Note—that’s not a question. I daresay that if you are on Facebook (Twitter, YouTube et al.) you are addicted. Maybe you don’t agree. Unfortunately, that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re correct.
Now, don’t get me wrong. For those of you who know me (and also those who don’t), I’m not attacking you with this comment. Actually, if anything I’m trying to help you.
- If you are able to use Facebook etc. in a healthy way, that does not impact with other areas of your life negatively, I applaud you.
- …but if you’re not sure that you can provide a positive response to that statement, keep reading, and try to keep an open mind!
I read a couple of articles today (one about email, and one about Twitter) which talk about a very interesting psychological fact called variable reinforcement:
Patricia Wallace, a techno-psychologist,…believes part of the allure of e-mail—for adults as well as teens—is similar to that of a slot machine. “You have intermittent, variable reinforcement,” she explains. “You are not sure you are going to get a reward every time or how often you will, so you keep pulling that handle.”
That’s why you keep refreshing your news feed. That’s why you keep watching all those “related videos”.
This may be you—it definitely described me at one stage. The way I killed it, simultaneously increasing my effectiveness and productivity (not perfecting, just improving!) was to stop checking Facebook. That can be hard to do. Maybe you need Facebook, and it provides a lot of value to your extended relationships—if that’s the case, try adding a bit of discipline to your Facebooking:
- Check at regular intervals, and at no other time. Say 1 hour to start.
- Try a different communication method in its place—a phone or face-to-face conversation is usually not a bad idea!
The basic difference between variable reinforcement and consistent reinforcement is that if you don’t get the reward (e.g. the buzz of a comment on your status update, or your newly-uploaded photos), you’ll forget about it and check later.
Maybe you won’t check at all!
So try turning off your email notifications, and just see what happens. If you do this, you are in control of your Facebooking. If you don’t, maybe it’s in control of you.
—Sharpy
4 Comments
Interesting read, I believe I am certainly addicted to Facebook.
I like how the physiologists relate to slot machines, puts things in perspective.
Technology can easily control you, I always think of them as a tool to achieve goals.
Thanks for making me more aware, I’ll attempt not checking my Facebook :-)
Good work mate! Thanks for the comment, too. (You happen to be the first!) Definitely let me know how the experiment goes. —Sharpy
Progress Report: Managed three to four days then jumped on to express how awesome life is check a few peoples profile and get off.
So I have learnt that I should not go cold turkey on something your addicted to.
Currently my aim is to go on Facebook at designated times or events (possibly completion of an assignment) and only for specific purpose like above I had a few specific tasks I wanted to do on Facebook then jump off rather than wasting time on it.
I know exactly what you mean—I recently created a Twitter account and at times it can be tempting to follow link after link…