There’s been a great deal of discussion this week about the role of smartphones in driving down fertility after an article by John Burn-Murdoch published in the Financial Times 3 days ago showed that the timing of the fertility decline of the past ~20 years coincides with the take-off of smartphones pretty much regardless of when a country introduced them, as shown here:
I think there’s an open discussion on what the biggest mechanism is here. I think one obvious one is just people not socialising/meeting people as much because more time is instead spent on the old device. The smartphone is, I think, particularly pernicious, because it stops us interacting with others even when we have the time and are in public spaces surrounded by people
Fascinating. What exactly are smartphones effects on romantic coupling? (Also what's the definition of romantic coupling lol)
I think there’s an open discussion on what the biggest mechanism is here. I think one obvious one is just people not socialising/meeting people as much because more time is instead spent on the old device. The smartphone is, I think, particularly pernicious, because it stops us interacting with others even when we have the time and are in public spaces surrounded by people
I see, yeah that makes sense!