Whether we like it or not, technology is a part of our daily lives. Most people’s concerns are how technology influences our laziness and does it make us lazy at all.
This rapid improvement brings up the question: Is technology making people lazy, or is this just a myth?
Typically, most of the technological advancements made us more efficient rather than lazy. Technology opens up new possibilities where hard workers become more efficient and lazy people become even lazier. It all depends on the individual’s mindset and how you look at things.
Even though it can sometimes be distracting rather than useful, we should be grateful for it.
I must admit that there are times when technology makes me a little bit lazier and keeps me occupied with unnecessary things, but overall it has made my life a lot easier than before. Easy access to information, quick transport, gadgets, and online jobs, have all made our lives easier and less time-consuming.
If you feel like technology is making you lazier, we recommend reading our free guide on how to stop being lazy and create an action plan.
I guess we can make two assumptions, one where technology makes us lazy and one where it makes us more efficient. These are the two questions that confuse people. Let’s get more deep into both of these questions.
Has Technology Made Society Lazier Or More Efficient In Practice?
We have to state the fact that technology complements your mindset. If you don’t have good habits, discipline, and motivation to improve your life, you will look at technology as an excuse. There is a whole industry dedicated to this target group and basically exists because of people’s laziness.
On the other hand, most of the time it is used for good reasons and creates huge progress in society. Technological advancements in medicine prolong our life span and engineers are creating new inventions that could make our life a lot easier.
Just imagine our lives if we never had electricity, cars, phones, printing presses, vaccines, etc. We are used to taking things for granted and not give them greater importance in our daily lives. Modern levels of technology vastly impact future inventions that can potentially solve many problems like climate change, world hunger, poverty, etc.
But no matter what happens some people will look at the improvement of technology as a bad thing. They will try to justify their laziness due to its vast improvement, no matter what era it is.
When we compare today’s society with the one 60 years ago, we can realize that there hasn’t been too much of a difference in terms of laziness and procrastination. I know that elder generations like to critique new ones and act like they were working 24/7, but I can assure you that wasn’t the case.
Our brains love to be occupied with distractions, so no matter what kind of technology we have it will always find a way to amuse himself. In the 60s people didn’t have iPhones and computers, but they were always watching baseball games and golf. Over time distractions just changed from physical to digital and that shouldn’t be too much of a concern.
If we take a look at the statistics from Google trends, we can see that from 2004 to 2020 the interest for working out has increased by more than 300%. Which further proves my point that technology doesn’t make us lazy.
I know that these numbers aren’t that accurate because they are searches on google and not real-life examples, but it surely means that people are more active today than in 2004. Bigger the interest, the bigger probability of being active.
Some Exceptions Where Technology Made Us Lazier
Technology can create distractions. Back in the day watching TV was the biggest distraction and now it evolved into YouTube and Netflix. These services allowed us to find an enormous amount of entertainment without lifting a finger. These distractions release an enormous amount of dopamine which makes them quite addictive.
Check out our article on how watching TV makes you lazy.
These addictions are hard to quit and that’s why many people think that technology makes them lazy.
Another great example where technology is making us lazy is through video games. On average, gamers spend more than 6 hours of gaming every day, while only 1% of them are doing it professionally. This type of behavior is really common among students and children, which directly impacts their grades.
As I already mentioned, video games create a lot of dopamine and that excess dopamine makes other activities like reading a book or studying look boring. I now understand why some parents think that technology is making their kids more stupid and lazy.
Mobile phones and social media also contribute to people’s laziness. Nowadays, we can’t even imagine our lives without our phones. Constant notifications distract us from doing our daily activities, but we still decide to stare at our phones. Luckily, most of us know how to manage our time spent on phones, but there will always be some exceptions that cannot control themselves.
The rise of online services like Amazon and eBay enabled us to skip shopping and do everything from our homes. Even though I look at this as a blessing in disguise, simply because there are too many responsibilities for me, a lot of people just encourage their laziness with this type of behavior.
Practical Examples Where Technology Makes Us Efficient
Let’s start off by saying that technology provides easy access to information. So many social media options, email platforms, websites, online dictionaries, encyclopedias, and many more things made us more efficient. Long gone are the days where we have to go to the library to search for books and studies, now we have access to all that in a blink of a second.
Secondly, technological improvements created modern medicine. Medical technologies are constantly evolving where even robots are capable of doing surgical incisions with extreme precision. It’s safe to say that modern technology prolongs our life span.
Thirdly, athletes can improve their skills a lot faster thanks to modern technology. For example, if you wanted to shoot 200 jump shots it would take you at least 1 hour without any help, but today with the right equipment you shoot the same amount in less than 15 minutes. Of course, there are many other ways where technology helps athletes, but we are not gonna cover all of them right now.
Fourhtly, modern technology protects the environment by improving solar panels and recycling processes. Our world is facing some serious problems with pollution, so technological improvements are necessary. Creating machines that don’t polute as much while still being efficient is the main priority and we have seen some great progress over the years.
Lastly, we have to mention the fact that the transport is regulated a lot better, we can hire people online without wasting too much time, GPS systems, safety cameras are all around us and most importantly electric cars are now the new reality.
Final Words
No matter what kind of technology influences our lives, we should always strive to be the best version of our self. You can either decide to use the full potential of technological improvements to create a better life for yourself or you can use it as an excuse for making you lazy.