As more and more of the world’s population gets access to the internet and smart phones, there are questions arising about how this is affecting us. An increasing number of scientists are worried about the effects on our intelligence. Is technology making us dumber? In 2020 approx. 66% of the world’s population (about 5,22 billion people) used smart phones.1 This is expected to increase to approx. 7,2 billion by the end of 2024!
The use of apps, like calculators and GPS on our phones, stops us from using our brains to work things out. Mohamed Elmasry,2 author of iMind: Artificial and Real Intelligence, and professor of computer engineering at University of Waterloo, asked his grandchildren what one third of nine is. Instead of using their brains to work it out, they immediately reached for their phones and opened the calculator app! On another occasion, after the family returned from a vacation in Cuba, he asked them to name the capital. They all Googled it on their phones, even though they’d just been there! Is technology making us dumber? Not necessarily – Elmasry maintains that his grandchildren are intelligent, but don’t think for themselves.
This applies to most of us when we allow devices and software to do the ‘thinking’ for us. Elmasry maintains that we should pay more attention to our Real Intelligence (RI) and less to Artificial Intelligence (AI). For example, studies show that people who habitually use a GPS app have a significantly decreased spatial memory, reducing their ability to navigate independently.3
Similarly, as the use of AI apps, like ChatGPT, become more common (55% of Americans report regular use4) studies are showing worrying trends. People who use AI regularly have been found to have difficulty making decisions5, thinking critically and laziness. An example of how critical thinking is impaired comes from a study in Tanzania.6 Pill dispensers in clinics who relied on AI tools were found to miss additional visual signs from patients (their gait, the smell of their breath, their temperament, etc.), resulting in incorrect provision of medications. Similarly, clinicians who rely extensively on AI have difficulty making decisions when it isn’t available, resulting in incorrect diagnoses.
One of the biggest concerns is its impact on students. Regular use of technology has been shown to decrease students’ willingness to think for themselves, problem solving skills and work ethic. It’s much easier to do an online search than to find out the answers to problems themselves, resulting in a lack of mental stimulation and stunted memory growth. Studies are showing that students who look thing up on the internet do not remember them as well as those who found the answers offline.7, 8 Interestingly, students who looked things up online were mistakenly just as confident, and often more confident, that they had mastered the questions than those who had found the info offline. The only thing they actually remembered well was where they had found the info.
Just having the technology around us harms our ability to use our brains efficiently! A study showed that having a smart phone in the room, even if it is off or in a bag, reduced “available cognitive capacity”.9 Having the phone available interferes with our ability to concentrate on the task at hand and our problem solving ability! Not only that, researchers have found that excessive use of technology impairs our social interaction skills. This is very evident in children who spend all their time playing games on their phone or online, or on social media.
As children spend more and more time online (8 – 12 years olds typically spend 4 – 6 hours and teens as many as 9 hours a day, looking at screens10), researchers are worried that they are becoming emotionally and socially stunted. Excessive screen time has been linked to increased autistic and ADHD symptoms,11, 12 including mechanical speech, lack of emotional expression, poor eye contact, and difficulty forming genuine human connections.
Humans learn best when we interact with our environment, what we see, hear, taste and touch, and our relationships with others. In a conversation with another person we are able to see the expression on their face, their body language and get a sense of their emotions. This enables us to communicate better, and all of this is lacking online. Children who spend the majority of their time texting their friends never learn these social skills and it can disadvantage them for any meaningful relationships, social and work related, later in life. One’s ability to get on with people is the biggest factor in determining success in life and technology is robbing us of this.
Excessive smart phone usage can lead to reduced quality of sleep, depression, anxiety, functional impairment, compulsive behaviour, depression and ultimately addiction.13, 14, 15 One study concluded that “The positive correlation between smartphone addiction and depression is alarming. Reasonable usage of smart phones is advised, especially among younger adults and less educated users who could be at higher risk of depression.”
Studies have also shown that the younger children are when they start using cells phones, the greater the dangers are.
While not necessarily affecting our intelligence, the regular exposure to electro magnetic frequencies (EMF) from cellphones and wifi has serious health implications long term. Although denied by the telecommunication industry and governments, there are a number of studies16,17,18,showing the health hazards of long term exposure to EMF radiation. These include increased risk of cancer, cardiovascular abnormalities, endocrine disruption, Alzheimer’s and oxidative stress. As with the psychological problems, the younger children are when they start getting exposed, the greater the risks are.
We have been gifted with incredible brains that are able to do what no AI programme can ever do. We have the ability of creative thought, we can imagine what is not yet possible and come up with ways to make it. Our brains learn from multiple sources, including all our senses and outside stimuli. AI programmes, on the other hand, rely on data input from humans, and can only manipulate that data. Sure they can do it far faster than we can, but we need to remember that we made them. The creator of the entire universe made us. Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, professor of psychology at Temple University and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, has this to say about AI: “It’s a machine algorithm that’s really good at predicting the next word. Full stop! AI systems cannot go beyond the information they have been given, and they, therefore, cannot truly produce anything new.”
Is technology making us dumber? The evidence is that excessive use of technology can have profound implications for our health, both mental and physical, in the long term. Limiting use of smart phones and AI and using our own incredible minds, instead of looking everything up online, are essential strategies for long term mental and physical health.
References.
1. https://financesonline.com/number-of-smartphone-users-worldwide/
2. https://ece.uwaterloo.ca/~elmasry/
3. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-62877-0
4, https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2023/02/15/public-awareness-of-artificial- intelligence-in-everyday-activities/
5, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10251321/
6, https://arxiv.org/pdf/2302.09487
7. https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/dwegner/files/sparrow_et_al._2011.pdf
8. https://bpb-us-w2.wpmucdn.com/campuspress.yale.edu/dist/c/259/files/2021/02/Fisher-Information-without-knowledge-the-effects-of-Internet-search-on-learning-copy.pdf
9. https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/epdf/10.1086/691462
10. https://www.aacap.org/AACAP/Families_and_Youth/Facts_for_Families/FFF-Guide/Children-And-Watching-TV-054.aspx#:~:text=Screen%20Time%20and%20Children&text=Children%20and%20adolescents%20spend%20a,spend%20up%20to%209%20hours.
11. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7920949/pdf/fpsyt-12-619994.pdf
12. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2687861 13. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5544206/ 14. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5970452/ 15. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21290162/ 16. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7642138/ 17. https://www.ifm.org/news-insights/emf-health-reducing-exposures/ 18. https://www.spandidos-publications.com/10.3892/ijo.2018.4606