Is Technology Addictive?

Yeh, I'm pretty sure that my generation (I'm 35) was the last one that grew up without some sort of technology strapped to their face. I've also watched technology dramatically change and negatively effect many aspects of life.

For me, it's nothing to leave my phone somewhere and completely forget about it. For my kids, it's as if life completely stops if they dont have a phone, tablet, playstation or xbox. Drives me crazy at times, but they're pretty good at doing other things.

Addictive? I believe anything can definitely become addicting.

It’s wonderful how fast technology has developed in the past 20 years. Now I’d be lost without the internet, but growing up I had much more fun outdoors! That’s what today’s child is missing out on.....the real life.

Larry, very nice of your wife and son spending the time with a family member, teaching him today’s technology......but watch out....seems they now created a Monster 👍. Now your wife needs to explain to him if he receives an email “ you’ve won the Irish sweepstakes “ NOT to respond back with funds so “ his “ money can be released.

My view point is that modern technology is just a scam by manufactures to make money. They told us way back when the first PC's came out there be no use for paper anymore yet they made a printer and all offices still have paper back up files. Each year if not sooner PC's became obsolete to there predecessors along with Operating system software and many other software, just like other electronic devices of endless types. Then came the stinking cell phones that are constantly out dated and upgraded. And now there making it, that you have to have a cell phone and all the other electronic garbage to do anything anymore. Its the beginning of the end and I just hope my time left on this earth is shot enough not to have to see the day when all those electronic devices are replaced with a implant you'll have to have to even purchase groceries.
Yeah, I can hear the laughter of the ignorant already, the sheep that follow and the ones that just go blindly having to have the latest greatest because the other guy has it. I attended electronics/ computer school and became a CET for a time when I was unable to pass a DOT physical anymore. And yes I have a PC and hate it but, nowadays dictates I need one to purchase the things I can not get at home for I do not live in a big city. And yes I had to purchase a cell phone for emergencies use for my trip to Texas but, I'll tell you the minute I get phone service at my new home its getting trashed. Many of us have lived most our lives without PC's, Cellphones and the like and until they make it a need as they've done the PC I'll reject all.

Definitely addictive in my case. I love computers, the internet, and all of the new technological advances. I bet I spend 1/3 of my time on a computer or cell phone; mostly working, but considerable time for myself. But every weekend I go on a hike in the mountains and enjoy getting away from all of that for a while.

My 16yo daughter has it in her hand even when she sleeps 

Being semi retired I no longer answer my cell phone most of the time it is dead. I had enough phone to last the rest of my lifetime. The Los Angeles Times is on my computer no stacks of newspaper for me. As a kid we used to go down to Baja Mexico every summer I remember well one whole wall was paper backs and a big yellow section of National Geographic magazines now days that wall fits on one hard drive. I think the TV has been on in the background for fifty years now. It tells me to buy a car, phone, furniture, where to eat and what pills I should ask my doctor about all day every day. So I turned it off. My main form of information is a 16 core mini super computer with a 28inch 4k screen it can play movies, TV, games, books, audio, My wall of VHS and CD's is all on a hard drive. That wall of National Geographic is a on hard drive. The work I still do is often handed out in the form of a USB stick or sent via a file attached to a email. Long gone is the room of paper, tapes, CD's. I didn't lose the old ways I adapted to the new way. The net has allowed me to make cyber friends from all over the world and realize we are more alike than I was taught in school. I can visit places I could only imagine in my mind from a few paragraphs in a encyclopedia. I can view the bottom of the ocean in real time or read a newspaper from across the world in few clicks. The best part is I can turn it all off with the push of one button.

Driving my truck all day watching people drive, thinking they are in command of the road while texting, I have to say that a fair amount of people are so addicted that they are willing to die for that addiction.
Not really tech related, but...
A couple months ago, a guy had headphones on while riding his bike... at least he was on the sidewalk and not in the bike lane. Right as I passed him, he jumped off the sidewalk down a crosswalk apron into the bike lane... he obviously didn’t hear my truck. He served into the outside edge of the bike lane, I thought that I was seeing a guy die in front of me. There was a school bus on my left, so that was no option. As I looked out my mirror there was no daylight between his shoulder and my trailer... only by the grace of God, did he not go under my tires and become hamburger. Had that happened, with no cars behind me as witnesses ( My truck would have blocked their view anyway).

The investigation would probably say that I ran over a guy in the bike lane, and his crying family would be telling us all that a promising individual had his life extinguished.... while they held out for a nice payment from a commercial carrier.

Well when you use the term addictive - I am thinking pathological.

When technology is useful, and serves a purpose, its not pathological.

When it gets in the way of your friendships, dating life, family life, when you start choosing the tech over people who are important to you in life, or over doing things that are more impotant, like just going to work, for instance, then I start thinking addiction, and pathology.

I have a health care background.  Sorry if I read too much into this.

I got my first smart phone two years ago.  I've been a Unix/Linux/FreeBSD user since the early 90s.  Go figure.

I fought the technology as long as I could. When I started driving OTR, I needed a cell phone to keep in touch with my wife and son. I had a flip phone up until last fall when I finally got a smart phone. I always grumbled when we would go into a restaurant and look around and 90% of the patrons had their phone in front of them. Now at times I do the same thing. I love google. I have gotten out of bed to go check facts on google when my wife and I got wondering about something. I love shopping on the internet. I get a new hobby every 6 months now because everything I need for it is at my fingertips. My name is Denis and I'm an addict...

Here's an anti-technology song written by my buddy Kevin Carl with his latest band, Higley:

At 36 I guess I'll never quite understand
What the hell society wants from a simple man.
All he wants is everyone to go and leave him all alone.
He seems to be a better man when he's on his own.
It's better than being dead with a bullet right in the head.

21st-century, fudge the digital world.
But it doesn't mean a thing in this winless fight.
Cause he'll never really understand why they won't let him be.
He says technology won't get the best of me.

Cause it's all a conspiracy
If you're not careful it will get to you
And suck you in!
Who needs society
A man you'll never see
Cause he's locked in his room here all alone.