Why modern technology and increased efficiency will make us unhappy

Life is becoming easier. Today, no longer need to rush to the shops, replenishing food supplies - within an hour, Amazon Now will deliver products to your home. If I can't wait 60 minutes, then I use Curbside to order everything I need, then I'll pick up at Target to pick up my order without even leaving my car.

A cleaning lady from Handy comes and cleans my apartment while I'm at work. When I need to fix the plumbing or assemble any shelf, Handy will also send me a plumber or a master. And thanks to Sprig, Munchery, GrubHub and other applications that allow you to order food at home, I do not need to bother with cooking.
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Unfortunately, all these benefits come at a price: the better such services work, the less we encounter other people.

Let's, for example, look at Amazon Now. A couple of years ago, if I needed to buy milk, coffee and bread, I went to the store. There I could smile to a couple of strangers to me, chat a little with the store employee and some shopper standing next to me in line at the checkout, thank the cashier and wink at the little girl who helps my mother to shop. Then I would go home.

Of course, I would not call this communication, but nevertheless, thanks to going to the store, I interacted with at least seven people. This can be called microcommunication: short and spontaneous interaction.

But if I order something in Amazon Now, then I only meet the employee who delivers the goods. So, instead of the seven possibilities of microcommunication, we get only one.

Over time, we will be able to more and more manage events without leaving the comfort (and relative isolation) of our home. On November 17, Uber delivered free flu shots in 35 cities. What's next? Improved doctor service on call? Will there be anything that we can not do thanks to these services?

Applications that facilitate our daily routines are not the only thing that helps reduce daily communication with people. Thanks to technologies that facilitate remote work (video conferencing, time tracking software, collaboration tools, applications that allow screen sharing, corporate chat, and so on), it has become much easier to work from home these days.

According to the latest statistics, the number of employees (not freelancers) who regularly work remotely has increased by 103 percent since 2005. And more than two-thirds of the employees “sometimes” work from home — a 50 percent increase from 2008.

The number of companies with a staff of employees working remotely (such as Buffer, Automattic, Lullabot, Zapier, Twilio and Shopify) is only growing, and according to forecasts, in five years the number of employees in the “remote” will grow by another 40 percent. It is clear that traditional offices will become far less frequent than today.

What is the point of convenience if they don't make you happy?

And it bothers. Think of all the micro-interactions that occur in the office; with the secretary, with people in the elevator, with a colleague sitting in the kitchen, while I make myself coffee, and also with a couple of guys who sit next to me - I met six people in only five minutes of my stay at work.

Such micro-interactions simply do not occur at home. I can assign a Skype call with my boss instead of the usual correspondence, but I can't greet people in the elevator. And while online messengers like Slack can help create friendly “spontaneous” conversations with my colleagues, they still are not: I communicate only when I myself decide to be active online.

In 2014, a study entitled “Social Interactions and Welfare: The Amazing Power of Weak Bonds” was conducted , which determined that communicating with “weak bonds” (with people we don’t know well) positively affects our happiness and feelings. the world. In other words, the more such microinteractions, the better we feel. The researchers also found that this effect extends not only to extroverts. On the contrary, the conclusion was that for introverts a large number of daily interactions with other people is extremely useful.

In addition, studies by Elizabeth Dunn and Gillian Sandstrom have shown that communication with other people has a positive effect on us, making us a little bit happier. The people who followed the instructions to “establish real interaction with the cashier” smiling, looking at the man’s eyes and talking to him, were much more pleased with this experience and generally more happy than those who were instructed to “make communication more rapid and effective”.

Researchers from the University of Chicago found that the passengers who were asked to talk with people who were sitting around were much more pleased with the trip than those who were instructed to "enjoy their loneliness."

The better the online services, the less we intersect with other people.

Since the applications providing us with some convenience will only develop in the near future, I propose to learn how to find a balance between them and the services that make micro-interactions possible. Instead of working from home, use the Workfrom to help you find a place near you with good Wi-Fi, great food and lots of cozy corners for productive work. Sign up for WeWork or use another service that provides collaborative spaces.

Install Treatings to find people in your city with similar professional interests and ambitions. Use Meetup to join different communities of interest. Use FindGravy to search for events that fit your mood and fit into the schedule. Join SuperClub. Meet the local dog owners at Meet My Dog or take the dog for a walk using the Walkzee!

Use all the comforts that modern technology provides us with, just as you need to use everything else - “moderately”. When you run out of drinks in the middle of a party, use the services of Drizly to get you a beer straight to the door. But on Sunday, go get yourself a beer in BevMo. When your boss invites you to work remotely, think about this answer: “It sounds great, but I would like to come to the office at least three times a week.”

Because in the end, what is the point of convenience, if they do not make you happy?