How Addictive Tech Exploits Our Evolutionary Needs
We evolved the need to be aware of anything important going on in our social circle
Living in a digitally enforced attention economy means being subjected to a constant assault of automated manipulation. Persuasive technology, as it’s now called, is a design philosophy taught and developed at some of America’s leading universities and then implemented on platforms from e-commerce sites and social networks to smartphones and fitness wristbands. The goal is to generate “behavioral change” and “habit formation,” most often without the user’s knowledge or consent.
Behavioral design theory holds that people don’t change their behaviors because of shifts in their attitudes and opinions. On the contrary, people change their attitudes to match their behaviors. In this model, we are more like machines than thinking, autonomous beings. Or at least we can be made to work that way.
That’s why persuasive technologies are not designed to influence us through logic or even emotional appeals. This isn’t advertising or sales, in the traditional sense, but more like war-time psy-ops, or the sort of psychological manipulation exercised in prisons, casinos, and shopping malls. Just as the architects of those environments use particular colors, soundtracks, or lighting…
