For the term project, I decided to do the whole course option that requires me to “Assemble a detailed overview of the course for a group of middle school or high school students; for your parents or grandparents; for business professionals, for university professors; OR for another audience.” I decided that the target audience for this project will be a group of parents and grandparents.

1. PSYCHOLOGICAL EFFECTS
OF THE INTERNET
TOM WENNERSTRUM

2. INTRODUCTION TO THE INTERNET
• Why do we fear the internet?
• Humans have always feared new technologies because we did not fully understand them.
• Older generations hear about the possible negative effects that may come from new
technologies and overestimate their severity and overall likelihood.
• Examples of revolutionary technologies that we once feared include television, novel reading,
bicycles, written language, pencil erasers, radio, calculators, landline telephones, chess,
radio…etc.
• Despite what some news sources may say, the internet is not making humans less intelligent or
slower. (Clive Thompson, 2014)
• In fact, the internet has tremendous upsides that strengthen our social connections, grant
educational opportunities to those who don’t have many, and make everything generally easier.
• Professional level employers prefer job applicants that are digitally literate, have a good
understanding of computers, and are well acquainted with social media in order to keep up in
our modern technology-based world. (Pew Research Center, 2016)

3. LEARNING VIA THE INTERNET
Image Source: http://clipartmonk.com/animated-brain-clipart

4. LEARNING VIA THE INTERNET OVERVIEW
• Academic benefits of internet-based higher education
• Internet access allows for people to obtain numerous free
forms of education
• How we can learn new skills from online videos

5. ACADEMIC BENEFITS OF INTERNET-BASED HIGHER
EDUCATION
• Internet-based higher education can lead to better mastery of material. (Gernsbacher)
1. Internet-based education consists of shorter, more frequent episodes of practice which
leads to better mastery of material than longer, less frequent episodes.
2. Distributed learning is more effective than massed learning.
• Internet-based higher education can optimize performance.
1. Allows for students to work on their courses at their optimal learning time.
2. Peak learning performance is at a different time of the day for each person, the flexibility
that is built in to internet-based education allows for students to work when they desire
to.
• Internet-based higher education can deepen memory.
1. Students can’t cheat on assignments because using the internet is encouraged.
2. Less cheating leads to better memorization of the course material.

6. ACADEMIC BENEFITS OF INTERNET-BASED HIGHER
EDUCATION (CONTINUED)
• Internet-based higher education can promote critical thinking.
1. There are plenty of resources available online that can help students to understand
certain topics.
2. The process of gathering information on the internet requires critical thinking.
3. Being able to think critically to discern between reliable and unreliable sources is a
helpful skill that everyone should strive to develop.
4. Active learning: Students learn to seek information rather than have it listed for
them.
• Internet-based higher education can enhance writing skills.
1. Students are required to write frequently in online courses.
2. Students also learn how to appropriately respond to other students’ online posts.

7. ONLINE INSTRUCTIONAL VIDEOS
• The internet has millions of readily accessible videos that can teach us
specific skills.
• Instead of spending money to hire someone to fix an appliance, people
can go online and learn the skills necessary to complete the project on
their own for much cheaper.
• Khan academy: An online organization that offers free videos containing
instructions on how to solve a certain academic problem.
• YouTube: A video-sharing website that stores over a billion videos,
including millions of recorded instructional walk-throughs.
Image Source:
https://www.youtube.com/yt/about/brand-

8. FREE EDUCATION ONLINE
• MOOC: Massive Open Online Courses
• 23,000 people finished a free online course offered by a professor at Stanford
University, which is far more than have ever completed a course from there
before. (Shirky, 2012)
• In-person lectures at large institutions did not create learning environments or an
intellectual community.
• Udacity: Free online education medium that has online lectures and graded
materials.
• Modern education is time consuming and far too expensive.
Image Source: https://www.ptcnews.tv/free-of-cost-
education-get-free-education-in-these-foreign-
countries/free1/

9. EDUCATING VIA THE INTERNET

10. EDUCATING VIA THE INTERNET OVERVIEW
1. Challenges that college students face today
2. U.S. Department of Education report
3. Daphne Koller’s Ted Talk

11. CHALLENGES THAT COLLEGE STUDENTS FACE
TODAY
• Traditional lectures where professors talk at their students is outdated. (Rhett Allain,
2017)
• 63% of STEM professors use extensive lecturing in their classes. (Dan Berret, 2012)
• “Poor teaching” is the most common complaint of STEM field dropouts. (Dan Berret,
2012)
• Textbook prices have increased tremendously, faster than houses, cars, and healthcare
. (David Kestenbaum, 2015)
• Later start-times are optimal for college students. Traditional college lectures start
early and are not flexible. (Evans et al., 2017)
Image Source: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/jessica-
beeli/dear-college-students-sto_b_9735730.html

12. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION REPORT
• “Evaluation of Evidence Based Practices in Online Learning: A Meta-Analysis and
Review of Online Learning Studies” (2010)
• This study was conducted in order to determine the efficacy of internet-based
formal education compared to traditional face-to-face learning.
• Researchers systematically searched for research literature from 1996-2008 and
analyzed the findings from each specific study in order to make a broader claim.
• Key finding: “The meta-analysis found that, on average, students in online
learning conditions performed modestly better than those receiving face-to-face
instruction.”

13. DAPHNE KOLLER TED TALK (2012)
• “What We’re Learning from Online Education”
• Daphne Koller and Andrew Ng founded a website called Coursera
that offers a free, online education to anybody with internet access.
• Koller and Ng’s goal is to “Take the best courses from the best
instructors at the best Universities and provide it to everyone
around the world for free.”
• Coursera has 43 courses, 640,000 online students, and over 14
million videos viewed.

14. DAPHNE KOLLER TED TALK (CONTINUED)
There are numerous benefits to Coursera and other online education platforms:
• Online education websites gives anyone access to high level courses.
• Individuals earn a certificate upon completing a course. This certificate can help
people get better jobs and college credit.
• Coursera is highly personalizable, meaning that students can complete the course
to the degree that they desire at their own speed.
• Coursera ensures that students engage with the material by adding built-in
lecture questions.
• New technology can grade ample amounts of problems and questions now so
grading does not require as much time or effort.

15. COMMUNICATING VIA THE INTERNET

16. COMMUNICATING VIA THE INTERNET OVERVIEW
• Has the internet made communication less
formal?
• Does the internet make communication briefer?
• Transience vs intransience
• Synchronous vs Asynchronous
• How to email a professor
• Writing vs Speaking
• Texting and literacy
Image Source: https://www.123rf.com/photo_58766928_stock-vector-
internet-communication-design-vector-illustration-eps10-graphic.html

17. HAS THE INTERNET MADE COMMUNICATION LESS
FORMAL?
•NO!
• Slang has existed long before the internet was invented.
• Humans have used shortened words or seemingly unprofessional
sentences to convey emotions throughout the entire duration of
history.
• Gernsbacher (2014)

18. HAS THE INTERNET MADE COMMUNICATION
BRIEFER?
•NO!
• Trying to fit as much information into as little space as possible is
no new phenomenon.
• Telegrams used charge message-senders a certain amount of
money per word. Because of this, people tried to abbreviate as
many words and phrases as possible while still making sense.
• Gernsbacher (2014)

19. TRANSIENCE VS INTRANSIENCE
• People are beginning to favor many forms of internet-based communication because
the contents of the conversations are intransient.
• Intransient text means that it is savable and can be referenced at a later point in time.
• Intransient text does not disappear unless it is manually deleted.
• Intransient text is also fileable, meaning that it can be saved and organized.
• Examples of intransient forms of communication include texting, messaging, emailing,
and communicating via other online platforms.
• Transient communication disappears after it is said.
• Talking on the phone is an example of transient communication. The messages that
were spoken no longer exist once the conversation is over.

20. SYNCHRONOUS VS ASYNCHRONOUS
• Asynchronous communication means that all members of a conversation do not
have to be present or available at all points in the exchange.
• Examples of asynchronous communication include texting and emailing.
• Synchronous communication requires that all members of a conversation be
available and committed to communicating at the same time.
• Examples of forms of synchronous communication includes phone calls and
Facetime calls.
• Asynchronous communication is usually preferred because it does not demand
that people be available at a specific time. It also gives the conversation
members time to create a message that is refined to include everything that an
individual wishes to say.

21. HOW TO EMAIL A PROFESSOR
• It is important to learn how to email a professor or someone of high standing in order
to come across as respectful. (“How To Email a Professor”)
1. Use your university/professional email account.
2. Use your professor’s last name in your salutation.
3. Start with a new message.
4. Write an informative subject heading.
5. Do not address a professor by their first name unless they have explicitly instructed you
to do so.
6. Write grammatically, spell correctly, and use appropriate capitalization.
7. Use paragraph breaks to help organize your message.
8. Don’t use email to rant or whine.
9. Write the body of the email message first; Fill in the address in the TO: line last.
Image Source: https://www.123-
reg.co.uk/email-hosting/

22. WRITTEN MESSAGES VS SPEAKING
• Humans have a preference for writing over speaking
• People respond more accurately to surveys where the participant replies
via text rather than via telephone call.
• Participants are less likely to straight-line, satisfice, and fall prey to socially
desirable responding when they respond to surveys in a written manner.
• One reason why this happens is because the participants have time to give
a thought-out answer due to the asynchronous nature of the text-based
survey.

23. TEXTING AND LITERACY
• Does texting hinder our digital literacy?
•NO!
• Texting and knowledge of textisms does not impact literacy. (Plester et al., 2008)
• Students who scored high in literacy could read and write messages in English
and textese very well. (Kemp, 2010)

24. BROADCASTING VIA THE INTERNET

25. BROADCASTING VIA THE INTERNET OVERVIEW
• Viral videos on the internet
• Revenge porn
• LinkedIn
• How is the way we get news changing?
• Fake news and digital literacy
• Steps to improve digital literacy

26. VIRAL VIDEOS ON THE INTERNET
• Charlie bit my finger: This video was not meant to be shared with only a small
number of family members but instead went viral.
• Ice bucket challenge: This trend was intended to go viral in order to raise money
to fight ALS.
• Why do videos go viral?
1. The content must be emotionally salient.
2. The content must have a point of connection.
3. The content usually has an element of surprise.

27. REVENGE PORN
• Revenge porn is unauthorized distribution and circulation of invasive (intimate/nude) photos
and/or videos on the internet.
• Social media outlets claim that revenge porn is banned on their sites but it is difficult to enforce.
(Ellis, 2017)
• Revenge porn is very hard to control because it is hard for social media outlets to infiltrate
closed groups.
• Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act grants immunity to message-board
owners and media outlets for what users do on their sites. (Leber, 2014)
• This act is one of the key reasons why there are no national laws against revenge porn.
• 29 states have now either passed laws or have introduced laws against revenge porn. (Leber,
2014)
• Wisconsin and California legal systems have made their first charges against revenge-porn
criminals. (Vielmetti, 2015)

28. LINKEDIN
• LinkedIn is an important website that
allows for job-seekers to form
connections with the professional
world.
• LinkedIn profiles have helped students
gain admission to prestigious
university programs. (Tyson, 2014)
• It is important to broadcast yourself in
a professional manner on online
business and employment-oriented
websites such as LinkedIn.
Image Source:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com
.linkedin.android&hl=en_US

29. HOW IS THE WAY WE GET NEWS CHANGING?
• Millennials get more news from Facebook than local TV, which is in contrast to
baby boomers. (Amy Mitchell and Colleagues, 2015)
• The internet news is now closing in on TV news use. (Gottfried, 2017)
• 2/3 of Americans get some news from social media. (Shearer and Gottfried, 2017)
• 36% of the time individuals got news online, they did so by going directly to a
news organization’s website or app. (Amy Mitchell and Colleagues, 2017)
• 40% of the time people got news was about government/politics.
• Yes, the way we get news is changing. We are now getting an increasing amount
of news from the internet.

30. FAKE NEWS AND DIGITAL LITERACY
• Fake news headlines fool Americans 75% of the time. (Silverman and Singer-Vine,
2016)
• People who say that Facebook is a major source of news are more likely to view
fake news headlines as accurate.
• Students are unable to detect biases between credible sources and “fringe”
sources. (Croft and Moore, 2017)
• Around 50% of students viewed fringe sources as accurate.
• If a site is higher up in the search results, then students are more likely to believe
that it is accurate. (Wineburg, 2017)

31. STEPS TO IMPROVE DIGITAL LITERACY
1. Look past the order of search results.
2. See if the quotes are in context.
3. See if the story is set in the future.
4. See if the article attacks a generic enemy.
5. Read the “About” page for the news organization.
6. Avoid all capital titles or photoshopped pictures.
7. Ask yourself if the story is too outrageous to believe.
8. Ask yourself if the story is too outrageous not to believe.
Image Source:
https://medium.com/@vibhutigupta/spreading-
digital-literacy-53092d2ac8ec

32. SOCIALIZING ON THE INTERNET

33. SOCIALIZING ON THE INTERNET OVERVIEW
• Online dating
• Internet trolls
• How to stop cyberbullying

34. ONLINE DATING
• Definition: Using the internet to arrange to meet somebody and possibly begin a
romantic relationship with them. (Oxford Learners’ Dictionary)
• Online dating popularity is growing very quickly.
• Dating plays off of interpersonal attraction.
• Online dating often works because people of the same niche are attracted to
each other. This is called the similarity attraction effect. (Wikipedia)
• Those who met their spouses online have expressed more marital satisfaction.
(Matthews, 2017)
• However, 53% of people lie on their online dating profile. (Thottam)

35. TROLLS ON THE INTERNET
• Internet trolls are prominent today, it is important that everybody learns their
motivations and how to handle one if encountered.
• Aggression depends on the individual’s perceptions and interpretations of other
people, their behavior, and the situation in which the behavior occurs. (Smith and
Mackie, 2007)
• A threat to a troll’s self esteem sparks aggression.
• Online trolls are more likely than others to show sins of sadism, psychopathy, and
Machiavellianism. (Gross, 2014)
• Sadism: Taking pleasure in other people’s pain or discomfort.
• Narcissism leads people to believe that they are better than others. (Lopes and
Yu, 2017)

36. TROLLS ON THE INTERNET (CONTINUED)
• Trolling is no new phenomenon.
• Albert Einstein dealt with trolls that ridiculed his ideas. (Newman, 2014)
• Famed philosopher Soren Kierkegaard also faced many trolls. (Popova, 2014)
His advice for dealing with trolls was to either pay them no attention or to talk to them
like normal people without acknowledging their trolling behavior.

37. HOW TO STOP CYBERBULLYING
• Cyberbullying is difficult to stop completely because of the anonymity that the
internet provides, but advances have been made.
• A “Commonsense knowledgebase” program (Bullyspace) uses an algorithm to
comb through online text and stop bullying situations. (Bazelon, 2013)
• Bullyspace also gives warning before posting a possibly harmful post.
• Another proposed way to hinder cyberbullying is to have an intervention on real
life bullies. The logic being that few cyberbullying occurs without real-life
bullying, so it would be helpful to stop the problem at the source. (Reynolds,
2017)
• Additionally, people have supported celebrity media campaigns against
cyberbullying. (Cunningham et al., 2015)

38. EMOTION AND THE INTERNET

39. EMOTION AND THE INTERNET OVERVIEW
• Emotional contagion on the Internet
• Emotional support via the internet
• Online social support groups
• Cats on the internet

40. EMOTIONAL CONTAGION
ON THE INTERNET
• Emotional contagion definition:
“Tendency to feel and express
emotions similar to and influenced by
those of others” (Dictionary.com)
• Emotional contagion creates clusters
and networks of happy and unhappy
people.
• Social network structure is very
impactful for how emotions spread
between individual people and groups
of people
Image Source:
https://www.theemotionmachine.com/how-to-use-
the-power-of-emotional-contagion-to-change-your-

41. EMOTIONAL CONTAGION ON THE INTERNET
(CONTINUED)
• Kramer et al. Study (2014)
• This study was designed to see if emotions expressed on the internet, Facebook in
particular, could influence others.
• The participants were 689,003 unknowing Facebook users and lasted a week.
• The study manipulated the extent to which people were exposed to certain emotional
expressions on their news feed.
• The researchers replaced or added additional positive words with negative ones on
participants’ news feeds (or vice versa) to see if the participant would use words from
the same or similar emotion.
• The researchers found that emotional states can be transferred online via emotional
contagion.

42. EMOTIONAL SUPPORT VIA THE INTERNET
• Online emotional support forums and websites are becoming much more
popular.
• Some reasons for this witnessed growth include:
If one needs to be alone but also needs support (Curd-and Wheyface, 2017)
If there is nobody around for you to tell something, then you can resort to the people
listening on the internet to talk to.

43. ONLINE SOCIAL SUPPORT GROUPS
• Emotional support groups are gaining popularity on the internet because they are
available to anyone with internet access, are much cheaper than meeting with
mental health professionals, and are anonymous.
• Social support groups have found to help patients with depressive symptoms.
(Goodwin et al., 2017)
• The researchers in Goodwin et al.’s (2017) study analyzed the pre- and post-
Internet Support Group depressive symptoms.
• The study found that depressive scores did not worsen and that there was a
statistically significant increase in reported self-efficacy.

44. CATS ON THE INTERNET
• Why do cat’s reign supreme on the internet over dogs and other animals?
 Because nobody expects cats to be funny. (Jin)
 Because cats are introverts, while dogs are extroverts. (Jin)
 Because dogs are trying too hard to please their owners. (Jack Shepherd, 2014)
 Cats’ reserved personalities entice us into paying attention to them and their thought
processes. (Jack Stein, 2012)

45. MOTIVATION AND THE INTERNET

46. MOTIVATION AND THE INTERNET OVERVIEW
• Distractions and laptop use in the classroom
• The effects of laptop use on students and professors
• Binge watching
• Types of motivation

47. DISTRACTIONS AND LAPTOP USE IN THE
CLASSROOM
• Students have been causing distractions in the classroom for far longer than the
internet has existed. (DeLucia and Lasenza, 1995)
• Some common distractions include arriving to class late, leaving class early, taking
naps during lecture, and talking while the professor is instructing.
• The main reason for why students, either intentionally or inadvertently, cause
classroom distractions is boredom.
• Boredom in classrooms results from unmet student needs for a higher degree of
classroom stimulation. (Aldridge and DeLucia, 1989)

48. LAPTOPS IN THE CLASSROOM
• Laptops allow students to take notes in a quick and organized way.
• Contrary to popular belief, students who use laptops do not perform worse in class
than students who take notes with paper and pencil.
• Students who use laptops also don’t impede the performance of others around them.
• Professors do not want students to use laptops because they rely on students’
nonverbal cues as feedback and as a source of enjoyment. (Mottett et al., 2004)
• Students’ motivation for going off-task during lectures is primarily boredom.
• Instructors talking with only one student, instructors having a monotone voice, and
the lecture hitting the 40 minute mark all increase boredom.
• If professors do not want students to go off task on laptops, then they should work on
how engaging their lectures are rather than blaming laptops.

49. BINGE WATCHING
• Binge watching is defined as “the practice of watching multiple episodes of a
television program in rapid succession, typically by means of DBDs or digital
streaming.”
• Some reasons for why people binge watch shows include: (Gernsbacher)
 Because it’s fun.
 Because it’s available.
 It allows for deeper connections with the characters to form.
 It is already paid for.
 It is usually commercial free.
 It is what everyone else is doing.
 It provides a sense of community.
 It enables a shared culture.
 To find out what happens next.
Image Source: https://www.complex.com/pop-
culture/best-movies-on-netflix/

50. MOTIVATIONS
• There are seven key motivations that drive humans to act in certain ways or make the decisions
that they do.
• These motivations can be observed in everyday life as well as in our internet behavior. (Huitt,
2011)
1. Stimulus-Response: Responding to an external stimulus.
2. Social: Achieving or maintaining social affiliation and affection.
3. Biological: Activating a specific sense or to maintain homeostasis.
4. Cognitive: Developing meaning or understanding, solving a problem, or making a decision.
5. Affective: Increase feeling good and decrease feeling bad.
6. Conative: Meet personally identified goals or obtain personal achievement.
7. Spiritual: Increase the understanding of the purpose of one’s life.

51. PERCEPTION AND ATTENTION TO THE
INTERNET

52. PERCEPTION AND ATTENTION TO THE INTERNET
OVERVIEW
• Are there any benefits to taking photos of our experience?
• Is the internet shortening our attention span?
• Are humans’ attention spans shorter than a Goldfish?
• How the internet can direct our focus

53. ARE THERE ANY BENEFITS TO TAKING PHOTOS OF
OUR EXPERIENCE?
• Taking pictures of an experience increases our overall engagement in that
experience. (Luttrell, 2016)
• More engagement in an experience typically leads to more enjoyment.
• Photo-taking directs greater visual attention to aspects of the experience that one
may want to photograph, therefore giving the photographer a greater
appreciation of the detail that exists.
• However, taking photos of negative experiences can also enhance the bad
experiences. (Zauberman)
• Also, cumbersome photography does not make the experience any better. (Purtill,
2016)

54. IS THE INTERNET SHORTENING OUR ATTENTION
SPAN?
• Attention span hasn’t decreased or increased in the past couple of decades.
• Millennials are not better at multi-tasking than other generations. (Tarranum,
2017)
• Taking short, controlled breaks on the internet actually improves attention.
(Science Daily, 2011)
• People may just be UNWILLING to pay attention rather than being UNABLE to.
• Attentional capacity hasn’t changed since before the internet was prominent.

55. IS HUMANS’ ATTENTION SPAN SHORTER THAN A
GOLDFISH?
• NO!
• False claim: The average American attention span in 2013 was 8 seconds, in 2000 it
was 12 seconds. The attention span of a goldfish is 9 seconds.
• This false claim was widely spread by news sources such as TIME, USA Today, and NBC
News.
• There is no real data to support this claim.
• Microsoft is often sited as a source for the information but they did not conduct any
experiments or offer a link to any credible research articles that explain the findings.
• Attention spans have been “remarkably stable across decades.” (The Wall Street
Journal, 2017)

56. HOW THE INTERNET CAN DIRECT OUR FOCUS
• The internet has proven to be an unnecessary distraction at certain times, such as
when an individual is driving or when they are working.
• But the internet also has given us apps that can help us direct our focus whenever
we need to.
• Apps have been created in order to limit phone use when driving.
• Also, the “Do not disturb” option that many phones have can limit distractions
while driving and while at work.

57. DECISION MAKING ON THE INTERNET

58. DECISION MAKING ON THE INTERNET OVERVIEW
• How Yelp reviews effect our behavior
• Trustworthiness of Wikipedia
• Decision making heuristics on the internet

59. HOW YELP REVIEWS EFFECT OUR BEHAVIOR
• Luca (2016) “Reviews, Reputation, and Revenue: The Case of Yelp.com”
• The Luca (2016) study compared reviews of restaurants on Yelp with the
Washington State Department of Revenue data to see how Yelp reviews impact a
restaurant’s revenue.
• The study found that a 1 star increase in Yelp ratings lead to a 5-9% revenue
increase.
• The study also found that Yelp reviews effect independent restaurants, not chain
restaurants.
• Changes in Yelp ratings were correlated with change in revenue.

60. TRUSTWORTHINESS OF WIKIPEDIA
• Wikipedia has historically gotten a bad reputation for being an unreliable source
of information. But how true is this negative stigma surrounding Wikipedia?
• It turns out that Wikipedia is actually very accurate on scientific topics.
(Wolchover, 2011)
• The overall accuracy of drug information on Wikipedia is about 99.7% accurate
when compared to textbook data. (Kräenbring et al., 2014)
• In a separate study, Wikipedia was rated highest by experts in accuracy, up-to-
dateness, breadth of coverage, and referencing for 10 mental-health topics
compared to 14 other frequently visited websites. (Reavley et al., 2012)

61. TRUSTWORTHINESS OF WIKIPEDIA (CONTINUED)
• An additional study found that scientists are beginning to use
information from Wikipedia in their own projects or scholarly papers
much more frequently, especially in developing countries. (Zastrow,
2017)
Image Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_Wikipedia

62. DECISION MAKING HEURISTICS ON THE INTERNET
• Representativeness heuristic: Occurs when an individual makes an assumption about
many other objects of a certain category based off of an individual’s personal
representative image of that object.
 People fall victim to this when they trust 2 5-star reviews over 200 4-star reviews of a
product.
• Availability heuristic: Occurs when an individual overestimates the likelihood of an
event happening because they had just recently heard about it.
 Example: Teens see pictures of others drinking alcohol on social media and think that
others drink far more often than they actually do.
• Anchoring and adjustment heuristic: Occurs when a starting number leads people to
adjust their answer based on the anchor number.
 Example: Making the starting price for the most basic object available for purchase high will
make all other objects seem appropriately priced when they are even higher.

63. DEVELOPMENT AND AGING WITH THE
INTERNET

64. DEVELOPMENT AND AGING WITH THE INTERNET
OVERVIEW
• Does the internet harm children’s development?
• Parenting types and technology
• Barriers that seniors face when adapting to a highly technological world
• Seniors also have many positive attitudes about using technology
• The benefits of seniors using technology
• The digital divide

65. DOES THE INTERNET HARM CHILDREN’S
DEVELOPMENT
• There is no hard evidence saying that the internet harms children’s development.
• The American Academy of Pediatrics suggests that children receive 1-2 hours of
screen time per day. Recent research has shown that this recommendation is
outdated and no longer holds true.
• While no use and excessive use of technology may have negative impacts on
adolescents’ development, moderate use may be beneficial. (UNICEF, 2017)
• There is currently no evidence to suggest that internet use has or has not had a
profound effect on brain development. (Mills, 2014)

66. PARENTING TYPES AND TECHNOLOGY
• Samuel’s (2015) article “Parents: Reject Technology Shame”
• Enablers: Parents whose kids have plenty of screen time.
• Limiters: Focus on minimizing their kids’ use of technology.
• Mentors: Take an active role in guiding their kids onto the internet.
Parents that are mentors can connect with their kids through technology.
Mentors are the most successful in preparing their kids for a world full of screens.

67. BARRIERS THAT SENIORS FACE WHEN ADAPTING
TO A HIGHLY TECHNOLOGICAL WORLD
• Pew Research’s (2017) report “Older Adults: Barriers to Adoption and Attitudes
Towards Technology”
1. Many seniors are not confident in their own ability to learn and use electronic
devices.
2. Older generations are not “digitally prepared”
3. Seniors are more likely to say they need others to show them how to use
devices.
4. Older adults may face physical challenges that make it difficult to use devices.
5. Seniors with a disability are less likely to utilize a variety of digital assets.

68. SENIORS’ POSITIVE ATTITUDES ABOUT USING
TECHNOLOGY
• Pew Research’s (2017) report “Older Adults: Barriers to Adoption and Attitudes
Towards Technology”
1. Once online, seniors make the internet a standard part of their daily routine.
2. A small share of older adults use social media, but those who use these
platforms tend to be highly engaged.
3. ¼ of adults age 65+ say that they play videogames.
4. Some seniors show a strong preference for early tech adoption.
5. Seniors also place a high value on the importance of home broadband service.

69. THE BENEFITS OF SENIORS USING TECHNOLOGY
• It is important that seniors overcome the barriers that they face in order to use
technology because the internet offers many benefits and advantages to those who
use it.
• Access to technology applications may enhance social connectivity and reduce
loneliness among older adults. (Czaja et al., 2017)
• Older adults that use the internet more have higher perceptions of self-efficacy.
(Erickson and Johnson, 2011)
• Higher levels of internet use were significant predictors of higher levels of social
support, reduced loneliness, and better life satisfaction and psychological well-being
among older adults. (Jinmoo et al., 2015)

70. THE DIGITAL DIVIDE
• Many students do not have access to the internet or modern technological
devices.
• Millions of students are being left-behind.
• In order to achieve a more equal education system, we must make the internet
and technology more easily accessible.
• Barriers: The change from the traditional style of learning would be monumental
and there may not be sufficient funding in many school districts.
• If possible, students should be given technology by the school to use in order to
learn new skills and to be integrated into the modern technological society.

71. PERSONALITY ON THE INTERNET

72. PERSONALITY ON THE
INTERNET OVERVIEW
• Big 5 personality traits
• Big 5 personality tests
• Personality on the internet
• Cambridge Analytica and the
2016 presidential election
• Selfies
• Humblebragging
Image Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits

73. BIG 5 PERSONALITY TRAITS
• Kendra Cherry’s article “The Big 5 Personality Dimensions: 5 Major Factors of
Personality”
• Extraversion: Contains characteristics such as excitability, sociability, talkativeness, and
high amounts of emotional expressivity.
• Agreeableness: Includes traits such as trust, altruism, kindness, affection, and other
prosocial behaviors.
• Conscientiousness: High levels of thoughtfulness, with good impulse control.
• Neuroticism: Emotionally unstable, anxious, moody, irritable, and sad.
• Openness: Tend to have a broad range of interests.

74. BIG 5 PERSONALITY TESTS
• Big 5 personality tests are often considered to be some of the best personality
tests.
• This is because:
Big 5 tests don’t try to categorize individuals, instead they place them on a spectrum
compared to others’ answers.
Big 5 tests don’t ask ambiguous, hypothetical questions.
Big 5 tests are direct and ask the test-taker to place themselves on a scale.
They are scientifically valid.

75. PERSONALITY ON THE INTERNET
• “Proportion of Variance in Internet Use Explained by Personality Traits”
• The proportion of variance is a test of how good of a predictor a variable is to a
specific outcome.
• This study analyzed how well personality traits were at predicting internet
behavior.
• The study found that personality traits are hardly accurate predictors of certain
internet behaviors.
• The only strong and consistent correlation that the researchers found is that
being a sadist is predictive of online trolling behavior.

76. CAMBRIDGE ANALYTICA AND THE 2016
PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION
• Cambridge Analytica claimed responsibility for Donald Trump’s victory in the
2016 presidential election.
• Cambridge Analytica claimed that they showed certain political messages to
different people on Facebook based on calculated personality types.
• This is not likely to be true because personality types do not predict internet
behavior, so identifying and targeting personality types based off of internet
activity is very difficult to do. (Kroll, 2018)

77. SELFIES
• There has been an incredible increase in the amount of selfies taken and the use
of the word “selfie” in the past couple of years.
• Humans have been taking selfies since long before cell-phone cameras existed.
• Posting a high number of selfies an individual posts does not correlate with
psychopathy or narcissism, instead it only correlates with the total number of
photos that an individual posts.
• Fun Fact: Similar to artists, people prefer to photograph their left side of their face
rather than their right side. (Bruno and Bertami, 2013)

78. HUMBLEBRAGGING
• Definition: To make a seemingly modest, self-critical, or casual statement or
reference that is meant to draw attention to one’s admirable or impressive
qualities or achievements. (Merriam-Webster)
• Sezer, Gina, and Norton’s (2017) paper “Humblebragging: A Distinct- and
Inefective- Self-Presentation Strategy”
• Humblebragging makes an individual appear to be insincere, less likeable, and
seem less competent.
• People humblebrag in order to elicit both sympathy and respect at the same time.
• This research was conducted because there was previously no research on the
psychological effects and causes of humblebragging.

79. CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY ON THE
INTERNET

80. CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY ON THE INTERNET
OVERVIEW
• Internet addiction
• Randomized control trials
• Kypri et al. (2014) study
• Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
• Methods of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

81. INTERNET ADDICTION
• Is internet addiction real?
• People have always feared addiction to new technologies, such as television,
books, and radios.
• Fear of internet addiction is caused by generational panic. This occurs when older
generations are fearful of technological advances that they are not well-
acquainted with.
• The internet itself may not be addicting, but the internet does enable certain
addictions.
Online gaming
Online shopping
Online gambling
Image Source:
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2016-03-
internet-addiction-misnomer.html

82. RANDOMIZED CONTROL TRIAL
• A randomized control trial is a scientific experiment which aims to reduce bias
when testing a specific treatment.
• There are two separate groups: A treatment group and a control group.
• Researchers randomly assign participants to one of the groups to minimize
selection bias.
• This model of scientific experiment eliminates extraneous variables from
interfering with the treatment that is being tested.

83. KYPRI ET AL. (2014) STUDY
• “Web-Based Alcohol Screening and Brief Intervention for Infant and Toddler Sleep
Disturbances”
• This study was a randomized control trial that tested the efficacy of a text-based alcohol
intervention.
• 3,429 university students that were eligible to participate in the study were divided into two
group: the control group and the experimental group.
• The experimental group received a 10 minute assessment of feedback on alcohol
expenditure, peak blood alcohol concentration, alcohol dependence, and access to help
information.
• The control group was screened and given no further treatment.
• The study found that, after 6 months, the participants that received the intervention
consumed less alcohol per typical drinking occasion compared to the participants in the
control group.

84. COGNITIVE BEHAVIORAL THERAPY
• Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is mental health counseling where you work with a
mental health professional in a structured way to help an individual become
aware of inna curate or negative thinking, so you can view challenging situations
more clearly and respond to them in a more effective way. (Mayo Clinic)
• CBT is a helpful tool in treating mental disorders or illnesses.
• CBT can help people learn how to better manage stressful life situations.
• Internet-based Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is as effective as face-to-face CBT
and more effective than doing nothing. (Adelman et al., 2014)

85. METHODS OF COGNITIVE BEHAVIORAL THERAPY
• “Try These Cognitive Restructuring Exercises to Improve Your Mood and Reduce
Stress” (Boyes, 2013)
Practice noticing when you’re having a cognitive distortion
Track the accuracy of a thought
Evaluate the evidence for/against your thought
Mindfulness meditation
• ”Self-Help- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT): Realistic Thinking” (Anxiety BC)
Use realistic thinking
• ”Procrastination: Getting Unstuck with CBT” (Hubbard)
Set SMART goals

86. THANK YOU!