Tag: Social media

Social Isolation Transforms the Brain

On By SupremeCmdrIn Mental Health, Mice Abuse, Psych, Social Media, TechnologyLeave a comment

In mice.

Confirming and extending previous observations, the researchers showed that prolonged social isolation leads to a broad array of behavioral changes in mice. These include increased aggressiveness towards unfamiliar mice, persistent fear, and hypersensitivity to threatening stimuli. For example, when encountering a threatening stimulus, mice that have been socially isolated remain frozen in place long after the threat has passed, whereas normal mice stop freezing soon after the threat is removed. These effects are seen when mice are subjected to two weeks of social isolation, but not to short-term social isolation — 24 hours — suggesting that the observed changes in aggression and fear responses require chronic isolation.

Though the work was done in mice, it has potential implications for understanding how chronic stress affects humans.

Get out of the house.  Socialize with friends and family.  Leave the cell phone at home.

Social media is not social.  It’s a serious public health problem for the brainwashed masses with addictive behaviors.

Read the source article here.

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The Pleasures of Life without Social Media

On By SupremeCmdrIn ICYMI, Lifelong Learning, Mental Health, Social Media, TechnologyLeave a comment

The fact of the matter is that we do not need the Internet, we do not need social media, and we certainly do not need “smart phones”. What are you, a brain surgeon, that you always have to be available in case of an emergency call? Listen to what people say when they use these “essential” gadgets, as I listen to the hordes on campus—the most typical utterances are: “Hey, what’s up? Yeah I’m on the escalator. Ok, see ya later”. Impressive. Clearly, it’s money well spent. It is almost as if individuals have become afraid of a moment of silence, possibly because they intuitively fear discovering that inside, they are empty…

If you are a professor, you learn that the years (or decades) spent acquiring knowledge in a subject area, plus all the resources devoted to the task, not to mention the training that went into preparing you, are worthless: everybody else always knows better, with their deep knowledge gained on the fly. Anti-intellectualism does not just come from outside the university’s walls. You get lectured at by snarky graduate students with deep insecurities who fashion themselves as activists, called “stupid” by barely literate undergraduate students who misspell their protest signs, and are immediately denounced as “racist” for the mere act of disagreeing with one of these imbeciles.

HT to WordPress and the Fabius Maximus websites.

This is the best essay I’ve read in a long time.  Please take the time to read the entire essay and share with family and friends who actually possess critical thinking skills.

And I thought that Twitter as a porno platform was bad…

 

 

Put The Phone Down…

On By SupremeCmdrIn Mental Health, Psych, Social Media, Uncategorized, WTF?Leave a comment

And keep your hands where I can see them.

Use of computer games was found to be negatively related to all personality and mental health variables: self-esteem, extraversion, narcissism, life satisfaction, social support and resilience.

The use of platforms that focus more on written interaction (Twitter, Tumblr) was linked to depression, anxiety, and stress symptoms.

In contrast, Instagram use, which focuses more on photo-sharing, was linked to positive mental health variables.

Go here for a link to the actual German study.

Read about Teenage Suicides here.

Seriously, put the damn phone down.

Have LinkedIn and Medium Killed the Old-Fashioned Blog? – HBR

On By SupremeCmdrIn Business Trends, Entrepreneurship, Question of The Day, Social Media, Survival strategies, TechnologyLeave a comment

Have LinkedIn and Medium Killed the Old-Fashioned Blog? – HBR.

Publishing exclusively on LinkedIn or Medium is indeed the right choice for some people, particular if you are a new or intermittent writer. If you’ve already invested time in building a LinkedIn network, you’re going to find an audience a lot more quickly than if you start a site from scratch. And unlike an independent blog, there’s no need to commit to a regular posting frequency on LinkedIn: you can write a post whenever you have something to share or say, and even if that’s only a few times a year, you’re extending your professional credibility and voice in a context where it can be discovered. It’s also a great way to try out posting without investing in setup or making a long-term commitment: you can write a few posts, develop your own voice, and then decide if you want to commit to running your own site.

Kids Ignored When Caregivers Are Hung Up With Phones

On By SupremeCmdrIn Social Media, Technology, Thought For TodayLeave a comment

Using a mobile device during meals in fast-food restaurants made caregivers less attentive to the small children they were with, researchers reported.

During a non-participation, observational study, caregivers who were absorbed with typing and swiping on mobile devices during meals at fast-food restaurants spent less time paying attention to the child or children (ages 0 to 10) in their care and often reacted harshly to misbehavior or bids for attention, according to Jenny S. Radesky, MD, of Boston Medical Center, and colleagues.

 

In the case of one absorbed caregiver, the child’s bid for attention was met with a kick under the table. With another, the child was trying to pull the caregiver’s face away from the screen, and the caregiver physically pushed the child’s hands away from her face.

via Kids Ignored When Caregivers Are Hung Up With Phones.

“You can observe a lot just by watching.”

OK, put the phone down and keep your hands where I can see them.  Now turn the damn thing off and pay some attention to your kids.

Or you can just kick them.

Google Hummingbird: Are You Still Playing Russian Roulette with Google? – Copyblogger

On By SupremeCmdrIn Management, Social Media, Success, Survival strategiesLeave a comment

However, the funny bit about our endless quest to know how Google ranks pages is that the truth has always been right in front of us: do the hard work of knowing your customer inside and out, establish your authority, and deliver the high-quality content they need.

via Google Hummingbird: Are You Still Playing Russian Roulette with Google? | Copyblogger.

This is a seriously good article.  I recommend it highly if you are trying to establish an online brand.