Bloomberg Businessweek Says To Reduce Loneliness And Anxiety, Throw A Party

Screen addiction is a real thing, and is something that leads to anxiety and loneliness, and is something we've been writing about for several years now.

We've talked about living in an age of anxiety, and that's not diminishing, unfortunately.

We've recommended that when appropriate, companies should consider emphasizing how they can help reduce stress. (Even B2B companies can consider talking about how they help reduce stress for decision makers.) 

We've also noted the rise of mindfulness and apps to help guide people -- last week, three different people urged us to download the same mindfulness app, and it seemed like a cult. (We tried it but had difficulty with it, and kept urging the narrator to speed things up, feeling like the 10-minute session was taking too long. Clearly we've got work to do.)

Meanwhile, Bloomberg Businessweek has a suggestion: "The World Depends on You Throwing a Party. More connected than ever, we are also lonelier than before. The case for being a host." Key quote from the article:

At the very least, let's agree: The more time we spend with our devices, the more time we need with actual human beings."

Interesting, the article notes, retailers and real estate developers are commissioning designs that turn places into gathering places. For retailers, that's an advantage over online retailers. For developers of commercial buildings, offering "lots of greenery, soft seating and even carefully chosen accents and music," are succeeding in "inviting tenants and guests to interact."

So Bloomberg Businessweek is validating our prediction. But in the interest in helping reduce our readers' stress, we're going to keep this blog short so that you can turn off your device, and start interacting with real humans.

Have fun!

New Study Reported in WSJ Validates Predictions

A day after we published two related predictions -- "The desire to be connected 24/7 may change in 2012" and "We may be immersed in social media, but we’ll spend less time with actual people" -- the Wall St. Journal published an article, Study: Face Time Benefits Preteens. (You can check out those predictions here.)

Stanford University researchers found, according to the Journal, that "media multitasking can hurt social and emotional development in preteen girls. And the researchers found a simple remedy—face-to-face talks."

In fact, the Journal reported that "the study, published in Developmental Psychology, found that heavy digital multitasking and more time spent in front of screens correlated with poor emotional and social health—including low social confidence, not feeling normal, having more friends whom parents perceive as poor influences and even sleeping less. Passively watching videos, online or on television, was also strongly associated with negative health measures."

A key point, which we did not discuss, is that because "everyone is looking at their devices instead," they miss the the tone of people's voices, their facial expressions and body posture. The result: according to Clifford Nass, a communications professor at Stanford and co-author of the study with Roy Pea, an education professor, is that “The most important message is that face-to-face communication is just enormously important and there has been a dramatic decline in that, among kids and among families.”

As the media writes about these issues, one that will get increasing attention is the growing inability to read emotions.