Digital Dementia

Abstract

The development of communication technology, especially mobile technology, which has become almost indispensable, leads in some situations to negative effects on users' cognitive abilities, effects named "digital dementia". The diagnosis of digital dementia has been said to bring together a series of symptoms similar to those of Alzheimer's in the case of intensive use of mobile phones and the habit of performing several digital activities simultaneously at the same time.

Full text

Eastern-European Journal of Medical Humanities and Bioethics
ISSN: 2559-7604
Covered in: CrossRef; RePEc; CEEOL; KVK; WorldCat; Google Scholar
2020, Volume 4, Issue 1, pages: 01-06 | https://doi.org/10.18662/eejmhb/4.1/22
Digital Dementia
Antonio SANDU1,
Polixenia NISTOR2
1 Professor PhD., Stefan cel Mare University
of Suceava; LUMEN Research Center in
Social and Humanistic Sciences, Iasi,
Romania, antonio1907@yahoo.com
2 Asist. Univ. PhD, Faculty of Orthodox
Theology, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University
of Iasi, Romania,
polixenianistor@yahoo.com
Abstract: The development of communication technology,
especially mobile technology, which has become almost
indispensable, leads in some situations to negative effects on
users' cognitive abilities, effects named "digital dementia". The
diagnosis of digital dementia has been said to bring together a
series of symptoms similar to those of Alzheimer's in the case
of intensive use of mobile phones and the habit of performing
several digital activities simultaneously at the same time.
Keywords: digital dementia; medical humanities; technology;
communication.
How to cite: Sandu, A., & Nistor, P. (2020). Digital
Dementia. Eastern-European Journal of Medical Humanities and
Bioethics, 4(1), 01-06.
https://doi.org/10.18662/eejmhb/4.1/22

Digital Dementia
Antonio SANDU & Polixenia NISTOR
2
1. Introduction
The development of communication technology, especially mobile
technology, which has become almost indispensable, leads in some
situations to negative effects on users' cognitive abilities, effects named
"digital dementia" (Hideya et al., 2018).
Studies conducted by Hideya Yamamoto and collaborators on 1,000
participants confirm the existence of cognitive dysfunctions, the results
showing that the age at which individuals begin to use mobile terminals, and
the intensity of their use, are factors for a potential cognitive decline (Hideya
et al., 2018). Other studies draw attention to the relationship between the
use of communication technology and the simultaneous performance of
multiple tasks (multitasking) - an aspect that can lead to declining attention
and memory (Brandon et al., 2015; Hideya et al., 2018).
The diagnosis of digital dementia has been said to bring together a
series of symptoms similar to those of Alzheimer's in the case of intensive
use of mobile phones and the habit of performing several digital activities
simultaneously at the same time.
Other studies cited by Hideya Yamamoto and collaborators (Hideya
et al., 2018) dispute the existence of a causal relationship between the
multitasking use of multimedia technology and the decline of cognitive skills.
The conclusion of the study by Hideya Yamamoto and his collaborators
(Hideya et al., 2018) is particularly worrying, namely that the state of digital
dementia will be a common state of consciousness due to the number of
people who will be affected due to excessive use of mobile technology
(Arakelyan, 2019).
2. The meaning of the term digital dementia
The term digital dementia was introduced by Manfred Spitzer (2020),
a researcher in the field of neuroscience, to describe the phenomena of
destructuring cognitive abilities resulting from excessive use of digital
technology (Spitzer, 2020).
According to Hayk S. Arakelyan (Arakelyan, 2019), the term
dementia refers to a broad category of brain disorders, which cause long-
term and usually gradual decline in cognitive abilities - especially thinking
and memory - that can go as far as to the irreversible impairment of the
person's mental functioning and even to their inability to perform current
tasks, completely losing their autonomy. Other symptoms of dementia
include emotional problems, language difficulties, decreased motivation, loss
of spatial orientation and the ability to solve problems. The most common

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Medical Humanities and Bioethics Volume 4, Issue 1
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form of dementia is Alzheimer's disease, along with it we can ennumerate
vascular dementia, Lewy body dementia, frontotemporal dementia (Pick's
disease). (Spitzer, 2020).
Digital dementia is described by Malfred Spitzer (2020) as a process
that affects short-term memory, with synaptic pathways beginning to
deteriorate, being less and less stimulated due to excessive use of technology
(Arakelyan, 2019). Moreover, it is appreciated that research is needed on the
possibility that a screen-dependent lifestyle (TV, telephone, monitor, tablet)
may induce pathological conditions similar to dementia. As an example, the
author states a possible causal relationship between the abuse of video
games and the possibility of mental dysfunction that includes dementia. The
described experiment targets the ability to orient and how it is affected - in
people who are addicted to video games - including changes in cortical areas
that respond to stimuli when the need for spatial orientation is involved.
Spatial orientation is thus affected, neural pathways are altered and the brain
response is different in people who do not use video games than those who
use them, when they are forced to orient themselves in a virtual or real
maze.
Malfred Spitzer shows that the impairment of memory but also of
other higher cognitive processes, such as thinking, is due to the emergence
of new habits - such as those to search Google for any information, giving
up both other sources of information and and the construction of one's own
critical reaction to the information obtained, which affects critical thinking.
The habit of always finding information in the digital environment affects
the memory, which is underused, the individual relying on various
information storage devices - phone, computer, internet. This is true both
for the common information - friends' birthdays, phone numbers, etc. -
which are no longer stored within ones personal memory, but stored in
external sources. The same is true for detailed information on science,
technology, art, culture, which are no longer filtered through learning
processes, but updated from external databases. Malfred Spitzer also draws
attention to the risks of replacing interpersonal contact between individuals
with the virtual one - a phenomenon that we have studied and named
"virtualization of social space" (Sandu, 2003, 2020).
According to Malfred Spitzer (2020), digital dementia mainly affects
children and adolescents - especially those in the generation of digital natives
- but it is very likely that other age groups will be affected in the future,
depending on the degree of use of digital communication technology.

Digital Dementia
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3. Views on the volume "Digital Dementia" by Malfred Spitzer in the
context of the pandemic
During a televised intervention with the show 100% Guaranteed on
TVR 1 (“Stop Virtual Autism”, 2018), Malfred Spitzer stated that “The
mobile phone can lower the IQ by simply being present. No study shows
that using computers in schools is a good thing. On the contrary! The more
teenagers use the smartphone, the less empathy they have for parents and
friends. The smartphone is one of the most dangerous killers in history".
These statements are generally about the risks of overuse of technology,
including in order to replace mental processes with artificial surrogates. The
statements were made in February 2020, before the declaration of the state
of emergency, but they went viral especially in the context that in the last
year we are talking about an accelerated virtualization of social interactions,
including educational ones.
Malfred Spitzer believes that "Digital media is detrimental to
education, and the level of education depends on the extent to which
dementia will affect you, in the medical sense of the term, that of declining
mental capacity as we age" (Georgescu, 2020). The experience of digitizing
educational activities during 2020 affected the entire school population,
regardless of age, when for reasons of public health schools had to close and
the entire educational activity moved online. Teachers and students alike
complained in the media or on social networks about the difficulty of online
learning, and the "little circle phenomenon" has grown, bringing with it an
increase in reluctance to cognitive activities related to the act of simply
participating in online courses. The name "little circle phenomenon" was
introduced by the undersigned in an online meeting with students, in which
they refused to be visible on the video camera during the online courses,
being present only in the form of an avatar that appears as a circle with a
letter in the middle or as an account holder photo - in the Google meet app.
The presence of an avatar does not ensure a real physical presence of the
virtual student in online courses, but even if he is behind the screen, the
student's attention is greatly diminished by the multitasking nature of the
activity. In addition to the partial reception of the course, the student is
often involved in other activities, such as social networking, instant
messaging, talking on the phone, or even activities that allow a vague
reception of the course during adjacent physical activities in the room or
home, where the digital student is physically situated.

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4. Digital dementia and the virtualization of social space
By the virtualization the social space we understand a series of
phenomena related to the gradual transition to the virtual environment of
activities that leave the specifics of social action, borrowing some of the
virtually mediated communicative action (Habermas, 2000).
We have presented in detail in a series of articles a series of features
of this process of virtualization of social space, including the relocation of
communicative action and virtual ubiquity (Sandu & Vlad, 2018; Sandu,
2015). Especially this last phenomenon, of virtual ubiquity, places the
communicative interaction in an extended, non-topological space, which
brings with it an artificial transcendence of the human condition,
traditionally linked to contact with the Other - in the sense of a physical
closeness and not only an existential one.
The emergence of an extended space, in the noetic dimension
(Sandu, 2021), raises, from a psychological, but also anthropological point of
view, the need to reinterpret concepts such as normality, but even
fundamental concepts - such as human nature or human condition, as long
as corporeality loses its defining properties over what humanity means.
Digital dementia can be an epiphenomenon of the virtualization of
social space, which occurs as a result of cognitive maladaptation to the
extended noetic space.
5. Conclusions
Digital dementia is, if it will prove through further research, a real
neurological phenomenon, a psychological condition based on the frequent
and long-term use of digital communication technologies.
The literature presents studies for and against the existence of this
phenomenon, however a study on a significant group of 1,000 people seems
to highlight a series of cognitive impairment phenomena, similar in terms of
symptoms with classic dementia.
Malfred Spitzer blames these phenomena on the underutilization of
the brain, but this causality is not yet fully proven, being speculated even in
conspiracy theories that criticize the technologization of the educational
activity.
Without a neurological basis, we formulate the opinion that digital
dementia can be, at least partially, explained by correlation with the
virtualization of social space and a number of related phenomena, such as
the relocation of interactions and their depersonalization.

Digital Dementia
Antonio SANDU & Polixenia NISTOR
6
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