All of this technology is supposed to be making our lives easier, right? But maybe sometimes we’re getting too much of a good thing. Cell phones, pagers, internet, e-mail, Wi-Fi almost everywhere – you name it! All of this technology is meant to help us to be more efficient in our daily lives so we can have some “me time”. But is that what is really happening?
No – all of this technology that’s supposed to be making our lives better is actually causing us MORE stress, studies say.
Cell phones can cause work to trickle over into home time for both men and women. But the interesting thing is that only women seem to have the opposite effect with cell phones bringing family worries into the office.
The study, published by the Journal of Marriage and Family, noted that ongoing use of mobile communications technology (cell phones and pagers specifically) was linked to heightened psychological distress and a reduction in family satisfaction. My cell phone causes me stress because I’m always misplacing it!
E-mail, too, has been studied and shown to actually decrease productivity in the workplace. Some employees feel under pressure to check and respond quickly with some checking their inbox up to 40 times an hour.
When you are working and have to break every few minutes to read and respond to an e-mail, going back to what you were doing is not as productive because you have lost your train of thought. And data shows that we are increasingly addicted to checking our e-mail, with 59% of portable device users (like PDAs or BlackBerrys) checking every single time an e-mail comes in. Additionally, 83% of survey respondents check their e-mail every day while on vacation.
People are even planning vacations around internet access, choosing hotels and places that have Wi-Fi or Ethernet access! A recent survey from AOL showed that a lot of people “have no shame” and detailed the many places they check their e-mail. People with portable devices check e-mail from bed (53%), in the bathroom (37%), and while in church (12%). No wonder why we feel chained to work! Of course not all emails are work related, but I would bet that a lot are.
So what can we do to “stop the insanity”, as Susan Powter would say? We need to get into the habit of turning off our cell phones and stepping away from the computer. Are you starting to panic already? Instead, try going for a walk or do some stretching. Or try communicating in person with your family and friends. One of the more common New Year’s resolutions is to spend more time with family. This is the perfect time to start to disconnect from technology and start to reconnect with life and loved ones!