In 'Hooked On Technology and Paying a Price' Matt Richtel writes about how
technology has grown substantially over the past few decades and how it is affecting different
aspects of everyday life. In the article Richtel tells about how one particular family, the
Campbells, are affected by technology while focusing mainly on the head of the family, Mr.
Campbell, in order to further support the point that he is trying to make. Through his use of
Kairos and Stasis Richtel is able to successfully make his argument known and prove his point.

In 'Hooked On Technology And Paying A Price', the author Matt Richtel starts the
article by immediately by giving one example of how technology has had a negative effect on
Mr. Campbell's life. 'When one of the most important e-mail messages of his life landed in his
in-box a few years ago, Kord Campbell overlooked it. Not just for a day or two, but 12 days.
By using this particular moment Richtel was able to start his article off with a strong point
that would make his readers want to read more and it effectively supports the title of the article.
Richtel then goes on to tell a little bit more about how technology and multitasking affects Mr.
Campbell's life, then he starts to refer to proven facts that support his ideas against technology
and trying to multitask. 'While many people say multitasking makes them more productive,
research shows otherwise. Heavy multiaskers actually have more trouble focusing and shutting
out irrelevant information, scientists say, and they experience more stress'. Richtel then
goes on to actually quote a scientist and talk about their findings, in order to support his claim.
By doing this Richtel is able to effectively to prove that all the multitasking Mr. Campbell and
others do is not only unnecessary but also harmful to their health. After further elaborating on the
art of multitasking, Richtel then transitions into talking about how Mr. Campbell's technology
obsession affects his wife and children.

He opens by describing a scene of Mr. Campbell and his son playing video games while
has daughter sits close by watching them. Mrs. Campbell, the mother of the two kids, recalls
moments when could hardly get the kids attention due to them being distracted by technology.
Getting Mrs. Campbell to offer her input on the situation further proves his argument because up
to this point he was giving his outside opinion but now he has the opinion of someone in the
family who sees the negative effects first hand. Richtel wraps up the article by telling the opinion
of an expert who says he fears 'the ultimate risk of heavy technology use is that it diminishes
empathy by limiting how much people engage with one another, even in the same room'.
By including this person's opinion in the article Richtel was able to slightly insinuate that this
person's biggest concern was slowly becoming a reality. Richtel's use of examples, proven facts,
and eyewitness testimonies helped to support the argument that he is trying to make. However, to
fully breakdown Richtel's argument the practices of Kairos and Stasis Theory must be taken into
account.

Kairos, to put it simply, is 'situational time or a period during which opportunities appear
to those who are prepared to take advantage of them'. Kairos is
extremely important with argumentative writing because it forces the author to think about the
timing urgency, audience, and venue of the subject. In this particular article Richtel effectively
hits all of the major points of Kairos in an effort to prove his argument. In the heart of the age of
technology Richtel couldn't have chosen a better time to write an article about multitasking and
technology and their negative effects on people's everyday lives. With campaigns out about not
texting and driving and the First Lady, Michelle Obama, putting forth the initiative to help kids
become healthier and have more outside activity and less inside activity, Richtel picked the
perfect time to bring up this topic.

While the topic of technology taking over has been a building, ongoing conversation
there is still urgency to this topic in the sense that technology is becoming more and more
prevalent in different areas of life that use to be free of this epidemic. Richtel manages to show
the urgency of this topic while also reaching his target audience. In this article Richtel's main
strategy for supporting his argument is using the situation of one particular family, the
Campbells. The head of the family, Mr. Campbell, is the best example of why technology
overload is still a relevant topic. Mr. Campbell, an entrepreneur, was almost a victim of his own
technology and multitasking when he neglected to respond to the email of a potential investor for
almost two weeks because he was distracted by his many other computer screens and mobile
device (Richtel 5). Although this was a gigantic error made by Mr. Campbell, he is just one of
many people who make mistakes like this because they don't understand the seriousness of
what's happening in their lives. One of the other many people affected by this problem is the
matriarch of the household, Mrs. Campbell. While she doesn't use technology as much as her
husband she has also felt the effects such as one regretful moment when she burned her peanut
butter cookies when she was distracted by her cell phone. She then proceeded to try to bake
the cookies a second time, but once again she became distracted by her cell phone and burned the
cookies. These two moments effectively show how the transition in technological
advancement is taking a toll on peoples' everyday lives and it needs to be taken more seriously.
Also by including the Campbell family in his article, Richtel effectively, showed that he was
trying to gain the attention of families in a family household setting. For an argument such as
this, reaching out to the family level in a household setting is the best option for Richtel to have
his argument heard because this technological plague that is currently taking place is being led
by the younger generations of pre-teens, teens, and young college students. As a whole Richtel
did a marvelous job of using Kairos to his advantage but he didn't just limit himself to this; he
also incorporated stasis theory.

Stasis is a way of thinking in which a person thoroughly examines the issue that is being
discussed by asking questions. In order to effectively complete the stasis
process an author must understand and examine both sides of the argument. Richtel does a good
job of clearly displaying stasis in this article. Richtel first displays stasis by posing the question
of whether or not someone could affect the brain in a negative way by 'rewiring themselves to
handle the load'. By posing this question Richtel forces his readers to stop and think
if they had done this to themselves, which forces them to examine the topic in the same manner
as him and this helps show his deep knowledge on the subject. He also takes this a step further
by telling of how Mr. Ophir, someone who worked for Israeli intelligence, wondered the same
thing. He then dives into discussing multitasking and the common misconceptions that
people have.

While it is important to pose questions that engage the readers, the biggest focus point of
stasis theory is for the author to recognize and acknowledge how people might oppose their
argument. Richtel exhibits this by devoting an entire section of his article to refute the common
misconceptions that people have about multitasking. Within the section Richtel tells about an
experiment in which there would be two groups: one in which the subjects were classified as
multitaskers after answering a series of questions and the other in which the subjects were
classified as non-multitaskers after a series of questions. 'In a test created by Mr. Ophir and his
colleagues, subjects at a computer were briefly shown an image of red rectangles. Then they saw
a similar image and were asked whether any of the rectangles had moved. It was a simple task
until the addition of a twist: blue rectangles were added, and the subjects were told to ignore
them'. After concluding this experiment, the results showed that the multitaskers did a far
worse job than the non-multitaskers and they couldn't focus on the most important information.
Another study that took place at Stanford 'showed multitaskers tended to search for new
information rather than accept a reward for putting older, more valuable information to work.
Researchers say these findings point to an interesting dynamic: multitaskers seem more sensitive
than non-multitaskers to incoming information'. Richtel then proceeds to tell how
researchers have recently found new information that proves that multitasking is damaging to the
brain. 'The lower-brain functions alert humans to danger, like a nearby lion, overriding goals
like building a hut. In the modern world, the chime of incoming e-mail can override the goal of
writing a business plan or playing catch with the children'. By discussing the data collected
from these two experiments and including the findings of other researchers, Richtel is able to
effectively prove his theory that people do alter their brains when they multitask and that this
altering can be harmful. Also, Richtel is able strengthen his use of Stasis by including these
studies and newly found information, which further shows his readers that he has an extensive
knowledge on the subject, which allows them to trust the article and the argument that he is
presenting.

When analyzing an argumentative piece of writing it is imperative that as a reader you
can identify qualities of Kairos and Stasis within the writing. In 'Hooked On Technology And
Paying a Price', Richtel effectively displays the qualities of both Kairos and Stasis in a manner
than can be easily detected by the readers which further helps strengthen his argument, such as
his timeliness of writing this article during the heart of the era of technology. By using Kairos
and Stasis in a way that can be understood by the masses, Richtel is able to make his argument
better known, as more people will read it and understand him. Richtel's use of these two writing
techniques makes his writing seem more reliable and helps back up his argument. Also, by doing
this not only did he prove his point, but he was also successful in convincing me to support his
argument by acknowledging the existence of multitasking, giving detailed information on it, and
telling the negative effects of it and how it can be stopped. This article successfully displays all
the necessary qualities of an argumentative essay.

