Speaker 1: Welcome to tech Stuff, a production of I Heart Radios
Speaker 1: How Stuff Works. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff.
Speaker 1: I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with
Speaker 1: How Stuff Works in My Heart Radio and I love
Speaker 1: all things tech And recently I attended a Techonomy conference
Speaker 1: in New York City where people from different parts of
Speaker 1: the technology space came together to give presentations and interviews
Speaker 1: about stuff like technology, government, society, and business. And most
Speaker 1: of the focus of the talk sort of gravitated toward
Speaker 1: a big question, will technology save us or will it
Speaker 1: destroy us? Now? I think ultimately everyone at that conference
Speaker 1: all agreed that that question, while compelling, masks the real question,
Speaker 1: which is will we work to save ourselves or will
Speaker 1: we allow ourselves to be destroyed? Technology, as it turns out,
Speaker 1: is really just a tool. It can facilitate either outcome.
Speaker 1: The determining factor, however, is us how we design and
Speaker 1: implement that technology. Now, that being said, technology can have
Speaker 1: real effects on us, and sometimes we might not even
Speaker 1: be fully aware of those effects. There was a lot
Speaker 1: of talk during the conference about how we tend to
Speaker 1: think about the Internet as a connective tissue that allows
Speaker 1: us to communicate with practically anyone anywhere on Earth. For
Speaker 1: many years, that was how we described the Internet. In fact,
Speaker 1: I would argue we still describe the Internet in this fashion.
Speaker 1: It's this global network of networks and you can easily
Speaker 1: get in contact with practically anybody at a moment's notice.
Speaker 1: But in reality, we've seen the Internet also serve as
Speaker 1: a means of creating silos of people who grow increasingly
Speaker 1: separated and insulated from each other, mostly from people who
Speaker 1: don't share their views, so they all end up an
Speaker 1: individual echo chambers that reinforce their views while simultaneously dismissing
Speaker 1: or denying the views of other people. So rather than
Speaker 1: a uniting force, the Internet is enabling greater division than ever.
Speaker 1: And there are a lot of reasons for that. And
Speaker 1: you could even argue that that is too narrow a view,
Speaker 1: that yes, that is happening, but it may be that
Speaker 1: that's not the only thing is happening, or not even
Speaker 1: the primary thing that's happening. So maybe someday I'm going
Speaker 1: to do a full episode or or perhaps even a
Speaker 1: short series about that topic. But today I just wanted
Speaker 1: to look at one specific component of this overall picture
Speaker 1: that factors into these discussions, and that component is addiction
Speaker 1: to technology, and addiction is a strong word. Uh, it
Speaker 1: may not be fully appropriate to use the word addiction,
Speaker 1: but it is the one that a lot of people
Speaker 1: do use to describe the kind of behaviors I'll be
Speaker 1: talking about. So for the purposes of simplicity, I'm going
Speaker 1: to use the word largely because I don't have an
Speaker 1: alternative that is as good at summing up the general meaning. Now,
Speaker 1: to understand the ideas behind this addictive nature of technology,
Speaker 1: I thought we could look at an older tech that
Speaker 1: I've covered before, and uh, it's from a Tech Stuff
Speaker 1: classic episode. I'm talking about slot machines. The technology of
Speaker 1: slot machines, when you really boil it down, is pretty simple,
Speaker 1: But the principle behind slot machines depends upon something that
Speaker 1: has nothing to do with the technology when you really
Speaker 1: boil it all down. Instead, it's depending upon human psychology
Speaker 1: and how through technology we can exploit the way we
Speaker 1: humans behave and make a profit from that behavior, because
Speaker 1: that's at the very heart of what we're looking at
Speaker 1: in tech today. Now, just in case you aren't familiar
Speaker 1: with a slot machine, it's like ambling device. Typically it
Speaker 1: has a panel that has divided up into columns, and
Speaker 1: each column is a reel or a wheel, if you
Speaker 1: can think of it that way. But it's a reel
Speaker 1: that has a selection of symbols on the outer side
Speaker 1: of that reel. So you put whatever the amount of
Speaker 1: money is into the slot machine for that particular machine.
Speaker 1: You know they're penny slots, they're hundred dollar slots, and
Speaker 1: then of course if you're in another country, it'll relate
Speaker 1: to whatever currency that country uses. But then you after
Speaker 1: you put the money in, you typically will pull a lever,
Speaker 1: or more frequently you'll push a button, and the reels
Speaker 1: begin to spin. The reels, by the way, it can
Speaker 1: be physical or they can be virtual. They can be
Speaker 1: digital reels on a video screen, or they can be
Speaker 1: actual physical reels that are spinning on a electro mechanical spindle.
Speaker 1: Then each reel stops. Typically they stop left to right,
Speaker 1: so if it's a three reel slot machine, it would
Speaker 1: go one to three, and if you have the right
Speaker 1: symbol that are aligned in a specific way, you win.
Speaker 1: There's no skill involved in playing a slot machine. There's
Speaker 1: only chance the symbols, like I said, could be permanently
Speaker 1: affixed to those physical wheels, or it could be a
Speaker 1: video screen that simulates a spinning wheel. I know people
Speaker 1: who won't play those games because they think of them
Speaker 1: as being somehow fixed that the video screen can show
Speaker 1: you any any, any collection of symbols at once, quote
Speaker 1: unquote it once, whereas a physical machine is different. But
Speaker 1: here's a secret, they're not really different at all. Now,
Speaker 1: some games will allow you to add in extra features,
Speaker 1: like you could play multiple credits at once, which typically
Speaker 1: means you get an increased payout if you do happen
Speaker 1: to win um, but it could also unlock extra features
Speaker 1: such as numerous potential lines that could represent a win. Typically,
Speaker 1: on a very basic machine, the three symbols have to
Speaker 1: line up in the center of each of those slots,
Speaker 1: and it has to be the same symbol on all
Speaker 1: three reels, and then you win. If one of those
Speaker 1: is offset, if it's a little too high or a
Speaker 1: little too low, it's the same symbol as the first two,
Speaker 1: but it's not in line, then it doesn't count. Some
Speaker 1: slot machines allow you to have multiple lines of play
Speaker 1: so that you can actually have those count, But otherwise
Speaker 1: there's not really that's not really skill. It's just that
Speaker 1: you're spending more money for a slightly increased chance of
Speaker 1: winning something. Um now I say slightly, and even that
Speaker 1: is a little misleading, because at the heart of a
Speaker 1: modern slot machine, there's a microchip that determines what result
Speaker 1: you're going to get, and typically it's based off the
Speaker 1: exact moment you either pull the lever or you push
Speaker 1: the button. When you do that, it stops a random
Speaker 1: number generator or r n G, and that r NGG
Speaker 1: is just cycling through millions or even billions of numbers
Speaker 1: for every set, and it's just going super fast. So
Speaker 1: the moment it stops that number is what determines whether
Speaker 1: or not you've won. It determines which stop each wheel
Speaker 1: or reel will hit. So you can think of that
Speaker 1: real is having numerous stops, some of which correspond to
Speaker 1: a symbol and some of which correspond to the blank
Speaker 1: space between symbols, and this random number generator figures out
Speaker 1: which ones those are for any given spin, and so
Speaker 1: it determines whether or not you win. In fact, you
Speaker 1: could technically strip all that other stuff out of a
Speaker 1: slot machine, the reels, the symbols, all that stuff, all
Speaker 1: the bells, and whistles. You could just have a random
Speaker 1: number generator, and you could just have a schedule or
Speaker 1: a sheet that indicates whether any particular number represents a win,
Speaker 1: and that would be the same thing, but you lose
Speaker 1: the theater of slot machines, the presentation, which is part
Speaker 1: of the appeal. So you could do that where just
Speaker 1: have a random number of generator. It tells you whether
Speaker 1: you want or lost, but that's not nearly as sexy
Speaker 1: as the slot machine. Modern slot machines use a lot
Speaker 1: of sensory stimuli to kind of entice and reward players. So,
Speaker 1: as I said, there's no skill in the game, there's
Speaker 1: not really any way to meaningfully improve your chances. You
Speaker 1: could boost a payout, but your chance of actually hitting
Speaker 1: a payout doesn't improve. Um, you could add lines of
Speaker 1: play and that might move the needle a little bit,
Speaker 1: but so little that it doesn't make a huge difference.
Speaker 1: And also, when you pay more money when you do lose,
Speaker 1: it means you're losing more money on that spend than
Speaker 1: you would on a regular spend. So how the heck
Speaker 1: are slot machines even popular if the odds are bad
Speaker 1: and you know the payouts are rare and it's all
Speaker 1: based on random number of generators. How can they be
Speaker 1: so popular? And when I say popular, I mean really popular.
Speaker 1: If you visit a casino, especially in the United States,
Speaker 1: they typically slop sans will typically take up about eight
Speaker 1: percent of the casino floor space on the playing floor,
Speaker 1: which means that you only have twenty percent reserved for
Speaker 1: things like table games, like games like black jack and
Speaker 1: roulette and craps and that kind of stuff. So slot
Speaker 1: machines dominate the physical space of casinos. They also can
Speaker 1: account for between seventy to eight percent of the profits
Speaker 1: for the house. It's big business. There's some regions in
Speaker 1: the United States where gambling is legal, but the only
Speaker 1: type of gambling that's allowed our slot machines. So what's
Speaker 1: going on? How come they're so popular if it's just
Speaker 1: a random number generator. Well, at the heart of it
Speaker 1: is the psychology behind playing a slot machine, and it's
Speaker 1: pretty ingenious and more than a little scary. The psychological
Speaker 1: design is largely based off the work of a famous
Speaker 1: psychologist named B. F. Skinner, who heavily researched human behavior.
Speaker 1: So back in the nineteen thirties, B F. Skinner researched
Speaker 1: what he was calling operant conditioning. This is a method
Speaker 1: of learning that relies upon either rewards or punishment for
Speaker 1: a combination of the two, and the basic principle is
Speaker 1: pretty darn easy to understand. If a behavior is followed
Speaker 1: by pleasant consequences, were more likely to engage in that
Speaker 1: behavior again. If it results in unpleasant consequences, were more
Speaker 1: likely to avoid engaging in that behavior, which again follows
Speaker 1: common sense right. If you do something and something good
Speaker 1: happens as a result, you're more likely to do it again.
Speaker 1: If you do something and something bad happens to you,
Speaker 1: you're probably not as eager to try it again. So
Speaker 1: if I bite into a chocolate bar, I'm going to
Speaker 1: have the sense of pleasure as I taste the chocolate,
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna think, oh, I want to do that
Speaker 1: again in the future. But if I bide into i
Speaker 1: don't know, an old sneaker, I'm probably not gonna enjoy
Speaker 1: it very much, and I'm probably not likely to go
Speaker 1: and do that again in the future. So by the
Speaker 1: nineteen forties, Skinner developed what he called an operant conditioning box.
Speaker 1: Just about everyone else uses the term Skinner box, and
Speaker 1: it was a box that you would put a small
Speaker 1: animal into, like a rat or a pigeon, and typically
Speaker 1: would have a lever in the box. UM there would
Speaker 1: be in the classic skinner box and electric grid on
Speaker 1: the floor. UM. Some of them would also have speakers,
Speaker 1: a couple of indicator lights, and a food cup. And
Speaker 1: he would put animals like pigeons or rats in the
Speaker 1: box and train them to see how or not even
Speaker 1: train them, just really letting them learn. Through this method,
Speaker 1: he wanted to sort out three types of responses that
Speaker 1: can follow any given behavior. So these responses or operant
Speaker 1: fall into three categories. There's neutral oprint uh, this has
Speaker 1: no effect on the probability that a particular behavior would
Speaker 1: be repeated or not. Then you have reinforcers. This is
Speaker 1: a type of operant that would encourage behavior repetition and
Speaker 1: thus increase the probability that the critter inside the box
Speaker 1: would do whatever that thing was again in the future.
Speaker 1: And reinforcers can be either positive reinforcers or negative reinforcers.
Speaker 1: A positive reinforcement encourages repeated behavior in return for a reward. Well,
Speaker 1: a negative reinforcement encourages repeated behavior by removing something unpleasant.
Speaker 1: So some people will conflate negative reinforcement with punishment. Those
Speaker 1: are two different things. Punishment is the third operant. By
Speaker 1: the way, punishment is where you punish a subject for
Speaker 1: making the wrong choice, as opposed to rewarding a subject
Speaker 1: for making the right choice. Negative reinforcement remains removing something
Speaker 1: unpleasant when the person or a thing makes the correct choice.
Speaker 1: So for example, let's say that I've got a room
Speaker 1: and there's a button on a little table in the room,
Speaker 1: and you are put into the room, and then the
Speaker 1: ramans are blasting at a very uncomfortable volume, and you
Speaker 1: want to just have some peace and quiet, and you
Speaker 1: know that if you push the button it will stop
Speaker 1: the um the ramons blasting at you. The behavior I'm
Speaker 1: trying to get you to do is to push the button.
Speaker 1: So you push the button, the negative stimuli goes away.
Speaker 1: That's negative reinforcement. Uh, And when it comes back, you
Speaker 1: push the button again. So now I have essentially trained
Speaker 1: you on this behavior where you know if you push
Speaker 1: the button you will prevent having the ramones blasted at you.
Speaker 1: The positive reinforcement would be you come in, You're in
Speaker 1: a room, there's a table with a button on it,
Speaker 1: You push the button and then you get a reward
Speaker 1: of some sort like a slice of pizza or something.
Speaker 1: So those are the basic operant categories neutral reinforcers punishment.
Speaker 1: So a typical experiment when involved putting a hungry rat
Speaker 1: inside a Skinner box and if the rat were to
Speaker 1: move the lever, typically it was done accidentally as the
Speaker 1: rat was just exploring its box. UH. That would cause
Speaker 1: a pellet of food to fall down a little shoot
Speaker 1: into the food cup inside the box, and so the
Speaker 1: rat would then get a food pellet, and before long
Speaker 1: the rats would learn to associate that moving the lever
Speaker 1: meant that a food pellet would come down, and so
Speaker 1: they would start to press the lever again and again
Speaker 1: in order to get the rewards. Uh. Skinner also did
Speaker 1: an experiment with negative reinforcement in which he would run
Speaker 1: a weak current through that electric grid in the box,
Speaker 1: which would cause the rats to experience discomfort. It wasn't
Speaker 1: like a strong enough electric current to truly shock the rat,
Speaker 1: but it was not a pleasant sensation, and hitting the
Speaker 1: lever would shut off the current for a while. So
Speaker 1: the rats would learn to hit the lever and turn
Speaker 1: off the current as quickly as possible. Now that bit
Speaker 1: doesn't really fall into what we use was lot machines,
Speaker 1: because as far as I know, casinos aren't using negative
Speaker 1: reinforcement to keep people playing, at least not yet. However,
Speaker 1: Skinner then went a step further to learn more about
Speaker 1: the reinforcement method of learning. He wanted to see what
Speaker 1: would happen if you were to change the schedule of reinforcement.
Speaker 1: What happens if you stop dispensing pellets when the rat
Speaker 1: hits the lever? So first the rat learns that hitting
Speaker 1: the lever dispenses pellets, Then you stop dispensing pellets. How
Speaker 1: many times will the rat hit the lever before it
Speaker 1: gives up, before it realizes that the thing that was
Speaker 1: working is no longer working and that behavior fades away.
Speaker 1: How long does it take for it to abandon that behavior.
Speaker 1: Skinner worked with other behavioral lists to determine things like
Speaker 1: response rate, which is how frequently an animal like a
Speaker 1: rat would hit the lever in an effort to get
Speaker 1: a pellet, and the extinction rate, and that's the rate
Speaker 1: at which animals would give up if they were not
Speaker 1: being rewarded. Then, by adjusting the frequencies at which a
Speaker 1: reward would come out. Skinner and others could determine the
Speaker 1: balance that would encourage the most work for the slowest
Speaker 1: rate of extinction. So, in other words, how frequently do
Speaker 1: you need to dispense a reward so that the rat
Speaker 1: doesn't give up and is incentivized to continue engaging in
Speaker 1: that behavior. Skinner discovered that the best approach was to
Speaker 1: use a variable ratio method, meaning there was no set
Speaker 1: number of lever pushes needed between rewards. It would change.
Speaker 1: So it might be that the first time you hit
Speaker 1: the lever you get a pellet. Then you have to
Speaker 1: hit the lever four more times before the next pellet
Speaker 1: comes out. Then two times and another pellet comes out,
Speaker 1: then three times and another pellet comes out. And they
Speaker 1: found that by using this variable ratio approach, you could
Speaker 1: extend the amount of time that the animal would engage
Speaker 1: in the behavior you wanted it to do. Now, I
Speaker 1: would like to tell you that we human beings are
Speaker 1: better than rats, but as it turns out that it's
Speaker 1: not true. We humans behave the same way, and that's
Speaker 1: what the design of slot machines is ultimately predicated upon.
Speaker 1: A slot machine promises payouts. In fact, a lot of
Speaker 1: slot machines in casinos have a payout rate of or more, meaning,
Speaker 1: over the life span of the slot machine, it will
Speaker 1: pay out about of the money it takes in in
Speaker 1: the long run. But the key phrase of that is
Speaker 1: in the long run, not in a play session. Over
Speaker 1: the entire lifetime of the slot machine, the likelihood of
Speaker 1: any one spin resulting in a jackpot is very low.
Speaker 1: It could be just a fraction of a fraction of
Speaker 1: a percentage point. Lower payouts have better odds, and if
Speaker 1: you sit at a slot machine long enough, you're likely
Speaker 1: to at least get a low payout hit. Now, that
Speaker 1: hit might not be enough to offset the amount of
Speaker 1: money you poured into the machine. In fact, more often
Speaker 1: than not it won't be, but it could be enough
Speaker 1: to keep you playing the game, and that's the rub.
Speaker 1: Here are a couple of other tricks that slot machines
Speaker 1: used in order to keep you playing the game. The
Speaker 1: odds of a specific combination coming up depends in part
Speaker 1: on how many of the corresponding symbols there are on
Speaker 1: the stops of each wheel or reel in that machine.
Speaker 1: So let's say you've gotten old fashioned three real slot machine.
Speaker 1: It's a physical one. You've got these three wheels, uh,
Speaker 1: and on that outer edge you've got the symbols on them.
Speaker 1: And the symbols include things like cherries and oranges and
Speaker 1: the good old bar sign. And let's say that the
Speaker 1: the jackpot symbol is a bag of money. It's got
Speaker 1: a bag and a little dollar symbol on it, and
Speaker 1: that represents the really big jackpot. Each reel also has
Speaker 1: a number of stops on it, and these are all
Speaker 1: the possible positions the real could be and when it
Speaker 1: stops rotating, which is completely determined by that microchip. Some
Speaker 1: of those stops have a symbol associated with them, you know,
Speaker 1: a cherry or an orange or the bag of money.
Speaker 1: Some of the stops actually represent the blank space between
Speaker 1: symbols on the reel. So let's say our machine has
Speaker 1: fifty stops per real, so each reel could stop in
Speaker 1: one of fifty different configurations. The bag of money represents
Speaker 1: just one stop on each of the three reels. So
Speaker 1: you do have a bag of money on real one,
Speaker 1: Reel two, and Real three, but you have forty nine
Speaker 1: other things on those reels as well. So what are
Speaker 1: the odds that you would hit all three of those well,
Speaker 1: it's one out of fifty times one out of fifty
Speaker 1: times one out of fifty and then multiplying by a
Speaker 1: hundred to get the percentage, which comes out to point
Speaker 1: zero zero zero eight chance. That's the chance you have
Speaker 1: of hitting the jackpot. Not great odds. But we're not
Speaker 1: done yet. I'll explain more in just a second, but
Speaker 1: first let's take a quick break. All right. So I
Speaker 1: mentioned earlier that the big jackpot might have a really
Speaker 1: low likelihood of popping up. But slot machine manufacturers have
Speaker 1: come up with ways to avoid discouraging players. They built
Speaker 1: in systems that would make it more likely that that
Speaker 1: bag of money symbol, for example, might appear lined up
Speaker 1: on the first two reels more frequently, which gives the
Speaker 1: player the sense of a near miss. So you get
Speaker 1: a bag of money, a bag of money, and oh,
Speaker 1: shoot cherries or a blank spot. That's nothing right there.
Speaker 1: There's no payout with that, but it feels like it
Speaker 1: was almost something because you had two out of the
Speaker 1: three bags you needed to hit the jackpot. It's like
Speaker 1: you almost got that big payout, but in reality, you
Speaker 1: didn't almost do anything at all. You've got a result
Speaker 1: based on a random number generator in the machines circuitry
Speaker 1: that amounted to a loss. The way the machine displayed
Speaker 1: that loss to you was in a way that made
Speaker 1: it seem like it was almost a win. So to us,
Speaker 1: it feels like we near really grabbed that brass ring,
Speaker 1: so if we just stick at it, we're gonna get it. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: other symbols might take up far more space on the reels,
Speaker 1: symbols that would result in a much lower payout, thus
Speaker 1: increasing the likelihood that you'll at least get some combination
Speaker 1: that represents a more modest wind if you play long enough.
Speaker 1: At least that's the way it looks on the outside right,
Speaker 1: that the odds of hitting a low payout might be
Speaker 1: closer to So we get two types of rewards. One
Speaker 1: are of these small payouts, which, if the machine is
Speaker 1: working properly, tends to be less than what we've poured
Speaker 1: into the machine in the first place, or at least
Speaker 1: the payout is less than what the machine has been
Speaker 1: collecting for that day. And another are these near misses
Speaker 1: that make us feel like we're getting closer to that goal. Now.
Speaker 1: Once in a blue moon, these machines will do the
Speaker 1: jackpot payout Uh, that's part of what keeps people playing
Speaker 1: these games is the promise that it can happen, but
Speaker 1: it doesn't happen freak ly. The odds alone tell you
Speaker 1: that it's pretty rare. Now, in addition to all that,
Speaker 1: we humans are also really good at recognizing patterns. This
Speaker 1: becomes more important with video slot machines. In fact, we're
Speaker 1: so good at recognizing patterns we will frequently perceive a
Speaker 1: pattern where there is no pattern, or at least no
Speaker 1: pattern that has been consciously created. So, for example, when
Speaker 1: you look at clouds and you see faces in them
Speaker 1: or other complex shapes, that's your brain applying a pattern
Speaker 1: to something that is actually random and not ordered. With
Speaker 1: slot machines, we're looking at the creation of patterns. Three
Speaker 1: symbols in a row would be a pattern. So there's
Speaker 1: another little psychological boost that keeps us playing even if
Speaker 1: we're not in a lucky streak, because we're looking for
Speaker 1: those patterns. We find that very satisfying. Now, there are
Speaker 1: a lot of people who give advice on how to
Speaker 1: play slot machines well, but at the very end of
Speaker 1: the day, you have to acknowledge the slot machines are
Speaker 1: designed to take money. There's no way to skillfully play
Speaker 1: a slot machine. You can use some wisdom to help
Speaker 1: pick out machines that might have more favorable odds for
Speaker 1: a payout, but those odds are are favorable because they
Speaker 1: ultimately benefit the house. You have very few decisions when
Speaker 1: it comes to playing a slot machine, and generally speaking,
Speaker 1: in house games, in casino games, gambling games, you narrow
Speaker 1: the odds between you and the house in those games
Speaker 1: where you have more options as a player, assuming that
Speaker 1: you are pursuing optimal play, that you're playing without mistakes.
Speaker 1: That's asking a lot because optimal play is a pretty
Speaker 1: tough skill to develop. But with slot machines, there's not
Speaker 1: really much you can optimize, so you're not really going
Speaker 1: to narrow those odds very much. Now, in addition to
Speaker 1: all I've just said are the more flashy slot machines
Speaker 1: that have come out over the last couple of decades.
Speaker 1: Many of these include using licensed i P to attract
Speaker 1: players to them. So if you walk around a modern casino,
Speaker 1: you're gonna see a lot of slot machines that are
Speaker 1: modeled after licensed material there licensed from popular movies like
Speaker 1: the Lord of the Rings franchise. That's one that my
Speaker 1: friends Shannon really likes, or television shows like the series Friends.
Speaker 1: These machines frequently include music and video clips to help
Speaker 1: lure people over to play them there they're more demographically
Speaker 1: aligned to capture certain types of people, and then the
Speaker 1: gameplay is what keeps them there. Um. They might also
Speaker 1: include bonus features that make the game more exciting to
Speaker 1: play without significantly increasing the likelihood of a big payout. Okay,
Speaker 1: so I've covered the psychology of slot machines, So why
Speaker 1: did I spend so much time on that. It's because
Speaker 1: many developers of both software platforms and apps rely upon
Speaker 1: those same sort of designs when they're creating their work.
Speaker 1: They designed the experience to have that same sort of
Speaker 1: reward system for users, and that encourages users to spend
Speaker 1: more time on the platform, which ultimately benefits the developer
Speaker 1: in some way. Now, that way could be through advertising.
Speaker 1: If you go to advertisers with data a out how
Speaker 1: many users you have and the average amount of time
Speaker 1: those users spend per day on your product, you've got
Speaker 1: a pretty powerful tool in your sales toolbox. If you've
Speaker 1: got a lot of users that use A that spend
Speaker 1: a lot of time on your on your platform, you
Speaker 1: can ask for better rates, and you can get better sponsors,
Speaker 1: and you can assure those sponsors that people using your
Speaker 1: services are spending more time doing that and less time
Speaker 1: doing other things. So advertisers one eyeballs, right, if the
Speaker 1: eyeballs are all on your app, they're not other places,
Speaker 1: So they want to be where the eyeballs are. That's
Speaker 1: your app. So it gives you a lot more leverage,
Speaker 1: and it allows you to have much better rates, sales rates.
Speaker 1: You're gonna make a lot more money, So you've got
Speaker 1: a really strong incentive to encourage people to look at
Speaker 1: your app or service for a long time and not
Speaker 1: at other stuff. Another possibility is that maybe you're using
Speaker 1: pay for content or pay for elements in your service,
Speaker 1: and this could be done in place of or in
Speaker 1: conjunction with advertising. A lot of mobile games use this method.
Speaker 1: You play the game and you make a little progress,
Speaker 1: so you receive that little psychological reward for achieving things
Speaker 1: in the game, little dopamine going through your system. But
Speaker 1: sooner or later you hit a barrier, maybe you run
Speaker 1: out of turns or lives in a game. Maybe you
Speaker 1: need a boost to get past a certain point in
Speaker 1: the game. Whatever the case, you typically have two options
Speaker 1: in most of these types of games. One is that
Speaker 1: you wait a given amount of time before you can
Speaker 1: try again, with no guarantee of success. So you might
Speaker 1: have to wait thirty minutes or an hour before you
Speaker 1: can try again and you aren't sure if you're gonna
Speaker 1: make any progress. Option two is that you can pay
Speaker 1: some money and in return you get immediate gratification, either
Speaker 1: you get more turns or lives, or maybe some sort
Speaker 1: of in game asset that makes it easier to get
Speaker 1: beyond that part of the game. Now, this isn't just
Speaker 1: something we see in mobile games. It's how the business
Speaker 1: model of shareware works too. When I was in high school,
Speaker 1: games like Castle Wolfenstein re D used that model. Developers
Speaker 1: would release the first level or the first part of
Speaker 1: a game for free so you could easily get your
Speaker 1: hands on that version and you could play through to
Speaker 1: your heart's content, and when you reach the end of
Speaker 1: whatever that free section was, you would typically get a
Speaker 1: message that would encourage you to purchase the rest of
Speaker 1: the game if you enjoyed what you had done. And
Speaker 1: it was an effective tool and one that a lot
Speaker 1: of gamers actually approved of because it gave them a
Speaker 1: chance to try out a game before committing real money
Speaker 1: to it, and if the game was good, many people
Speaker 1: were willing to cough up the cash to get the rest.
Speaker 1: So while the shareware model followed a bit in the
Speaker 1: wake of Skinner's work, it wasn't seen as predatory because
Speaker 1: you could just say like, well, you know, I played it.
Speaker 1: It didn't really impress me. I'm going to walk away.
Speaker 1: Now that's not necessarily the case with apps and services
Speaker 1: that are popular today, whether it's the algorithm that serves
Speaker 1: up a feed of content on a social platform cough
Speaker 1: Facebook cough, or the propensity of game features like looped
Speaker 1: crates that became incredibly pervasive. Over the last couple of years.
Speaker 1: We've seen developers exploit the same behavioral tendency, and we
Speaker 1: as consumers, have engaged in those behaviors again and again,
Speaker 1: just as predictably as the rats in Skinners experiments. Now,
Speaker 1: this also plays into the larger concept of game theory.
Speaker 1: How do you balance out different factors to maximize engagement
Speaker 1: with games? Developers have to balance challenges and rewards carefully.
Speaker 1: If a game is too easy, players may become bored
Speaker 1: and move on to something else. If it's too challenging,
Speaker 1: they become frustrated and they won't stick with it. So
Speaker 1: it needs to be challenging enough to the player so
Speaker 1: that when they win a game or achieve a goal,
Speaker 1: there's a sense of accomplishment, and this needs to be
Speaker 1: repeatable to keep the experience going. The same theory can
Speaker 1: be applied to other stuff, not just too explicit games.
Speaker 1: So let's take Tender for example. The dating app Share
Speaker 1: is a lot in common with slot machines. Users flick
Speaker 1: through photos of other users, swiping left or right, and
Speaker 1: there's a quick psychological reward. Either you find someone attractive
Speaker 1: or you don't, and you pass judgment, then you move on.
Speaker 1: So if that person has similarly passed judgment upon you
Speaker 1: and found you attractive, and you found them attractive, then
Speaker 1: you can connect. All the elements are there. And I'm
Speaker 1: not getting on a high horse here. I'm as guilty,
Speaker 1: or probably even more guilty than any of you guys
Speaker 1: out there. I find myself having to be mindful to
Speaker 1: not be actively using some device that's got a screen
Speaker 1: on it. Otherwise that's where you're gonna find me, is
Speaker 1: behind a screen. I try to make rules for myself,
Speaker 1: and they are hard for me to follow because I'm
Speaker 1: pretty darn addicted to screens. It takes effort for me
Speaker 1: to not whip out my phone as soon as I
Speaker 1: sit down to eat, for example, or if I'm in
Speaker 1: line anywhere, I want my phone out in my hand.
Speaker 1: But even when I'm at home, I'm usually either are
Speaker 1: playing a game or watching something online. I have numerous
Speaker 1: tabs open all the time in my browsers. I play
Speaker 1: some mobile games that are definitely built on top of
Speaker 1: this understanding of human behavior, and I find myself growing
Speaker 1: more disenchanted with it overall. And we're starting to see
Speaker 1: a bit of backlash against this trend in broader culture.
Speaker 1: This includes articles, books, public speaking engagements, politicians, activist organizations,
Speaker 1: and more. There are lots of articles out there pointing
Speaker 1: out our tendency to spend more time in front of screens.
Speaker 1: A recent article in The Chicago Tribune cited a study
Speaker 1: conducted by a nonprofit group called Common Sense Media that
Speaker 1: found US teenagers are spending about nine hours each day
Speaker 1: on some sort of digital media, and adults. Don't feel
Speaker 1: good about yourselves because we're even more extreme eleven hours
Speaker 1: per day devoted to screen time. Now, this prompts us
Speaker 1: to ask the question, is that much time in front
Speaker 1: of screens harmful to us? Should we be concerned that
Speaker 1: we're dedicating so many waking hours to interacting with digital
Speaker 1: media that it is encouraging this behavior and rewarding us
Speaker 1: in psychological ways for engaging in it. Could we actually
Speaker 1: be hurting ourselves and each other through these practices. Now,
Speaker 1: as it turns out, there are a lot of people
Speaker 1: who have stuff to say about this particular set of ideas,
Speaker 1: and as you might imagine, the responses range from well,
Speaker 1: of course, this is dangerous and harmful behavior and we
Speaker 1: need to do something about it, to a more cautious
Speaker 1: statement like, we honestly don't have enough empirical evidence to
Speaker 1: support any sort of conclusion on the matter. So as
Speaker 1: tempting as it is to come to one, the responsible
Speaker 1: thing to say is we don't know enough yet. So
Speaker 1: in our next section will dive into some of those arguments,
Speaker 1: and some of them will appeal to common sense, But
Speaker 1: it's good to remember that common sense isn't always right.
Speaker 1: Sometimes we'll draw a conclusion because we all see a
Speaker 1: correlation that ends up being impossible to support upon further study. Remember,
Speaker 1: correlation and causation are not the same thing. Sometimes the
Speaker 1: correlation can indicate a causal sort of relationship between two things,
Speaker 1: but it's not always the case. So when we come
Speaker 1: back from this break, we'll look further into this issue
Speaker 1: and we'll be right back. Okay, So it's pretty clear
Speaker 1: people are spending more time with digital medium than ever before,
Speaker 1: and if we're dedicating time to those screens, we might
Speaker 1: also be taking time away from other tasks. So at
Speaker 1: some level you could argue that spending time on digital
Speaker 1: media can have a negative impact if we're neglecting real
Speaker 1: world issues while we are engaged in the digital world.
Speaker 1: But to make that argument convincingly, we need more data. Further,
Speaker 1: there are many who might argue that because we're spending
Speaker 1: so much time on digital media, we're hurting our own
Speaker 1: ability to form meaningful connections with other people in the
Speaker 1: real world. There's a growing concern that we're relying more
Speaker 1: on online interactions than ones in a physical space, and
Speaker 1: we're seeing it reflected in multiple behaviors, such as relying
Speaker 1: more heavily on text and essueing phone calls. Most of
Speaker 1: the people I know will not answer the phone, even
Speaker 1: if they know who it's coming from. They would rather
Speaker 1: just have a text. They actively avoid having to talk
Speaker 1: on the phone. It's a social interaction that they don't
Speaker 1: want to have. So we're choosing interactions that don't connect
Speaker 1: us with each other in more traditional ways and arguably
Speaker 1: more meaningful ways. But the jury is still out over
Speaker 1: whether or not this constitutes actual harmful behavior. Is an
Speaker 1: online relationship less meaningful or emotionally fulfilling as one done
Speaker 1: in real space? Can we even draw any sort of
Speaker 1: conclusion about that in general or does it depend upon
Speaker 1: the actual situations and individuals involved On a case by
Speaker 1: case Base says it may be that we cannot make
Speaker 1: a generalization about the health of an online relationship versus
Speaker 1: and a meat space relationship. Now, from an armchair psychology standpoint,
Speaker 1: you could argue that the online world has deprived us
Speaker 1: of a sense of intimacy that we tend to crave.
Speaker 1: And I'm not speaking solely of romantic intimacy, though that
Speaker 1: can play apart two. Rather, I'm talking about the intimate
Speaker 1: connection between two people in a one on one interaction,
Speaker 1: not a romantic intimacy, but just a human connection. It
Speaker 1: is very tempting to argue that the rise and popularity
Speaker 1: of things like a S m R style videos in
Speaker 1: which a creator focuses their attention on the viewer in
Speaker 1: some way in an effort to soothe, relax or tingle
Speaker 1: that person, is evidence that we in general lack the
Speaker 1: sort of connections in our day to day lives. We
Speaker 1: crave that connection and that we're not getting and that
Speaker 1: has given birth to an entire genre of videos that
Speaker 1: have become incredibly popular over the last five years. If
Speaker 1: you do a quick search on YouTube for the terms
Speaker 1: personal attention, you're going to find thousands of videos catering
Speaker 1: to that audience. These videos tend to feature one or
Speaker 1: more creators speaking to the camera and microphones as they
Speaker 1: serve as a stand in for the viewer, so they
Speaker 1: are simulating the sort of interactions people would otherwise have
Speaker 1: in real spaces. It's possible that the popularity of this
Speaker 1: genre is in part due to a decline in such
Speaker 1: meaningful interactions happening in the real world, but without an
Speaker 1: actual study investigating the matter, it's not scientifically responsible to
Speaker 1: make that claim. You could say, I suspect I have
Speaker 1: a hypothesis that this is because of that, but until
Speaker 1: I test it, I cannot really be certain. Also, these
Speaker 1: sort of end up being very tricky to arrange because
Speaker 1: there are a lot of potential variables that could affect
Speaker 1: the outcome, and isolating all those variables is notoriously difficult
Speaker 1: to do. In these sort of social uh survey and
Speaker 1: social scientific studies, they're very very challenging. It's much more
Speaker 1: challenging than say, taking a substance and saying is this flammable?
Speaker 1: That's pretty easy claim to test. These sort of claims
Speaker 1: much trickier. Now. We might also draw the conclusion that
Speaker 1: all this technology is hurting our ability to focus on
Speaker 1: specific tasks and interactions. When our world is filled with
Speaker 1: notifications and demands for our attention, are we giving anything
Speaker 1: our full focus at any given time or are we scattered?
Speaker 1: There are a lot of articles suggesting that that's the case,
Speaker 1: that we're not capable of really focusing on things anymore,
Speaker 1: though again, few studies really back up this claim, And
Speaker 1: I should also point out that this doesn't mean the
Speaker 1: claim is false, That just because it's not yet supported
Speaker 1: by scientific research doesn't mean it's wrong. It just means
Speaker 1: we can't be certain. You can make a claim and
Speaker 1: not have evidence, and you can end up being right,
Speaker 1: but you have to have the evidence to prove whether
Speaker 1: or not you're right. People who follow me outside of
Speaker 1: tech stuff might know that I used to do a
Speaker 1: show called Podcast Without Pretense with my co hosts Eric
Speaker 1: Sandean and I as actar, and the show gradually evolved
Speaker 1: into a sort of jokey experiment. Each week, one of
Speaker 1: us would pick a movie, usually a really poorly reviewed
Speaker 1: film that we could watch on a streaming service like Netflix,
Speaker 1: and then we would set time aside to watch the movie.
Speaker 1: Each of us would make time in the week to
Speaker 1: try and watch the movie, and the rule was you
Speaker 1: could not have any distractions present while you tried to
Speaker 1: watch the film. No second screens, no smartphones out, no laptops,
Speaker 1: nothing like that. It was just you and the movie.
Speaker 1: And then we'd each write down how long into the
Speaker 1: film we lasted before we either grabbed a second screen
Speaker 1: because we didn't want to pay full attention to the
Speaker 1: film anymore, or we just gave up entirely and turned
Speaker 1: the film off, which happened more rarely than you would think.
Speaker 1: Usually we would just give up and grab a second
Speaker 1: screen and keep on going. Now, this was in reaction
Speaker 1: to that same feeling that our dependence on technology meant
Speaker 1: that when we do something like try and watch a show,
Speaker 1: we'd have another screen open at the same time, and
Speaker 1: it would leave us feeling like we hadn't really watched anything,
Speaker 1: that we were just sort of there while it was happening.
Speaker 1: So this was sort of us testing our ability to
Speaker 1: focus on a topic even if that topic didn't deserve
Speaker 1: our attention, and dedicate all of our attention to it,
Speaker 1: and it wasn't easy, even when the films weren't absolutely awful. Similarly,
Speaker 1: claims that screen time is harmful in of itself, while
Speaker 1: appealing on a common sense level, haven't had a lot
Speaker 1: of critical scientific study. It's a challenging thing to explore.
Speaker 1: You might see a rise in screen time and a
Speaker 1: similar trend in people seeking help to treat depression, so
Speaker 1: that is attempting connection there. But does that mean people
Speaker 1: are becoming more depressed as they spend more time interacting
Speaker 1: with screens or could it mean that depressed people seek
Speaker 1: out screens as a means to help alleviate their depression.
Speaker 1: One does not necessarily cause the other, and it could
Speaker 1: be that both trends have no meaningful connection at all.
Speaker 1: They're both on the rise, but maybe they both stem
Speaker 1: from a common source that doesn't have a connection between
Speaker 1: the two. Now, I say all this to remind myself
Speaker 1: just as much to remind all you that these are
Speaker 1: complicated issues. I have my own opinions, which typically lean
Speaker 1: toward the idea that more screen time and less interaction
Speaker 1: in real space is probably not the most psychologically healthy
Speaker 1: behavior we could engage in. But I also must admit
Speaker 1: that I don't have any scholarly evidence to support this,
Speaker 1: and that most of my conclusions are really drawn from
Speaker 1: my own personal experience, and as any good scientist will
Speaker 1: tell you, anecdotal evidence isn't really evidence at all. At
Speaker 1: the same time, for my own mental health, I feel
Speaker 1: the need to do something, and so I've been trying
Speaker 1: to sort of wean myself off of my dependence of
Speaker 1: social media and screens to see if that has a
Speaker 1: positive impact on my life. I'm not the only one
Speaker 1: drawing these sort of tentative conclusions, and some people are
Speaker 1: far less cautious in connecting the dots than I am,
Speaker 1: but they also are more educated in the field than
Speaker 1: I am, So it's not meant to be a dig So,
Speaker 1: for example, the Chicago Tribune piece that I mentioned earlier
Speaker 1: in this episode, the author, Drene Dodge and McGee is
Speaker 1: a psychologist and a researcher, and she believes that there
Speaker 1: is a connection between an increase independence upon technology and
Speaker 1: the rise of depression among certain populations in the United States.
Speaker 1: She connects increased usage with declining mental health, and she
Speaker 1: may be right, but I still worry that without some
Speaker 1: carefully designed studies, we can't be sure that that's the
Speaker 1: actual flow of behavior. That is, that people begin to
Speaker 1: experience a decline and mental health as they use more
Speaker 1: and more technology, instead of people are using more and
Speaker 1: more technology as a result of them already dealing with
Speaker 1: a decline in mental health. Like, without establishing the actual
Speaker 1: causal relationship there, I don't think you can make any
Speaker 1: real conclusions. Now, another factor we should take into consideration
Speaker 1: is what is the actual behavior being reinforced through these
Speaker 1: various technologies and services if the purpose is to capture
Speaker 1: eyeballs for the purposes of generating revenue, And nearly every
Speaker 1: case does boil down to that if you go far enough,
Speaker 1: the best you might be able to say is that
Speaker 1: it's not necessarily doing direct harm to someone. If the
Speaker 1: design is meant to convince someone to pour money into
Speaker 1: a service, you could argue that the service can be
Speaker 1: financially harmful to those who are vulnerable to the reinforcement cycle.
Speaker 1: And while social networks can help people connect with one
Speaker 1: another and stay in touch, if the algorithm that populates
Speaker 1: a news feed is selecting which posts you see and
Speaker 1: which ones you don't in an effort to convince you
Speaker 1: to spend more time on that platform, you're not really
Speaker 1: engaging with those friends and loved ones. Instead, you're seeing
Speaker 1: a curated list that isn't meant to create meaningful connections,
Speaker 1: but rather keep you on the platform longer so that
Speaker 1: the platform can serve you more ads. If you're lucky,
Speaker 1: just like with a slot machine player, than some percentage
Speaker 1: of those posts you are seeing are actually meaningful and
Speaker 1: do help you create those close connections, but otherwise you're
Speaker 1: being fed stuff with the intent of keeping you there.
Speaker 1: From a business standpoint, I can totally understand that design
Speaker 1: businesses generate revenue, and generally speaking, you want as much
Speaker 1: revenue as you can earn. You want that revenue to
Speaker 1: grow year over year. To return money on the investment
Speaker 1: for building the business in the first place. Publicly traded
Speaker 1: companies face growth targets each year with the goal of
Speaker 1: creating a return for shareholders, But that just means that
Speaker 1: the business has to find ways to make more money,
Speaker 1: not to make money in a responsible or a compassionate way.
Speaker 1: As long as the business isn't outright violating any regulations
Speaker 1: or laws, it's pretty much fair game. And this has
Speaker 1: created the environment we see today and has enabled companies
Speaker 1: to create services that incentivize us to use them more
Speaker 1: and more. They can serve up ads, and in the
Speaker 1: case of companies like Facebook or Google, they can use
Speaker 1: the collected data that we generate to great advantage. So
Speaker 1: even if the use of these strategies isn't directly causing
Speaker 1: us harm, it is certainly an attempt to manipulate us
Speaker 1: into being ever more dependent upon those services, and it
Speaker 1: totally works, just as it worked in those rats in
Speaker 1: Skinner's experimental box. Now there are people out there who
Speaker 1: are dedicated to breaking this dependence on technology. In some cases,
Speaker 1: it all starts with more tech. There's an app called Moment,
Speaker 1: for example, and it tracks how much you use your
Speaker 1: phone in her tablet and includes a breakdown of which
Speaker 1: apps you use most frequently and for the longest amount
Speaker 1: of time. Sometimes just getting quantifiable data can help you
Speaker 1: get some perspective. For some people, the results might not
Speaker 1: be a surprise or even alarming, but for others it
Speaker 1: could serve as an incentive to try and reduce the
Speaker 1: amount of time spent on devices. There are books and
Speaker 1: camps dedicated to helping people break free of technology dependence,
Speaker 1: and I think that can be well intentioned. But I
Speaker 1: also want to point out that the world we live
Speaker 1: in skews pretty darn heavily in favor of people who
Speaker 1: are making use of technology or communication systems. Means of
Speaker 1: finding work, uh commerce systems and more grow increasingly tech dependent.
Speaker 1: I think it's not realistic to truly shed your use
Speaker 1: of technology, to go off the grid entirely and be
Speaker 1: meaningfully interacting with society at large. I suppose it's possible,
Speaker 1: but it's really really hard to do. I do think, however,
Speaker 1: you can make some choices to reduce your dependence on
Speaker 1: technology if that's your goal. Now. For me, I plan
Speaker 1: on stepping back a significant amount later this year. En
Speaker 1: I'm likely deactivating my Facebook account in June of two
Speaker 1: thousand nineteen. And this is a choice I'm making for myself.
Speaker 1: I'm not urging anyone to do Likewise, I don't pretend
Speaker 1: that I have the answer for everyone out there. Heck,
Speaker 1: I'm not even certain that cutting back on screen time
Speaker 1: and social platforms will have any meaningful positive effect in
Speaker 1: my day to day life, but something I'm going to
Speaker 1: try in an effort to be more engaged with the
Speaker 1: people around me and my real world community. So we'll
Speaker 1: see if it makes an impact in the meantime. If
Speaker 1: you guys have any suggestions for future topics of tech stuff,
Speaker 1: or you have any questions or comments for me reach out.
Speaker 1: You can do so through email. The address is tech
Speaker 1: stuff at how stuff Works dot com, or on Facebook
Speaker 1: or Twitter. The handle for both of those is text
Speaker 1: stuff HSW. I'm eager to hear what you guys think
Speaker 1: about this stuff. Also, remember you can pop on over
Speaker 1: to our website, tech Stuff Podcast dot com. I promise
Speaker 1: I don't use any of those tricks to try and
Speaker 1: keep you on that site forever, but you can search
Speaker 1: the archive and look at all the past episodes we
Speaker 1: have up there in case you want to see if
Speaker 1: there's something specific in our library. And you can also
Speaker 1: pop on over to our merchandise store if you want
Speaker 1: to get a tech Stuff T shirt or a hat
Speaker 1: or a coffee mug or something like that. And remember
Speaker 1: every purchase you make goes to help the show. We
Speaker 1: greatly appreciate it, and I'll talk to you again really soon.
Speaker 1: Hext Stuff is a production of I Heart Radio's How
Speaker 1: Stuff Works. For more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit
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