You might be doing okay, getting by; you're really fulfilled in your life. Each human being carries something deep within us that encourages us to seek connection, and it is built in to ensure our survival. We have a desire for socialization and belonging. Sometimes, this very natural need is not met the way we might be truly desiring. So we maintain our livelihoods with a small, quiet ache at the center of our being. It might be saying: "No one really sees me." Or: "I don't matter here."
In conversations about how our society is evolving through the internet and our persistent use of AI, most people miss this element: The same small, quiet ache I am describing is driving a lot of what we're doing on the internet. As mental healthcare professionals, we are interested in how technology and AI use reshape people's relationships, attachment patterns, and sense of self.
Of central fascination to us is internet addiction: digital compulsion. An ancient craving for relief being met in a new way, new to our world and society.
Humans' nervous systems are activated and then seek safety, in a constant and persistent loop. We often talk about this as it pertains to our relationships and attachments; we fear insecurity, shame, or isolation, and want to find safety between people in fulfilling, reassuring relationships. Sometimes we go about this the wrong way because of default wiring from difficult upbringings.
But this behavior of our nervous system takes on many different forms --- it is not just between people. We want to destroy our depressive and anxious feelings and replace them with happy feelings, even in the most subtle ways, all the time.
The internet gives us fast, secure, and stimulating jolts of distraction from reality and plunging in feelings generated from human connection: oxytocin, and dopamine. But it is no longer human connection. And what will this mean for the world? Potential enslavement the same way we are slave to any addictive substance --- if you're not careful and attentive and willing to self-regulate.
We are often eager to trade the depth, risk, and complexity of a calmed nervous system through human connection, for a simple, personalized machine that can provide it for us now and in excess. As a hyperbolic example, this system is working the same way some might reach for cigarettes, drugs, alcohol, gambling, sugar/food, and sex.
Next time you reach for your phone, ask yourself what your nervous system is seeking relief from. Ask yourself if there is another, better, more tangible, lasting, and interpersonally connected way to do it.