At the root of what seems to be anti-social behaviour among gadget obsessed teens is a yearning to connect with others. — Photo: master1305 on Freepik
During a gathering with some friends last weekend, one thing we all agreed on was that while playing board games in almost any circumstance is likely to be fun, playing with real people in real life definitely hits differently.
Because humans are complicated and messy, it makes interacting with them interesting in unexpected ways. (They can also be a pain and difficult to deal with, but then I would have to say you shouldn’t do anything with them if you can help it.)
So although there are now artificial intelligence bots clever enough to negotiate and cajole when playing war games, and there are virtual reality helmets that literally put you next to interactive avatars, there’s still something that doesn’t quite click – at least for my friends and me.
But perhaps this is something that is less true for the younger ’uns. A group of teachers I know recently talked about how teenagers could sit in a group next to each other while being completely engrossed in their phones. When prompted to talk to each other IRL, their response is emphatic, “But we are doing that, on our phones!”
As a result, one policy their school is seriously considering is to lock gadgets away when students arrive for the day, and only permit access to phones under exceptional circumstances.
However, I personally believe this is avoiding the problem rather than trying to solve it.
In fact, the obvious question is, what exactly are students doing on their phones that potentially makes it so bad? Technology just provides tools, and it’s how they are used that determines the value – good or bad – that you get out of them.
In my day (technically, about a decade after my day) it was about chat rooms and how teenagers could have quiet nooks and crannies to themselves to have private conversations and share information and files that might make an adult blush. Fast forward to the 2020s, and online communities are still going strong. Sites like Reddit and Roblox are used by nearly a hundred million users each day, and LinkedIn and X (formerly Twitter) has hundreds of millions of active users. Meanwhile, despite slowly being delegated to being a clubhouse for Boomers, Facebook still has on the order of a billion active users daily.
Recent surveys have found up to 95% of teenagers use social media, with over 45% reporting “almost constant” use, with YouTube being the favourite.
However, that last particular popular website mentioned is a hint that people are not really spending their time typing “A/S/L?” (Age/Sex/Location) any more. Instead, they are watching videos.
A report from marketing platform HubSpot estimates that there are 1.6 billion short video users worldwide (about a fifth of the whole planet), and that this contributed 90% of all Internet traffic in 2022. They are expected to become the most popular type of content on social media, accounting for 40% of all videos.
Malaysians are, unsurprisingly, hot on this trend. Marketing services company KOLrader says of the over eight hours a day that an average Malaysian spends online, they have a social media usage rate of 81%. Facebook and Instagram have usage rates of 84% and 74%, respectively, making them the top social media platforms in Malaysia alongside TikTok and YouTube.
And what is big on these four sites? Streams of 60-second videos that continuously play and scroll, while users hunch a little over in torpor, uncertain if they really want to watch what they’re seeing.
Indeed, the fact that they’re so short means they’re easy to consume, like salty, buttery popcorn full of taste and air, both something delicious and nothing at the same time.
Social media management company Sprout Social shared that short-form videos get 2.5 times more engagement than long-form videos. Meanwhile, digital media measurement solution Media IDentity Graph finds that users of TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube spend more than two hours a day on average on each platform; meaning, if you are a regular user of all three of them, you are potentially spending almost half your waking hours watching short videos.
It may not surprise you that spending that much time essentially watching drips of fast-moving, easy-to-consume videos has its consequences. It interrupts sleep in teens, resulting in less attention and time being spent on school work, it increases procrastination while raising the risk of mental health issues like depression and anxiety.
And yet, I believe that at the root of what seems to be anti- social behaviour is in fact a yearning to connect with others. I believe this is the ultimate reason why we read books, and watch movies, and listen to songs. There is no better feeling than to watch somebody else create something that is so in tune with something you feel.
One finding that supports this idea is research that shows there is a correlation between people suffering from social anxiety and the likelihood of being addicted to short-form videos, including the creation of them. Perhaps neurotic users feel less anxious because they maintain their anonymity while still making that connection they want.
Yet, this ability to build virtual walls between yourself and what and who you connect with is precisely what I railed against earlier. You are connecting via short videos on social media apps, but it’s also too easy to disconnect when you feel anxious. While it’s tempting to use this form to enjoy a sense of safety when connecting with others, I also think there is value in learning how to navigate difficulties in relationships IRL, and hopefully in the process build better bonds with those you care about.
I’m afraid the only way to do this is to continually reach out to the kids around us, and let them realise that while technology makes it easy to keep in touch with others through perfect ones and zeroes, there’s value in looking up and out to reach out and make real, messy connections.
Logic is the antithesis of emotion but mathematician-turned-scriptwriter Dzof Azmi’s theory is that people need both to make sense of life’s vagaries and contradictions. Write to Dzof at lifestyle@thestar.com.my. The views expressed here are entirely the writer’s own.
