Dr Anders Hansen

That's why we have so strong instincts to create bonds to other people.

We read one another.

We're very good at that.

And we try to create bonds, social bonds.

And we want to belong to a group at all costs.

Now those social needs, they were created during millions and millions and millions of years where we met physically.

And now all of a sudden we meet like this.

And we can replace some of that with a screen, but we can't replace all of it.

It's not just your face expression on the screen, you know, it's so many more signals that we are constantly registering.

And we all felt that during COVID, when we spent so much time on our screens, that they were good for helping us during a difficult period.

But most of us felt very lonely and isolated.

And that shows, I think, that there's a purely physical dimension to our incredible strong social need.

And when that need is being eroded by these incredibly powerful super stimuli, we spend six hours on this, the brain thinks that we're lonely.

And if we're lonely, well, then we will die.

That's the mortal danger.

And then we feel crappy, of course.

Exactly.

And there's actually been experiments made where you have students doing tests for focus and for memory, and half of them bring their phone into the testing room.

The other half leave their phone outside.

And the ones that bring the phones with them don't pick it up.