How to think about technology
Determinism, Constructivism, Momentum

Randyconnolly
Professor, dept. computer science
Mount royal university
Calgary, canada

The common way of seeing technology is that
it is akin to a cue ball
impacting or altering the rest of society

In this perspective
key technological inventions
have transformedthe world.
Thus new technologies
need to be analyzed to understand the
wide changes they will enact.

This approach to technology
is generally referred to as
Technological Determinism

(society, politics, economy, psychology, etc)
Independent Variable
Dependent Variables
Technological Change
determines

It is understandable
why computer professionals find technological determinism attractive.
We are the people helping to invent new technologies

It is also understandable why media professionals find
technological determinism attractive.

It feeds our
clear desire
to be
socially
relevant

… and our desire to believe that we computer geeks (or media people)are the driver of social change, and not politicians, business people, or celebrities.

Most current historians and sociologists of technology
firmly reject technological determinism
theoretically inconsistent
because it is
empirically under-supported
and

The well-established academic field of
science, technology and society (STS) studies has time and time again found that when examined carefully
most technologies rarely have had the effect that was expected
or
had the transformative impact people claim.

Some examples …

First some fine examples of bridges in the United States in the late 19thcentury.
To begin, let’s look at a high technology of the 19thcentury: bridges.

1884http://bridgehunter.com/ny/orange/petticoat-lane/
1886http://bridgehunter.com/ny/orange/hubbard-road/

1886http://bridgehunter.com/ny/saratoga/hadley/
1869http://bridgehunter.com/pa/perry/rices

Now, contrast those to some bridges built in the United Kingdom at the same time.

1842http://historic-railway-buildings.fotopic.net/p13531318.html

1846http://historic-railway-buildings.fotopic.net/p12745082.html

1842http://historic-railway-buildings.fotopic.net/p13531319.html

1889http://www.flickr.com/photos/26354/122035079/

19 BChttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Pont_du_gard.jpg

368 ADhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Valens_Aqueduct_in_Istanbul.jpg

1859http://en.structurae.de/photos/index.cfm?id=34737 /

Again, contrast those to some bridges built in the United States at the same time.

1884http://bridgehunter.com/ny/orange/petticoat-lane/
1886http://bridgehunter.com/ny/orange/hubbard-road/

1850http://img.groundspeak.com/waymarking/display/b8d85c66-dec3-4020-a50e-411fc3f53549.jpg

1841http://historic-railway-buildings.fotopic.net/p13531471.html

British bridges were “treated as monuments symbolizing progress already achieved, the whole ethos surrounding their American counterparts was one of expectations of future progress.”
--Arnold Pacey, The Maze of Ingenuity: Ideas and Idealism in the Development of Technology
Both these bridges were built in 1890 and cross a similar width of river, one in Britain, the other in the United States

The hot new technology of the 1850s?

http://www.sewerhistory.org/grfx/components/pipe-early1.htm

What was the point of all this decoration?

1893 World’s Fair Chicago
-Edison DC (internal)
-Westinghouse AC (External)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:1924Stanley740-boiler.jpg

1912 Stanley Steam Car

Sholes original typewriters were plagued by the bars jamming when typist typed too quickly. Remington (which bought Sholes), solved the problem in the 1880s with qwerty keyboard (i.e., made it harder to type quicker) and also allowed salesmen to quick type TYEWRITER.
Example of alternate keyboard arrangement that is significantly quicker to type on.

“Because small, random events that happen early can be magnified to have great importance later, the eventual outcome can depend quite sensitively on circumstances –it is path dependent. … Such path dependence implies that the outcome can not be predicted with any certainty ahead of time.” Robert Pool, Beyond Engineering: How Society Shapes Technology(1997)

Technological determinism visualizes competing technologies as a marble in a bowl: gravity forces it towards the same destination regardless of the path it take (and thus technology is predictable)

Constructivist historians see technologies like a marble poised on top of an upside down bowl: the path the marble takes (and its resulting destination) can be quite different.
Its path can be quite complicated to understand, and requires examining factors such as: the dissemination of scientific discoveries, existing technological infrastructure, market judgments, organizational decisions, actions by key individuals, etc.

however

While the path a technology takes will depend on a wide variety of factors made near the beginning of a technology’s development,
it eventually follows a path that is constrained and difficult to veer from.
Some people have called this technological momentum.
A technology develops momentum or has inertia due to established interests (financial, educational, biases, social practices, etc) and it can be very difficult for a technology to shift or change drastically after that early stage.

Most technological deterministic impact prognosticators do their work by looking at the functional capabilities of a given technology
and then imagining the impact of those functions.

The introduction of anti-lock disc brakes have not
reduced accidents at all,
because drivers tend to drive faster and tailgate more closely due to the improved braking technology and also partly because of increases in the intensity of traffic due to unexpected changes in urban geography.

The introduction of household technology
did not end up creating,
in the words of Ruth Schwartz Cowan,
less work for mother,
but
in fact
more work
because of a series of social changes that could not have been predicted if one limited one’s analysis just to the functional capabilities of the household technologies.

it is always a mistake
“to assess the impact of a technology on the basis of inference from capabilities instead of on the basis of evidence”

If we do examine the evidence
we will see that the intrusion of ICT into reading is NOT improving human knowledge but doing the opposite

electronic
Reading comprehension

Are there differences in the reading experience between paper and screen?

There is evidence that YES
readers’ comprehension levels are significantly lowerwhen reading materials on the screen in comparison to reading paper materials

EvelandJr, W. P., & Dunwoody, S. (2001). User control and structural isomorphism or disorientation and cognitive load?: Learning from the web versus print. Communication Research, 28(1).
Liu, Z. (2005). Reading behavior in the digital environment. Journal of Documentation, 61(6).
Macedo-Rouet, M., Rouet, J. F., Epstein, I., & Fayard, P. (2003). Effects of online reading on popular science comprehension. Science Communication, 25(2).
Ji, S. W., Michaels, S., & Waterman, D. (2014). Print vs. electronic readings in college courses: Cost-efficiency and perceived learning. The Internet and Higher Education, 21.
Ackerman, R., & Lauterman, T. (2012). Taking reading comprehension exams on screen or on paper? A metacognitive analysis of learning texts under time pressure. Computers in Human Behavior, 28(5)
DeStefano, D., & LeFevre, J. A. (2007). Cognitive load in hypertext reading: A review. Computers in Human Behavior, 23(3).
Mangen, A., Walgermo, B. R., & Brønnick, K. (2013). Reading linear texts on paper versus computer screen: Effects on reading comprehension. International Journal of Educational Research.

Why
are comprehension levels lower?

Scanning while
Consuming electronic text

Research into actual behavior when consuming text online
provides clear explanation for diminished comprehension

Early research
into web usability quickly uncovered a very important fact about how people actually read on the web

How long do you spend visiting a web page?
You’re looking at the answer

The evidence for this is verystrong
It has been empirically verified via server records, eye tracking in labs, and monitoring software.

The science for this is very well validated empirically
Users are reading at best 20% of the text on a web page.

Are academics any different?

NOPE

Reading time: Paper
10-15 min

Reading time: acrobat pdf
1-2 min

users rarely have even remotely accurate insight into their actual scanning behaviors

Academic’s self- assessment of their pdfreading time
5-10 min

and
distraction
multitasking

One absolutely vital feature
of most current electronic reading devices is that they contain within them substantial potential for distractibility.

This potential distractibility
lowers comprehension levels and lowers task completion probabilities.

It is becoming progressively more common for people to multitask, especially in regards to different media technologies.

Who cares?
Some have argued that younger digital generation can multitask successfully

unfortunately
The evidence tells a different story

For instance

Bowman, L. L., Levine, L. E., Waite, B. M., & Gendron, M. (2010). Can students really multitask? an experimental study of instant messaging while reading.Computers & Education, 54 (4)
Levine, L. E., Waite, B. M., & Bowman, L. L. (2012). Mobile media use, multitasking and distractibility.International Journal of Cyber Behavior, Psychology and Learning (IJCBPL), 2(3), 15-29.
Ophir, E., Nass, C., & Wagner, A. D. (2009). Cognitive control in media multitaskers.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 106(37)
Aguilar-Roca, N. M., Williams, A. E., & O'Dowd, D. K. (2012). The impact of laptop-free zones on student performance and attitudes in large lectures. Computers & Education, 59 (4)
Fried, C. B. (2008). In-class laptop use and its effects on student learning. Computers & Education, 50(3),
Junco, R., & Cotten, S. R. (2012). No A 4 U: The relationship between multitasking and academic performance.Computers & Education, 59(2), 505-514.
Lee, Y., & Wu, J. (2012). The effect of individual differences in the inner and outer states of ICT on engagement in online reading activities and PISA 2009 reading literacy: Exploring the relationship between the old and new reading literacy.Learning and Individual Differences, 22 (3)
Judd, T., & Kennedy, G. (2011). Measurement and evidence of computer- based task switching and multitasking by ‘Net generation’ students. Computers & Education, 56 (3),
Brasel, S. A., & Gips, J. (2011). Media multitasking behavior: Concurrent television and computer usage. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 14(9).
Yeykelis, L., Cummings, J. J., & Reeves, B. (2014). Multitasking on a single device: Arousal and the frequency, anticipation, and prediction of switching between media content on a computer. Journal of Communication
Sana, F., Weston, T., & Cepeda, N. J. (2013). Laptop multitasking hinders classroom learning for both users and nearby peers. Computers & Education, 62.
Rubinstein, J. S., Meyer, D. E., & Evans, J. E. (2001). Executive control of cognitive processes in task switching. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 27(4)
Wood, E., Zivcakova, L., Gentile, P., Archer, K., De Pasquale, D., & Nosko, A. (2012). Examining the impact of off-task multi-tasking with technology on real-time classroom learning. Computers & Education, 58(1).

the evidence is very consistent
Heavy media multitaskers(of any age) have lower grades,
less self-regulation,
lower motivation levels,
and lowered learning

So is this just something that only those young kids are doing?

NOPE

How frequently will this person switch her attention between devices?

About every 2 to 5 seconds
Attention lengths of 5 seconds for laptop, and 2 seconds for TV

Multi-tasking on one device?
Task switch happens about every 19 seconds

Are we aware of how frequently we task switch?

NOPE

Test subjects underestimated their attention switches by
88%

In An overview of the evidence
researchers concluded that availability and usage of ICT had a direct and negative impact on literacy , knowledge, grades , and creativity (even after controlling for other factors)

please
is this almost over?

YUP

In all these cases
the expected social impacts of a technology
ended up being wildly wrong
because either the prognosticators
believed in a
naïve technological determinism

or
Because the prognosticators
Used simplistic future models
Based on the technology’s
Functional capabilities

The first step
Then we should take when Thinking
about social consequences
Of technology
is to remember
how rarely
technologies achieve their promise,
and indeed,
how many do the opposite.

The SECOND STEP IS TO RECOGNIZE THAT TECHNOLOGIES DO HAVE AN EFFECT ON PEOPLE AND SOCIETY.
MOMENTUM EXISTS … UNFORTUNATELY, THE PATH TAKEN BY A TECHNOLOGY IS OFTEN NOT THE ONE INTENDED, OR ONE THAT IS EASILY UNDERSTOOD.

The third step
Is not relying on
anecdotal evidence,
marketing hype,
or hasty web-based journalism
When looking for evidence about social effects of technologies.

There are many excellent evidence-basedacademic journals that should be your source for information about social consequences of new technologies.