Re:What happens when children don’t have the internet for a ...
by Broken_Hippo on Thursday September 15, 2016 @08:24AM
(#12505468)
I was a teenager 20 years ago, and I'm not so sure about that. My brother was an actual child then.
The equivelent would have been to take away all social contact, plus television and video games and some freedom of movement to see folks for 8 hours. It wasn't like I generally had 8 hours to myself back then - between school and homework and chores and church (parents insisted) and the few friends and outings I did have, I simply didn't have that. And then, suddenly, some person doing an experiment wants to isolate me for 8 hours? I'd have been horribly bored as well.
Re:What happens when children don’t have the internet for a ...
by anotheryou on Thursday September 15, 2016 @08:57AM
(#12505685)
Exactly. Even staying at home alone while the supervising parent went shopping sometimes got boring after the first 30 minutes. Albeit no horrible experience, I went along shopping most of the time, not to stay home alone.
I think you could have done this experiment 20 years ago and get the same results.
What will be different nowadays is that your friends are always an your pocket. A situation where you are confronted with something emotional and unable to talk to a friend right away might be more unusual and frightening than it was 20 years ago.
Maybe kids 20 years ago could handle boredom better, but I think this study has too many flaws to judge about that.