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Tweets Cause Fights, But Do They Cause ADHD As Well?
The constant churn of commentary directly delivered to us, puts new demands on our brain processing.
Among his other battles last week, Mr. Trump resumed fighting with CEO Jack Dorsey about whether Twitter can censor the president’s tweets that incite violence or are blatantly false. The president relies heavily on Twitter to attack enemies, praise himself, and to announce policy and personnel decisions (reference). He relishes the fact that people respond whenever he tweets.
The president’s tweets strongly affect the world, even if investigators believe that a third of his 66 millions followers are bots. But beyond the content of any particularly comment, I’d like to examine the overall effect that his tweets have. He’s averaged more than ten a day during his presidency, and the rate has increased dramatically in the past half year, sending out closer to two dozen tweets most days. Even if you are not on Twitter, social and news media flood our eyes and ears with repeats, agreements, or refutations of his utterances.
People feel compelled to respond to his tweets, with either adulation or contempt. They feel forced to respond quickly, because everyone else seems to tweet, text, or utter their reaction within minutes, and if one delays…
