Could you manage a day without access to the media? An experiment by 200 students at the University of Maryland

Posted by: Krishna De | Posted on: April 27th, 2010 | 11 Comments | Posted in: Communication, Media strategies, Research

Could you go 24 hours without being connected to the media – no mobile phone, iPod,  iPad, television, radio, magazines, newspapers, computers – yes no Facebook, no Twitter and no text messaging?

Yesterday someone I was with mentioned they had been out for dinner and noticed a family in the restaurant where Mum, Dad and the six children were not talking to each other as they were all independently connected to a device – be that a mobile phone or a games console. I did comment that they may have been playing a game together on the console’s. It’s so easy to check your email, news or messages any time of day wherever you are thanks to applications that deliver breaking news to your phone or you can check the latest happenings on twitter.

I can not remember a day in the last 10 years where I have turned off all forms of communication – but that’s what a group of students did recently.

A class of 200 students at the University of Maryland, College Park, undertook an assignment that asked them to go media-free for 24 hours – they could self select which 24 hours in a nine-day period, from February 24-March 4, 2010 they would be unplugged from the media.

Some of the insights from the experiment were that they disliked going with out access to media and reported that it was like being without friends and family – that they felt isolated. They also used texting and Facebook as a way to make social arrangements so without access they felt unable to easily make social arrangements.

The summary of the report comments that of all the media platforms, losing access to their mobile phone was the most challenging as they use it not only to call friends and family but to text, Tweet, connect to Facebook, even when in lectures.

I love these quotes from the experiment:

Writing by hand is so last-century (and so slow).

I had to take notes by hand which was difficult for the particular speed in which my professor lectures.

I found it harder to keep up with the teacher because I am so use to typing my notes very quickly on my computer, and now I had to handwrite the notes for the lecture.

We are off with the family for a short break soon; I wonder if we had a 24 hour moratorium on media and devices which one of us would would last the longest? No Nintendo’s, iPhone, Blackberry, PC, newspaper, radio, TV. And I wonder if we would miss it?

Have you unplugged from the media for 24 hours recently? What were your insights?

Photo credit: Nige_Mar