The Ultimate Inception - Persuasive Technology

I thoroughly enjoyed the movie Inception and I recently encountered something eerily similar to it but oblivious to many: the use of persuasive technology by social media and online games to influence human behaviour.

It is by no chance that hordes of youths and even adults are spending more and more time on mobile games and social media to the extent of becoming unknowingly addicted. This is the engineered result of the unprecedented marriage of psychology and technology which gave birth to apps with drug-like power - so now you know why you can't resist crushing candies or checking Instagram/Facebook for the number of Likes!

I personally witnessed its destructive power in youths, causing them to neglect their studies, family and even their own health. And the saddest thing is that there is little we can do. I have tried to help one teenager through professional counselling but not one counsellor has succeeded. I only discovered the reason recently through this insightful article on persuasive technology. As the root cause is new and hence unknown to psychologists, an effective "cure" has not been found - perhaps we should fight technology with technology - to use persuasive technology itself to reverse its effects.

As I do not see a solution in the near term, our best defence is to create awareness among parents and the vulnerable youths themselves of this modern scourge. Another way to slow its advance is to use technology to set usage limits as seen here. Perhaps it's time governments step forward to regulate the usage of persuasive technology just as they regulated cigarettes 20 years ago...