Psychology Today has a piece by Larry Rosen discussing his new book iDisorder: Understanding Our Obsession With Technology and Overcoming Its Hold on Us:
An iDisorder is where you exhibit signs and symptoms of a psychiatric disorder such as OCD, narcissism, addiction or even ADHD, which are manifested through your use--or overuse--of technology. Whether our use of technology makes us exhibit these signs or simply exacerbates our natural tendencies is an open question, but the fact is we are all acting as though we are potentially diagnosable. [...]Our most surprising study examined a thousand teens and adults to see whether technology use might be related to signs and symptoms of psychiatric disorders. The short answer is YES. For each generation, regardless of ethnic background, socioeconomic status, or gender, the more certain technologies are used the more likely it is that the person will exhibit these signs. Different technologies appear to be predictive of different signs. One of the major culprits is social networking, which is a predictor of many disorders.
NYT describes the book as "a pleasant surprise -- lean, thoughtful, clearly written and full of ideas and data you'll want to throw into dinner-party conversation."
A dinner party?! That sounds like too much work--wouldn't it be easier to just tweet some aphorisms and update our Facebook statuses instead?
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