Meteier Quentin, Délèze Anouk, Chappuis Sébastien, Witowska Joanna, Wittmann Marc, Ogden Ruth, Martin-Sölch Chantal
Clinical and Health Psychology Unit, Department of Psychology, University of Fribourg, Fribourg, 1700, Switzerland.
Institute of Psychology, The Maria Grzegorzewska University, Warsaw, 02-353, Poland.
Sci Rep. 2025 Mar 26;15(1):10469. doi: 10.1038/s41598-025-94316-3.
The technological advances in recent years are influencing and redefining our daily lives, communications, and social relationships. While these advances bring us many benefits, their negative effects may also cause concern. Although often studied, the potential benefits of digital deprivation are still disputed. This laboratory study investigates the impact of short digital deprivation (7 min and 30 s) on the psychophysiological state and time perception of 90 participants. Three experimental conditions were created for the task performed during the waiting period (30 subjects per condition). Participants had to either freely use their smartphone, perform a non-digital task (sudoku), or wait (i.e. passive digital deprivation). Indicators of electrodermal activity and heart rate variability were calculated for the baseline and waiting periods, along with measures of subjective affective state. Four measures of time perception were also collected after the waiting period. Regardless of their experimental condition, the participants underestimated the duration of the waiting period on average (5 min 44 vs. 7 min 30). Passive digitally deprived participants felt that the time passed more slowly and were more bored than participants engaged in a task, regardless of whether the task was digital or not. Sudoku induced more positive affect and was more cognitively engaging than the free use of a smartphone regarding heart rate variability measures. The results suggest that performing a digital task (free smartphone use) is less cognitively demanding than a non-digital task (sudoku) and alters time perception in the same way. The digital nature of a task might also impact one's affective reaction. A similar study in the field with longer or repetitive digital deprivation periods and a different non-digital task to perform (e.g., reading news) should be conducted to confirm the results obtained in this study.
近年来的技术进步正在影响和重新定义我们的日常生活、通信及社会关系。虽然这些进步给我们带来了许多好处，但其负面影响也可能引发担忧。尽管经常被研究，但数字剥夺的潜在益处仍存在争议。这项实验室研究调查了短时间数字剥夺（7分30秒）对90名参与者心理生理状态和时间感知的影响。在等待期间（30名受试者/条件）为执行的任务创建了三种实验条件。参与者必须要么自由使用智能手机，执行非数字任务（数独），要么等待（即被动数字剥夺）。计算了基线期和等待期的皮肤电活动和心率变异性指标，以及主观情感状态的测量值。等待期结束后还收集了四种时间感知测量值。无论实验条件如何，参与者平均都低估了等待期的时长（5分44秒对7分30秒）。被动数字剥夺的参与者感觉时间过得更慢，并且比参与任务的参与者更无聊，无论该任务是否为数字任务。就心率变异性测量而言，数独比自由使用智能手机更能引发积极情绪且更具认知吸引力。结果表明，执行数字任务（自由使用智能手机）的认知要求低于非数字任务（数独），并且以相同方式改变时间感知。任务的数字性质也可能影响一个人的情感反应。应该在实地进行一项类似研究，设置更长或重复性的数字剥夺期，并采用不同的非数字任务（例如阅读新闻）来证实本研究获得的结果。
