A study conducted by Chicago University’s Both Business School has revealed some startling information about the kind of impact social networking and the Internet is having over the minds of people nowadays.

The objective of this study headed by Wilhelm Hoffman and his team was to gauge the will power of people aged between 18 and 85 ad how well they managed to resists their desires. The experiment had a sample size of 205 candidates and was conducted in the German city of Wurtzburg – well outside the confines of a traditional laboratory.

The results of the study would be published on Psychological Science journal

According to the results of the study, people fin it harder to resist the urge to do an online activity like a tweet or check email than going for a smoke or a drink. During the course of the experiment the participants were called and asked seven times a day for seven consecutive days to let the researchers know what desire they were experiencing at the time of the call – or 30 minutes prior to it. They were also told to reveal how strong the desire was with various rating options and to also reveal as to whether they intend to go ahead with the desire – or they resisted. At final count, the researchers had over 10,558 responses and over 7000 desire episodes.

While you will get to read the study in detail later, some highlights of the research included revelation that the respondents’ will power kept on getting lower with each passing hour of the day. Another startling fact was the finding that subjective reporting of desire was relatively low for tobacco, alcohol and coffee – all traditionally known to be highly addictive indulgences.

One reason being cited for the reason behind the desire for media being harder to resist is the fact that their availability in general is much higher. Add that to the fact that compared to other desires, it doesn’t cost as much to indulge in it. William Hoffman says; “With cigarettes and alcohol there are more costs – long-term as well as monetary – and the opportunity may not always be the right one. So, even though giving in to media desires is certainly less consequential, the frequent use may still ‘steal’ a lot of people’s time.”

 

 

 

 

 

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