The relentless permeation of technology continually reshapes human behavior, interactions, and reactions. These, in turn, directly impact-for better and worse-personal happiness. This paper studies the issue from four perspectives. First, how specific, important behaviors are changing what we do more of, and what we are doing less frequently. Second, how these changes influence time choice decisions. Third, what influence these behavioral changes and time choice decisions has on happiness. Fourth, how these changing behavioral trends-along with the “Facebook Effect”-map against Abraham Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs and the human pursuit of happiness. This paper shares twenty-one specific examples of things we now do more of, and fourteen behaviors we are now doing less of; and overlays these changes against time-use decision-making and the impact of those time choices on happiness.
The remarkable acceleration and increasing reliance and permeation of exploding
technology across the globe brings is radically changing human behavior [
This paper studies the issue from four perspectives. First, how specific, important
behaviors are changing what we do more of, and what we are doing less frequently.
Second, how these changes influence time choice decisions. Third, what influence
these behavioral changes and time choice decisions has on happiness. Fourth, how
these changing behavioral trends—along with the “Facebook Effect” [
Importance of Specific Behavioral Changes While inarguable that technology permeation influences behavior, the two-pronged fundamental principle of human behavior remains constant: What we think shapes how we feel. Accumulated thoughts, both positive and negative, continually reshape our outlook. While our life lens and core beliefs are established during our formative years (0-to13), reshaping comes about due to significant emotion events—good and bad—as well as life’s steady stream of emotional inputs and outputs. Since technology allows a remarkably accelerating accumulation of thoughts, societies of the future must respect fundamental behavioral principles with great responsibility. This rapid accumulation of horizontal and vertical thoughts, as demonstrated by today’s relentless reshaping of behaviors, steadily stream through, and anchor down, in crowded brains in positive and negative ways.
How we feel – the emotional conclusions we reach as a result of thought accumulation – drives what we do. Thoughts shape positive and negative perspectives. When emotional triggers reach a point strong enough to merit action, we do so for one of two reasons: the pursuit of a positive reward, or the avoidance of a negative consequence. While fear is the dominant behavioral motivator, it is important to recognize that fear crowds the mind with negative emotional beliefs. The challenge in building a forward-thinking, technology-influenced society is minimizing the fear element and maximizing the behavioral drivers of positive pursuit.
When technology-influence thoughts percolate to the point of creating emotional conclusions strong enough to act upon, behaviors result in ways that make us do more of some things, and less of others. 3
Changing Behaviors: What We Are Doing More Of
mistaking relentless busy for efficient and productive.
one million ads in a lifetime. It is currently over one million per year and rising. “Busy” (the velocity of life)
“Do-it-yourself” society
bullies, and the growing threat of cyber-terrorism
good and bad) Political cesspooling “Gotcha” political correctness *How we want to appear to others, how we do appear to others, and who we really are.
simplify our lives, the more complicated it becomes.
generation ago. Now they loom as inevitable foes. People used to have to accomplish something to become noteworthy. Now they simply have to do something. “What is wrong with the other guy” has supplanted “What I stand for” in American politics.
contributes to physical and mental fatigue.
increasing due to inability to reconcile negative perceptions of others.
ever, all designed to jam more thoughts into the mind.
Strike at the emotional core of safety and survival. “If it bleeds, it leads.” The media can make instant martyrs of anyone; or instant celebrities without regard to earned achievement.
3.1
Reviewing the list above clearly illustrates that many of the behaviors technology is shaping create negative emotional experiences and therefore are to our detriment. These negatives must be offset by positive emotional experiences gained elsewhere simply to get our thoughts back in balance. In order to reach a positive frame of mind, any (or all) of these negative thoughts must be exceeded by multiple positives.
Changing Behaviors: What We Are Doing Less Of Just as technology is causing us to do more of some things (above in Table 1), it is changing what we do less of, see Table 2. Just as Table 1 previously showed how Increases in certain behaviors can negatively impact the mind, we add to that Table 2’s list of Decreasing Behaviors. These changes impact all age groups, most dramatically the younger workers for whom technology and tool use is organic by nature, rather than acquired (as it must be for older workers raised in a pre-technology world).
Because of their combined influence, it is important to map these emotional effects against the desired state of positive behavioral time choices. 5
How Changes Influence Time Choice Decisions
Time decisions are a vital study point because waking hours pass one of four ways,
and how that time passes and our lives pass by drives happiness and fulfillment [
Because time is finite and equal to all—168 hours per week total, 112 presumed waking—it is insightful to map how our chosen behaviors fall into the four time-use categories (Fig. 1): 1. Wasted time. 2. Spent time.
If we imagine each day as a pie that must be cut into four pieces, life will be unfulfilled if we waste and spend too much on things with little or no return, while investing and cherishing too little.
A happier life will cut those slices differently: It will invest and cherish as much as possible (via large slices) and waste and spend as little as necessary (small slices), see Fig. 2.
Cherished
Wasted
Spent
Invested
Effective time utilization decisions make us feel proud and satisfied at the end of the day. Poor time utilization leaves us feeling empty or disconsolate.
These behavioral choices, therefore, explain the life difference between being “busy” and being “productive.” A forward-thinking future society will strive to build an environment that enables its inhabitants to maximize desired time use (Invest and Cherish) while minimizing behaviors with little return (Spent and Wasted).
If we ignore this vital recognition of time use during the design and implementation phases, we will end up with a frustrated collection of technology-driven people whose lives are unfilled.
This approach is vital because the manifestation of hollow existences can be found in global daily headlines of violence lashed upon the innocent, perpetrated by broken people. Feelings of frustration drive irrational behaviors. In a world of instant notoriety, feeding negativity serves no one a positive result.
When we map the changing behaviors in Table 1 and Table 2 (what we are doing more of and less of) virtually all impact the time-use pie negatively. They create a larger “waste” or “spend” slice of pie. The ramifications, of course, are enormous.
Because the pie is finite in size, if the Waste and Spend slices increase, the two we prefer to nurture—Invest and Cherish—must decrease. The art of future design must incorporate the strategic management of the two categories we want to nurture while minimizing the pair we do not. 6
How Behavioral Change Influence Happiness While it is easy and convenient for the unknowing to say happiness is a choice, happiness is an emotional conclusion drawn from a collection of positive thoughts. Teaching or protecting it comes involves three coachable steps: • Cognitive awareness that happiness is attainable, worth pursuing, protectable, and sustainable. • Providing tools—tangible and intangible—to create a positive environment that helps enable a desired, happy conclusion. • Influencing lives and societies to maximize time choices that enable people to invest and cherish as much time as possible, while minimizing the nonproductive time they might otherwise waste or spend.
When we embrace the realities of technology’s negative behavioral impact, we are able to design a future environment to orchestrate a more positive, encouraging, and fulfilling series of daily interactions. 7 7.1
Discussing Behavior Changes and Maslow’s Hierarchy
Mark Zuckerberg changed the world by creating an easy tool with a very simple
objective: allow people to boost their self-image and self-esteem [
Decreasing Behaviors and Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
When we map our previous list of Table 2’s fourteen Decreasing Behaviors against
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs [
Concluding with the Maslow/Facebook Correlation As Facebook has so remarkably demonstrated—it now has 1.4 billion users communicating in 70 languages, with participation rising 12 percent year-over-year—the need to feed and replenish feelings diminished by the aforementioned changing behaviors seems insatiable.
As three-fourths of Facebook users are from outside the United States, the needs the site is filling are globally relevant. Nearly half of all users log in ever day, and spend nearly 20 minutes online, for a simple reason: They seek these reaffirmations during the normal course of daily living.
To underscore the impact of technology as it relates to both Facebook and Maslow’s Hierarchy, it is vital to note that eight of Table 2’s fourteen Decreasing Behaviors fall directly into the appeal of Facebook’s wheelhouse.
Forward-thinking society-shapers must strive to emulate the Facebook Effect in design and execution. This will be maximized through positive interaction, which will fuel Maslow’s two key levels, Level 3 (Acceptance, Love, and Belonging) and Level 4 (Respect).
The challenges—and opportunities—are right there in front of us. Whether we are designing a community of the future, shaping behaviors within that community, or simply deciding to be a positive force in the universe, each of us is fully empowered to provide relentless boosts in the lives of others—a design solution we must embrace.