Media Use

When I was a junior in college, I studied abroad and taught English to hundreds of kids in Rwanda for five weeks. Those five weeks were the most exciting and influential weeks of my life—but they came with a fair amount of difficulties. Among those difficulties: learning to communicate with…

A popular topic of conversation (at least in the world of psychology) is whether or not video games make people more aggressive. For years, the bulk of research said yes, they certainly do; even the American Psychological Association declared violent video games—such as Halo and Call of Duty—a danger to…

I’ve never had the best of luck with technology—but these past couple months have been particularly horrible. To start, my iPhone went haywire: it started dying at a 50% charge, it would turn off any time I tried to listen to my Pandora app, and it froze whenever I typed,…

Social media has gotten a bad rap lately: it’s been blamed for growing feelings of low self-esteem, loneliness, and bouts of depression. And not without warrant. Not only have users of the platforms reported these negative effects, but studies have shown that social media is, indeed, a likely culprit of…

Growing up, my two brothers and I loved to play all sorts of video games. We’d crowd onto the couch and battle each other in Halo 2 and Call of Duty on the Xbox. We’d spend hours creating our dream houses and families on Sims (with the help of some…

Pros and Cons of Swipe Dating On Your Mental Health, MoodThere was a stigma to online dating ever since Match.com first launched in 1995. The perception was that it was for people who were desperate and incapable of meeting someone in person. I’ll admit it; I never tried online dating…

The second season of Stranger Things debuted last weekend, and once again, Netflix subscribers all over the world had another season and reason to “get their binge on.” Netflix was the first streaming platform to introduce this epic television watching experience, and to say it’s been met with positive feedback…

A couple years ago, my little brother called me into his room and begged me to try on his new video game headset. This wasn’t any old gamer headset—it was virtually a portal to another world. I’m a baby so, of course, I denied his request at first. But then…

The new, much-anticipated medical drama The Good Doctor finally premiered last night, September 26 on ABC—and all eyes were on Freddie Highmore, as he made his debut playing young autistic surgeon Shaun Murphy. Many shows and films have gotten bad raps in the past for misrepresenting mental illnesses or perpetuating…

From Pac-man to Playstation, video games have become a big part of our culture. This year, on September 12, gamers all over the country will want to mark their calendars for National Video Game Day. With 24 hours dedicated to the pastime of video games, gamers will want get their…

The realm of dating as we know it has completely transformed and continues to change with advancing technology. Today, there aren’t as many of us meeting our loved ones in person—striking up conversation with them at the local coffee shop, or beginning our love story with a circumstantial meeting on…

Take a moment and try to imagine life without modern-day technology. No alarm to wake you up for work in the morning. No car to get you where you need to go. You don’t have the option of picking up your phone and calling your dad. Or the ability to…