The human mind, especially the young one, is drawn to consistency and comfort. Up until recently for most of us this wasn’t achievable with just typical hardships like boredom, manual labour, etc. being an inevitable part of our day. The developed world has eliminated this, and we can live in relative physical comfort almost perpetually, and raise our children in such a world.

For young people, consistency is a huge attraction. It builds trust and comfort in a world where they typically have little control or understanding as they learn about the world. They don’t have autonomy and rely on adults for protection and guidance. Technology provides them a source of this consistency.

When they’re online, whether it’s gaming or scrolling, they have a predictable experience, and this predictability is comforting. Even if it’s unhealthy, even if it sometimes angers or upsets us, we are drawn to the reinforcement of our expectations and world views. This above all else for young people is the attraction of technology.

Layered on top of this are patterns of reinforcement. Dopamine hits as we see things which are funny, amusing or thrilling. Confirmations of our ways of thinking and feeling that validate us and make us feel heard and seen.

This reinforcement, especially in young people, will mean that the behaviour becomes stronger and more likely to occur. Similarly, if they have challenging experiences in the tangible world, they reach for a device to soothe themselves and are immediately reinforced with a familiar and calming experience.

This will strengthen the bonds and associations that we give to different programs, devices and the digital world as a whole, increasing our reliance on it without any use of cognitive or emotional strategies that could intervene better, and help us grow.

These processes are self reinforcing. As our behaviour drives us away from tangible, challenging experiences, and it’s reinforced through comfort as we go back to the technology, it both increases the chances of it happening again through conditioning, but also reduces our resilience and tolerance for discomfort.

This then increases the speed at which we turn to tech to be comfortable and stable, and begins the process again.

In a lot of cases, in particular with how we respond to overuse, we can actually reinforce really unhealthy behaviours through a process called Counter Conditioning. This requires three steps:

1. Tech Overuse Occurs,
2. We remove the tech and they respond negatively with frustration, anger, sadness, etc.
3. After a period of time, we discuss the return of tech and how we’re only trying to do what’s best for them.

What this actually does is create an association between the final positive outcome, (which is two things, the return of tech, and a nice moment where they feel heard by their family or leaders) and the negative interaction of an argument.

This counter conditioning process means that, despite our intentions, we are actually teaching the young person the way they get their back is through the negative emotions. They will respond that way more regularly, and they may even begin to turn towards those negative emotions in order to get what they want more regularly and in other circumstances.

There’s more to the circumstance than just young people’s use of tech and how it makes them feel though. There’s also our behaviour as parents, families and a wider community. The “Intensification of Parenting” is a real phenomenon where parents have gradually had more and more pressure piled on them, the expectation being that they’re developmental psychologists, nutritionists, cleaners, exercise scientists, and supposed to be 100% invested in their child’s development at all times.

This is not only impossible, but unhealthy, but there’s very little likelihood of it lessening any time soon. As a result, what ends up happening is that parents and educators feel pressure to keep young people engaged and productive. Technology is a very easy way to feel like we’re doing this, with a young person claiming they’re “bored” as being a sign of failure.

However it’s not only normalised, because so many others are doing it, the things that used to be normal such as having kids play outside alone, are now looked on negatively. This increases the drive to have kids indoors, where the level of stimulation and engagement is low and the opportunity to turn to tech is very easy.

We’re also more afraid than ever. Developed countries, in particular western ones, are highly fearful of young people being alone, outside and/or bored. We’re afraid of them being unhappy or uncomfortable as signs that we’re failing, or even worse that if we allow this to happen that we’re traumatising them.

We’re afraid of being judged by others, as not doing what seems to be normal and accepted, and we see the world as one which is dangerous and our young people as incapable of navigating it without us.

So we lean into the things that make them happy, comfortable, within our reach and sight and therefore safe from harm so we believe. It might even make us feel like good parents or educators, but it’s driven by fear, and only when we understand and confront that fear can we make the right decisions.

These are just some of the factors which contribute to tech overuse. It’s wrapped up in multiple levels of individual, familial and social challenges that we’re all facing together. It’s a mixture of meeting unmet needs, and the development of a reliance on tech.

At its heart though is challenge and resilience. Technology does not really challenge us, even when it’s designed to, like games, it’s still predictable, consistent and within our control.

Life is about the uncontrollable, resilience is about growing and building back up after adversity that we don’t have the tools to navigate yet. Whilst tech is a big part of our world now, it’s still only a part of it and the best, and worst parts, are beyond it.