies. In psychological studies on primes, interestingly, the primes had little effect if the participants were warned about them beforehand. This finding suggests that internet users educated on the primes of the internet are potentially immune to them. This immunity requires constant awareness. Let your guard down for an instant, like I did while researching psychology, and the primes will instantly take hold again.
We must view the issue of online literary consumption with a healthy dose of realism and understand that the corporations who run the internet are not going to change their ways. The individual bears the responsibility to use healthy literary consumption. Because of this, we must realize the very little control we have over how we act on the internet. This susceptibility is something that we can overcome through diligent awareness, but placing the epicenter of academic activity in a medium designed to wear away attention seems unwise at the least.
Honor Pledge: DD
Sources:
Carr, Nicholas. “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” The Atlantic, The Atlantic, July 2008, www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/07/is-google-making-us-stupid/306868/. Accessed 9 Sept. 2019.
Fitzpatrick, Kathleen. “Reading (and Writing) Online, Rather Than on the Decline.” Profession, vol. 2012, no. 1, Dec. 2012, pp. 41–52, 10.1632/prof.2012.2012.1.41. Accessed 6 Mar. 2019.
Kahneman, Daniel. Thinking, Fast and Slow. New York, Farrar, Straus And Giroux, 2015.
