Irresistible
"An urgent and expert investigation into behavioral addiction, the dark flipside of today's unavoidable digital technologies, and how we can turn the tide to regain control. Behavioral addiction may prove to be one of the most important fields of social, medical, and psychological research in our lifetime. The idea that behaviors can be being addictive is new, but the threat is near universal. Experts are just beginning to acknowledge that we are all potential addicts. Adam Alter, a professor of psychology and marketing at NYU, is at the cutting edge of research into what makes these products so compulsive, and he documents the hefty price we're likely to pay if we continue blindly down our current path. People have been addicted to substances for thousands of years, but for the past two decades, we've also been hooked on technologies, such as Instagram, Netflix, and Facebook--inventions that we've adopted because we assume they'll make our lives better. These inventions have profound upsides, but their extraordinary appeal isn't an accident. Technology companies and marketers have teams of engineers and researchers devoted to keeping us engaged. They know how to push our buttons, and how to coax us into using their products for hours, days, and weeks on end. Tracing the very notion of addiction through history right up until the present day, Alter shows that we're only just beginning to understand the epidemic of behavioral addiction gripping society.
Stats for nerds
3recommend
5mentions
4people
2017–2022years
80% recommend20% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- Swiping is a great interface to increase user engagement. But true gamification has two more subtle components too. - variable rewards - no ending cue (unlimited feed) Read Adam Alter's book, Irresistible to learn more about gamification.
- Ooo.. hard question. I read a mixture of fiction and non-fiction. There were only fiction books available in the jail libraries, so that was the bulk of my reading. In fiction my favourites were probably the Southern Reach trilogy and the 3 Body Problem trilogy. I also really liked Shantaram.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shantaram_(novel)
In non-fiction some of my favourites were several biographies of people who had conquered Everest. Superhuman by Dave Asprey. And this one:
https://www.amazon.com/Irresistible-Addictive-Technology-Bus...
I did make a list of every book I read but the jail destroyed it. I feel for the author of Shantaram: "His manuscript was destroyed twice by a prison guard, each time after he had written between 300 to 400-odd pages. Referring to this in interviews, Roberts said the guard was "a very harsh critic", remarking that "if you get past something like that, you can take some criticism when you get it from book reviewers.”"
- Related/more recent: "Irresistible: The Rise of Addictive Technology and the Business of Keeping Us Hooked" by Adam Alter back in March | https://amzn.com/dp/B01HNJIK70
As mentioned here: The relationship between social media use and well-being | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14082130
- The Classic "HOWTO" for software: Hooked by Nir Eyal (2009) https://amzn.com/dp/B00LMGLXTS
A New "History": Irresistible by Adam Alter (2017) https://amzn.com/dp/1594206643/
Your Recommendation: Addiction by Design by Natasha Dow Schüll (2014) https://amzn.com/dp/0691160880
- I should make a list but I don't keep one yet. I can tell you who comes to my mind off the top of my head
* Maryanne Wolf * Cal Newport * Jaron Lanier * Studies conducted by Facebook and brought to public attention by Frances Haugen
Not all are writing about kids specifically but rather humans in general. There are also plenty of psychotherapists specializing in internet addiction, you can look through some of their web pages to see what they are dealing with. I'm from a small European country, I'd recommend looking into local professionals.
It's true that there is a lot of hysteria and speculation and the grand experiment is still running. I admit I'm also biased by what I see in grown ups around me and by my own experiences. The apps and games our kids use are designed to make them addicted. And wasn't it in Irresistible by Adam Alter that managers of companies like Facebook and similar heavily regulate their kids screen times?
I'm not advocating for zero screen time. There are official recommendations from institutes of developed countries and I lean on those. I believe in limits on time and content and media education. They can also learn to deal with something dangerous slowly, they don't have to crash a thousand times.
