If society as a whole were to look back on how much we have progressed within the last century, everyone would be able to agree that technology has positively benefitted the world, and as a result, it has brought us into the modern age of technology. While inventions have been created to make living more comfortable, such as vaccinations, air conditioning, and new-and-improved motorized vehicles, some gadgets have been made in order to further our routes of communication and to expand our knowledge based on terms of science and medicine. With new advancements such as cell phones and laptops, it is easier to stay in touch with friends and family, and makes it possible to form new relationships with other individuals around the world. Other machines, such as satellites and space shuttles, have been made in order to physically improve the way we interact with not only each other but the world around us. It is inevitable that technology is, and continue to constantly evolve and push this society to become more efficient. Technology has not only made an impact in our social lives, but it has extremely advanced the educational field and the transportation system. 

Today, people are always connected to some kind of social network, like Facebook, but are we actually connected to the people around us? The population abuses technology constantly, which has caused individuals to become addicted to not only their mobile devices, but the internet as well. This technology addiction can lead an individual up to becoming socially isolated among their peers. This can cause social anxiety, which can be correlated with bad sleeping habits and obesity. These side-effects are mainly associated with the way that many adolescents are behaving. This could have an extreme impact on communities around the world, because the next generations to come are the future of nations throughout the globe. While technology has many positive effects on everyday life, it seems that the overuse of technology has a more negative impact on society than positive.

As the advancement of technology continues, people have become too dependent on technology. Communication between people is mostly through mobile phones or the internet. This typically causes the young population to constantly be on their different devices. Even though technology is essential to making everyday tasks easier, the unnecessary or excessive use of technology has been proven to lead to addiction. Technology addiction can be defined as a person who has a compulsive need to use devices such as smart phones, computers, and video games. While some might argue that is not a big problem in the United States, "In a public opinion poll in U.S., it was found that 13 to 17 years old age group (73%) were commonly affected by internet addiction. More than 60% of Americans said, being addicted to internet as found in a survey in 2010" (Agarwal, Vivek, and Sujit Kumar Kar). Also in China, "Of these 100 million young users, about 9.72% to 11.06% are serious addicts, amounting to about 10 million young people" (Young, Kimberly S., and Cristiano Nabuco De. Abreu). After seeing these statistics, it can clearly be observed that technology addiction is becoming a serious problem not only in America, but around the world. 

With these gadgets being used for entertainment such as listening to music, playing online games, or looking at iFunny; adolescents are becoming obsessed. Although technology addiction is a problem for all age groups, these devices mainly target adolescents and young adults. In the article, "Teachers' Attitudes to Using Ipads or Tablet Computers; Implications for Developing New Skills, Pedagogies And School-Provided Support" Keith Young talks about the study, which involves the attitudes of teachers towards using tablet computers in an educational environment. In the research given, the teachers were providing an extreme positive feedback on the usage of iPads in a classroom setting. "But children and adolescents are not mature enough to understand adverse effects associated with excessive use of these things and they are easily likely to be hooked to modern technologies" (Agarwal, Vivek, and Sujit Kumar Kar). Not only are adolescents too immature to handle the responsibilities of technology in a classroom setting, but in the study a large complication with enabling factors occurred within the students. Adolescents will have the tendency to play on the tablets, rather than focusing on the tasks that they were given during class. Also some schools do sometimes provide students with tablets who cannot afford, or do not have internet access. While this is thoughtful and might help some individuals complete their homework assignments, many of these children will take advantage of this privilege. Overtime this kindness could actually distract the adolescents from their work, causing them to fall behind on their studies. Although most supporters will argue that you cannot assume what a child will do given this opportunity, it would be best to accept there would be a great amount of teenagers, who are just too juvenile to handle this opportunity.   From the research provided, it can be argued that the disadvantages of technology in the classroom outweighs the advantages. 

It seems like with the constant connection to technology individuals feel more linked to each other, but a huge problem with social isolation is occurring. "Adolescents with poor coping skills, often find it difficult to deal with day to day minor issues and engage with mobile or internet to distract themselves from the stressful situations," this could be the main reason why the young population is becoming more secluded from others (Agarwal, Vivek, and Sujit Kumar Kar). As face-to-face communication continues to dwindle among the population, the interactions in community settings seem to decline as well. The prime example for this problem are neighborhoods. Back in the day, neighbors would actually converse with each other, and were willing to lend a hand if the other needed help. Now people rarely speak to, or even see their neighbors, and when they need help people mainly feel like it is not their problem. So people hardly ever try to help their neighbor out. Also with people being more private about their problems; individuals would rather go online and search for an answer, rather than ask their neighbors to help them. "The way we become more human is by paying attention to each other ...  It shows how much you can care" (Richtel). In this quote, Mr. Nass at Stanford is trying to express that heavy usage of technology weakens empathy. I agree because if individuals continue to limit their contact with others, then they are more unlikely to help the people surrounding them. If this social isolation continues, then it seems that humanity will socially decline drastically. Technology narrows the interaction with people, since an individual will be able to receive entertainment more easily compare to the attempt to interact and get along with another individual. 

Technology does not just affect humans socially, but can also result in negative outcomes revolving around a person's physical appearance. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, a child is estimated to spend up to seven hours on television, the internet, or video games, while the maximum time a child should spend online is two hours. The main problem with obesity is not the amounts of calories that are consumed, but the absence of exercise. In the past we have seen that children would go outside and play, which was a form of exercise, but with technology today it is being eliminated as children would rather stay indoors and be on their devices for entertainment then continue having a healthy lifestyle. In the study, "Technology Is Making Us Fat, Not A Few Extra Calories" Sabrina Bachai hints that the increase of body mass is not the food, but the amount that people are actually exercising less and less. With adolescents increasing their technology time, and cutting out exercising; the main culprit of obesity seems to be technology.

Television or mobile devices can play an extreme negative role on the mental health on individuals. Now that television sets are more common in households today, every other room usually has a T.V. including bedrooms. It is also tremendously common for people to bring, and view their cell phone before they go to sleep. This could have a great impact, and is harmful on an individual's sleeping habits. Why would your technological devices have any bearings on our sleeping habits? Well one reason is people will stay up late because they are usually binge-watching T.V. shows, or they lose track of time when they are scrolling on their cell phones. Another reason why we stay up so late that most people do not consider, is that the blue light on our laptop or cell phone screens mimic daylight. This blue light tricks your brain and stimulates your brain to stay wide awake. When you eventually fall asleep, most will wake up feeling tired, restless, and even sometimes depressed.  

With us continuously staying awake during the night, technology can cause an energy imbalance in the body. This makes a connection between an individual's bad sleeping habits with obesity. The energy imbalance in your body can cause your body to try, and increase its energy intake. This can, and will most likely, cause a person to increase their eating habits, mainly their intake of junk food, despite their body's lack of hunger. (Arora, T., et al.) 

Technology not only has a negative effect on a human's well-being, it also has a huge impact on the environment. A great time in history where technology really advanced was during the Industrial Revolution, but these further advancement caused a life-threatening amount of pollution. Although technology developed rapidly during this time period, most of the pollution on the planet can be connected back to industrial factories. Even though people are living in the now; we must look to the future, and see how polluting our earth will affect us. It can be asked, is the further advancement of technology really worth the unceasing and ever-lasting pollution in our atmosphere? Not only does this pollution cause contamination in water, soil, but also results in wildlife extinction (Rinkesh).

Should the advancement of technology take all the blame for the all the negative effects put on society? No, I believe not all the blame can be put on technology, but on how this society reacts to technology. We should recognize that technology can actually have a harmful impact on communities across the country. To solve these problems, we must all come together, and recognize that technology can actually be damaging, and not stay ignorant to the fact that all these gadgets do in fact negatively impact out everyday lives.

 A great way to breakdown these problems is to set boundaries on technology usage. Parents need to realize that their children are not mature enough to recognize when they are using technology excessively and obsessively. Parents should cut the amount of time their child spends on technology. With the cut backs, this could stop many adolescents from becoming addicted to their mobile devices, which could drastically decrease social isolation among the younger population. This solution would also play a huge role with obesity, because with the lack of distractions like video games or television, children would go outside more. They would actually interact with other children, and get the social and physical experience that they need. As to helping with bad sleep habits, your body needs at least thirty minutes before bed, of not technology. This will help with not stimulating your body into believing your cell phone screen is the daylight. Your body will also have enough sleep, causing your body to having the proper amount of energy making your body not crave as much junk food. The proper use of technology will have a great impact on your life in the long run. 

In summary, the overuse of technology in society causes negative effects, which greatly outweighs the positive effects. The excessive use of technology can cause technology addiction, mainly in the younger population, social isolation, bad sleeping habits, obesity, and even pollution. These effects not only have an emotional impact a persons' psychological or physical well-being, but the environment as well. While most will believe these issues cannot be solved there is a simple solution, to stop most of these problems. All we have to do is cut back on our usage of technology. Just by doing that we can have a healthier lifestyle, whether it be mentally or physically.  

  
