So you’re saying that while online adults are finding themselves in increasingly radicalizing bubbles and echo chambers that isolate them from other points of view and even distort their sense of “truth” and “fact”, kids are somehow having the exact opposite experience in the same online world?
The internet does not seem to expose people to a “myriad of ideas” that challenge them. It lets them shop for the community that exactly aligns with their preconceptions and reduces their need to find compromise with the disagreeable meatbags that are physically around them. This is as true for teenagers as it is for adults, but it also steals from teenagers a traditional opportunity to learn critical mediation and coping skills.
In other words, it quite specifically coddles them and makes them grossly ill-prepared for adulthood in a diverse world riddled with small and large conflicts.
When I first read your comment, I was shocked when there was no “/s” at the end.
> So you’re saying that while online adults are finding themselves in increasingly radicalizing bubbles and echo chambers that isolate them from other points of view and even distort their sense of “truth” and “fact”, kids are somehow having the exact opposite experience in the same online world?
Correct. If they were having the same experience, I'd expect opposite results to Alternative #13 (see article). Given that's not the case, I have to conclude that adults and children do not indeed share that experience.
The coddling pattern of behavior describes people who encountering ideas that made them feel bad, react by wanting distance themselves from that idea. We seem to have a case where kids are encountering things that make them feel bad and Haidt is making a case for distancing kids from it? Makes no sense.
The internet does not seem to expose people to a “myriad of ideas” that challenge them. It lets them shop for the community that exactly aligns with their preconceptions and reduces their need to find compromise with the disagreeable meatbags that are physically around them. This is as true for teenagers as it is for adults, but it also steals from teenagers a traditional opportunity to learn critical mediation and coping skills.
In other words, it quite specifically coddles them and makes them grossly ill-prepared for adulthood in a diverse world riddled with small and large conflicts.
When I first read your comment, I was shocked when there was no “/s” at the end.