Class: Writing Design and Circulation
In this class, the culmination assignment is a revision, where we take an old piece of work and craft it into a new genre. This was a really fun assignment with lots of room for creativity. I used a past nature memoir I wrote and I transformed it into an Op-Ed.
Photos are Diluting Your Beautiful World
This is something that every millennial has heard from every boomer.
Picture this.
The end is in sight! The summit sits like a king, rough and sharp and majestic on its throne of stone. When you finally reach the top of the precipice, you feel like you’re on the moon. 14,060 feet in the air. There is not a single human being in sight, and your heart drops into your stomach. You stop and look around in a full 360. A blood orange wave hovers around you and you gaze down at the trail, littered with boulders on the rough blanket of earth. Down the backside you see turquoise pools surrounded by bony trees. Each new angle has its own fleeting beauty. You marvel at what you have just overcome. You reach in your pocket to take a photo…
And you forgot your phone in the car!
Phones and photos and social media and sharing. What effect do these things have on our raw experiences? They dilute our experiences. In the moment when you get to the summit of that 14’er, you may be devastated that you will not have a photo to document that experience, that maybe this memory will flee from your memories faster. However, you are wrong. By constantly striving to document experiences, people may fail to enjoy those experiences to the fullest. Not only does it dull the moment, but taking photos even makes objects, places and experiences easier to forget.
You make take photos because you want to remember an experience, or because you may think that it will be enhance an experience because you have a physical manifestation of that memory. However, a series of lab studies reveal that taking pictures as compared to not taking pictures decreased the enjoyment of a given experience. The results in this study found that consumers may unwittingly fail to enjoy those experiences to the fullest, when pairing that experience with a photo opportunity. You took that hike to enjoy nature and embrace the beauty of a mountain. You shouldn’t dilute that incredible experience by distracting yourself with photos! We can get so caught up in the photo that we miss the experience itself.
Another reason why people take photos is because they think it will help them preserve the memory. On the contrary, In a new study, psychological scientist Dr. Linda Henkel of Fairfield University present data demonstrating how participants had worse memory for objects and specific details when they took photos of them. People are so quick now to just whip out their cameras and phones almost mindlessly to capture a moment, to the point where they miss what is going on right in front of their eyes. Research suggests that the sheer lack of volume and lack of organization of photos on devices such as phones decreases the likelihood that anyone would even go back and reminisce on these photos. Henkel calls this the “photo-taking impairment effect” – when people rely on technology to preserve memories and moments, but it has the adverse effect. In many cases, scientists found that constantly taking pictures actually decreases our ability to remember experiences, distracts us, and takes away from the real moment. On a larger scale, the constant photo capturing may even be transforming how we recall events in our own lives.
Social media is such a large part of modern society, connecting relationships worldwide. So much of social media is centered around sharing our own experiences and lives with others on the internet, and much of this constitutes photos. You hike on a glacier, get a world-famous milkshake, or enjoy a sunset on a rooftop, and you have to plaster it al over Instagram. After all, take a pic or it never happened, right?
No, not right! Studies conclude that when asked to take photos not just for yourself, but ultimately to share on social media platforms, people’s enjoyment was further hindered. The inherent social pressure of seeking approval of others makes experiences more about documentation then enjoyment.
This is not to say that photography of nature is in any way unjustified. Photography is a beautiful artform. Taking photos for the purpose of taking photos is exquisite and interesting and intriguing. However, if you want to enjoy your experiences, whatever they may be: in nature, in your everyday life, with your food, at the beach, challenge yourself to live the experience untainted by technology. Next time you climb a 14’er, leave your phone in the car. Challenge yourself to widen your perspective, beyond a 6 x 3 screen. See what happens.
