Riley Kane

Adam Padgett
UWRIT 1102
April 5, 2015
Technology and Disorders

There are many disorders out there, many that we are born into and many that we
fall into while trying to please everyone in this judgmental world. One of the most
popular disorders that is becoming more and more common among kids is ADHD.
ADHD stands for Attention Deficit/hyperactivity Disorder. This is a chronic condition
that includes difficulty paying attention, hyperactivity, and impulsive behavior. Children
that have ADHD are distracted very easily, usually unable to be still, very talkative, and
antsy. This disorder has become a very large concern among parents of young kids
because their schoolwork and learning abilities are being directly affected by it. Another
type of disorder that is very relevant in todays society is eating disorders. There are
multiple different types of eating disorders; the most common ones are anorexia, bulimia,
and binge eating. Anorexia is self-starvation, when someone doesnt eat so they lose an
excessive amount of weight. Bulimia is when someone eats an excess of food and then
forces him or herself to throw up so that they do not gain weight. And binge eating is
when someone eats an excess of food, to where theyre uncomfortable, but does not do
anything about it. These are all psychological disorders that develop over time and all of
them can be life-threatening. The last disorders that are being discussed are sleeping
disorders, which include abnormal sleeping habits and patterns. There are many different

types of sleeping disorders, a few of them include: insomnia, which is having a hard time
falling asleep or staying asleep, sleepwalking, nightmares, and sleep paralysis, which is
when your mind is aware of what is going on but your body is still asleep and unable to
move. Sleeping disorders can occur in people of all ages and can affect someones health
and everyday life. All three of these disorders have something in common and that is
technology. Technology contributes to or has an affect on eating, learning, and sleeping
disorders.
In the article Television and Video Game Exposure and the Development of
Attention Problems, the authors discuss how watching television and playing video
games frequently can contribute to attention disorders. These authors conducted an
experiment where the kids teachers as well as their parents examined a random group of
1,323 middle school students over a 13-month period. The parents recorded how often
their kids were sitting in front of a television screen, and the teachers reported the kids
attention spans. After doing this experiment for 13 months, they came to the conclusion
that watching television and playing video games can increase attention problems in
children. After research, the authors came up with some hypotheses as to why
technology might contribute to attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder. One
hypothesis they came up with is kids that watch a lot of television have a hard time
paying attention in less exciting environments because they get so accustom to the
excitement of television shows and video games. Another hypothesis they came up with
is because television and video games have such a rapid change in focus, children cannot
keep focus on tasks that are slow or boring. In the article Attention Deficit
Hyperactivity Symptoms and Internet Addiction, Yoo did a study to see if there is a

relationship between attention deficit disorder and Internet addiction. Yoo took 535
elementary school students and had them complete two different assessments. He had the
students parents and teachers complete the DuPauls attention deficit hyperactivity
disorder rating scale as well as the Child Behavior Checklists and then depending on
their scores, he separated them into an ADHD and non-ADHD groups. He also tested
their Internet addiction by having the students take the Youngs Internet Addiction Test.
After assessing the scores from these tests, Hee Yoo (2004) found the ADHD ground
had higher Internet addiction scores compared with the non-ADHD group (pg.487-94).
He then stated, significant associations have been found between the level of ADHD
symptoms and the severity of Internet addiction in children (pg.487-94).
Technology contributes to eating disorders in a different way that it contributes to
attention disorders, but still negatively. There are probably many women that walk by
you everyday that have eating disorders and you wouldnt even know. Eating disorders
are life altering and become very addictive, very quickly. In the article The Relationship
between Media Consumption and Eating Disorders, Harrison and Cantor (2006) state,
There is evidence that adolescent girls images of their own bodies are influenced by the
mass medias portrayal of ideal body types (pg.40-67). The world has brainwashed girls
into thinking that being skinny is the only way to look beautiful. Little girls are taught
this at young ages, even if we do not realize it. For instance, Barbies are one of the most
common little girls toy and Barbie has a perfectly skinny, hourglass shaped body.
Starting at this age, young girls want to look exactly like Barbie because they think she is
the definition of beautiful or perfect. This is causing eating disorders in adolescence
and without even realizing it; it begins when girls are only toddlers. In the article

Harrison and Cantor reference Garfinkel and Garner. They state, The media have
capitalized upon and promoted this image (of thinness) and through popular
programming have portrayed the successful and beautiful protagonists as thin. Thinness
has thus become associated with self-control and success. In other words, the only way
to live a happy and fulfilling life, you must be skinny. Harrison and Cantor did a study
by looking at historical trends between eating disorder rates and what the ideal women
looked like during that period of time. They reported that, The highest reported
prevalence of disordered eating occurred during the 1920s and 1980s, the two periods
during which the ideal woman was thinnest in U.S. history (Boskind-White & White,
1983). This shows that whatever mass media is portraying as beautiful at the time,
people all around the world will believe that is the only way to be beautiful. In another
article Pressure to be Perfect: Influences on College Students Body Esteem Pavica
Sheldon discusses the relationship between the media and eating disorders and how it
affects adolescent girls. Pavica Sheldon (2010) states studies using surveys and
experimental methods have found significant associations between exposure to thin
female images in magazines and on television and disordered eating, drive for thinness,
and body dissatisfaction (pg.277-98). This relates to the last article talked about as well,
media has a huge impact on how people perceive their bodies. Pavica also talks about a
study done by (Goodman, 2005; Stice, Schupak, Neuberg, Shaw, & Stein, 1994). In this
study they gave a survey to 238 college girls and it turned out that the media directly
affected 43.5% of these girls that had eating disorder symptoms. Media convinces girls
into thinking that being thin is the only way to be, and this is causing lowered self-esteem
and eating disorders in many adolescence and adult women.

Sleeping disorders are also a problem that technology is contributing to

negatively. In the article TV Exposure Associated with Sleep Disturbances in 5 to 6
year-old Children, they took 321 five to six year-old children and their parents and asked
them survey questions having to do with TV viewing, sleep disturbances, and
psychiatric symptoms. After analyzing the results, Juulia Paavonen (2006) states that,
Both the amount of time the TV was switched on in the family and the quantity of
passive TV exposure were signicantly associated with childrens sleeping diculties,
especially sleep onset problems and sleepwake transition disorders (pg.154-61). Juulia
talks about the effects of TV exposure at a young age and how they can be an outcome of
many different things. For instance, too much TV exposure makes it more likely for
children to see violent or inappropriate shows, which can cause a loss of sleep. This also
relates to post-traumatic stress disorder and how certain shows can cause PTSD in young
children, which will cause a child to lose sleep. She also talks about how children under
8 whose abstract reasoning skills have not yet developed, cannot discriminate between
fantasy and reality, and may be therefore particularly vulnerable to direct influences of
media (pg.154-61). This is a negative effect that technology has because TV can be
feeding information into childrens heads that is not true, but their brains are not
developed enough to know if it is real or fake. She also talks about parenting and how
some families will keep their TVs on all day, which takes time away from other tasks
little kids should be doing. Watching TV takes time away from playing, reading, and
bonding with parents which all play a part in sleeping difficulties.
People of all ages are being affected by different disorders such as eating,
learning, and sleeping disorders. All three of these disorders have something in common;

they are all influenced negatively by technology. Technology has more of a physical
effect on ADHD and sleeping disorders where as it has an emotional effect on eating
disorders. Although technology affects different disorders to a different extent, and in
unique ways it tends to have a negative influence on all of them. There have been many
studies done to figure out if technology such as media, TVs, and cellphones has a direct
affect on disorders. All of these studies have come out positive in that technology
contributes to eating, sleeping, and attention deficit disorders.

Works Cited

Dictionary.com. Dictionary.com, n.d. Web. 06 Apr. 2015.

<http://dictionary.reference.com/>.
Harrison, Kristen, and Joanne Cantor. "The Relationship between Media Consumption
and Eating Disorders." Journal of Communications 47.1 (2006): 40-67. Web. 6
Apr. 2015.
Paavonen, Juulia. "TV Exposure Associated with Sleep Disturbances in 5-6-year-old
Children." Journal of Sleep Research 5.2 (2006): 154-61. Web. 6 Apr. 2015.
Sheldon, Pavica. "Pressure to Be Perfect: Influences on College Students' Body Esteem."
Southern Communication Journal 75 (2010): 277-98. Web. 12 Apr. 2015.
Swing, Edward L. "Television and Video Game Exposure and the Development of
Attention Problems." Pediatrics 126.2 (2010): 214-21. Web. 6 Apr. 2015.
Yoo, Hee. "Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Symptoms and Internet Addiction."
Psychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences 5th ser. 58 (2004): 487-94. Web. 12
Apr. 2015.