Click here, then here -- connecting some digital dots

So many depressing trends, so many factors to consider in screens culture

All together now: “Correlation not equal causation.”

No matter what charts appear to show, there doesn’t seem to be a direct connection between eating ice cream and drowning. Ah, but how about charts showing rising temperatures and ice cream consumption?

If you have followed debates about smartphone addiction and mental health, you will have encountered arguments about correlation and causation. If you wish, click here and surf debate about Jonathan Haidt’s must-read book “The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness.”

The question is how much connection does one need in statistics in order to see some, or a great deal, of causation? I will argue that, when looking at distressing trends through a Rational Sheep lens, there doesn’t need to be a 100% connection for parents, pastors, teachers, counselors and others to be concerned.

This won’t be holiday fun, but let’s connect a few dots in my Rational Sheep “guilt folder” containing emails and URLs for things that bother me, but I am not sure how to describe them in coherent, easily digestible posts.

For example, what about this journal article about video-game and smartphone addiction in South Korea:

… In 2012, an estimated 2.55 million people were addicted to their smartphones and the internet. For adolescents in particular, around 12.5 percent of teenagers were at risk for internet addiction disorder in 2014. And in 2019, the latest government-issued survey revealed over 20 percent of South Korea’s population — nearly 10 million citizens — were now at risk for the addiction. Due to the isolating nature of the COVID-19 pandemic, many countries have reported an uptake in the amount of time minors spent gaming, suggesting a probable increase in problematic gaming for South Korean adolescents.

Might that sad subject be connected to this life-and-death CNN headline: “South Korea’s birth rate is so low, the president wants to create a ministry to tackle it.”

How low is that fertility number?

South Korea has the world’s lowest fertility rate, which indicates the average number of children a woman will have in her lifetime. It recorded a rate of just 0.72 in 2023 — down from 0.78 the previous year, the latest drop in a long string of yearly declines.

Countries need a fertility rate of 2.1 to maintain a stable population, in the absence of immigration.

Connection? Some degree of causation?

Let’s click a few other dots. This is where I really wish that Substack software included an option for embedding tweets from X.

Look at this chart that was posted by the must-follow Brad Wilcox of the University of Virginia and the Institute for Family Studies. He is the author of the new book “Get Married: Why Americans Must Defy the Elites, Forge Strong Families, and Save Civilization.”

What does that chart show?

“On the family front, America has just crossed a historic threshold where, of adults aged 18-55, there is now a greater share of single adults with no children than there are married adults with children.”

OK, that’s disturbing. What are the trends that are making marriage-formation more and more difficult? What is dividing women and men these days?

Maybe that’s just America. Maybe there are larger trends at work.

What about this? This is a chart, recently posted on X by Aaron M. Renn, author of the new book “Life in the Negative World: Confronting Challenges in an Anti-Christian Culture.”

I know, there are too many new books to read on all of these potentially connected topics. I get that. Yes, they are stacking up on my desk, too.

OK, here is another chart — featured in one of those Axios news-you-can-use email newsletters with this headline: “1 big thing — Jarring generation gap.” As it turns out, there are other divisions that are on the rise.

The obvious question: Is digital tech use higher among the young? #DUH

Here is another link to click if you can handle it, care of an essay at the Jean Twenge Substack feed called Generation Tech. I saw this, naturally, at the After Babel feed from the Jonathan Haidt team.

What is the Big Idea that you see in the following chart?

In 2020 and 2021, the suicide rate among Americans in their 20s or 30s was higher than the suicide rate among those in their 40s or 50s (see Figure 1; 2021 is the most recent data available). 

Between 2019 and 2021, suicide fell among middle-aged adults and continued to rise among younger adults. The end result was the reversal of the long-accepted statistic that more middle-aged Americans take their own lives than younger adults. 

But is it still true that the highest suicide rate is among middle-aged men? …  

It is not. The highest suicide rate is now among younger men (see Figure 2). Suicide rates for middle-aged men fell precipitously after 2018 while those for younger men rose. Until men reach 75 or older, when suicides rise due to terminal illness, the highest suicide rates are now among men in their 20s – not the middle-aged.

Here is that chart (the essay includes many others):

What about young females today?

With that question, the key word is “despair.” This is from another After Babel feature with this double-decker headline:

The Global Loss of the U-Shaped Curve of Happiness

Happiness used to be U-shaped by age, with middle age the least happy. Not anymore. Young people are now the least happy.

That chart shows:

OK, OK. I hear you. That’s too much bad news in one bleak holiday post.

In an attempt to share the acid, this journalist (that would be me) will now toss this chart into the mix — drawn from this Associated Press article: “News organizations have trust issues as they gear up to cover another election, a poll finds.”

Want to bet that the “distrust” factor is higher among the young?

In conclusion: Am I claiming that smartphones are THE cause for all of these trends? Am I claiming causation?

Of course not. However, I am asking — especially dealing with trends in mental-health, marriage formation, birth rates, etc. — if it’s possible for religious leaders to address these issues WITHOUT discussing the role of digital technology in our fragmented lives.

Yes, there are many, many more of these “connect the dots” items in my Rational Sheep guilt folder. But I will stop at this point.

Have a nice day.