Supernormal is on a mission to redefine workplace productivity through AI

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Supernormal Stimuli: Are We Amusing Ourselves to Death?

অতিপ্রাকৃতিক উদ্দীপনা: আমরা কি মৃত্যুর জন্য মজা করছি?

Übernatürliche Reize: Amüsieren wir uns zu Tode?

Estímulos sobrenaturales: ¿nos estamos divirtiendo hasta la muerte?

Stimuli supranormaux : sommes-nous en train de nous amuser à mourir ?

अलौकिक उत्तेजनाएँ: क्या हम अपने आप को मौत तक मनोरंजन कर रहे हैं?

超常刺激：私たちは死ぬほど楽しんでいるのか？

초자연적 자극: 우리는 죽을 때까지 즐겁게 지내고 있나요?

Estímulos supranormais: estamos nos divertindo até a morte?

Сверхъестественные стимулы: развлекаемся ли мы до смерти?

Olağanüstü Uyarıcılar: Kendimizi Ölesiye Eğlendiriyor muyuz?

Kích thích siêu thường: Chúng ta có đang vui vẻ đến chết không?

超常刺激：我们是不是正在自娱自乐？

Just two years ago, manual note-taking was the way to go – and the mere idea of having your notes appear automatically after meetings seemed like science fiction. Then, everything changed with the rise and democratization of large language models (LLMs) and generative AI, leading to a proliferation of new consumer platforms and bots that can take notes, generate action items, produce custom summaries and more, to help users keep track of every meeting. As we enter 2024, the market for note-taking apps is vibrant and filled with options. You may have heard of Big Tech companies like Google and Microsoft providing these services as part of their suite. As a speech-to-text provider powering numerous virtual meeting apps, we can vouch there are many other exciting alternatives out there that are worth exploring. We have personally tested and compared a bunch of them for you, and here are the results! Dive in and discover the most innovative and useful AI note-taking apps to take your productivity to the next level. Types of note-taking apps for online meetings The number and variety of note-taking apps available may seem overwhelming at first. We put together some criteria to help you filter them out based on your needs and preferences: Recording vs. pure notes Do you want a tool that or just ? Some users prefer to have a one-stop-shop platform that records their meetings and aggregates them all in one place. Others are happy with simply receiving notes at the end of each call. records your meetings provides notes Pay attention to how the recording occurs: is it a that joins the meeting or an ? Or would you prefer to upload the meetings there manually? From our experience, extensions are generally best for async communication, i.e. when you record a demo for your colleagues or clients, while bots are optimal for transcribing meetings with several participants. Note that some bots join by default, whereas others require an explicit opt-in. Think of a preferred user experience you want for the note-taking app and its recording tools. bot extension Type of notes Once your meetings are transcribed, the AI does its magic behind the scenes to automatically generate the notes for you. The types and sophistication of such LLM-based notes vary a lot. Features range from and generated based on pre-set contextual templates to in response to your prompts. summaries action items GPT-like interfaces that produce insights The easiest question to start with is: how long and detailed do I want my notes to be? Do I prefer to have templates for my summaries and action items, or do I want to have more control and prompt myself, or both? Complimentary AI-powered features Together with the note-taking functionality comes the ability to your notes. Good can be vital for quickly finding information within your notes and/or video recordings. is another great feature that visually breaks down who spoke in a meeting and for how long. Some providers allow you to edit the notes manually or automatically, taking out repetitions or silences from the transcript by default. store, organize, and categorize semantic search Speaker separation Integration with other apps Check if the note-taking app integrates well with other tools and applications you use, such as or . Compatibility with your go-to meeting platform is an absolute must. Luckily, most providers are, by default, compatible with Zoom, Google Meets, and Microsoft Teams. calendar apps, task management tools, productivity suites Pricing Consider the pricing structure of the app, whether it's a one-time purchase, subscription-based, or freemium, where your feature set or storage history is limited. Evaluate if the features provided justify the cost, given your monthly volume of meetings and how extensive your usage will be. Supported languages Language support is not something to be taken for granted just yet. We generally recommend testing several apps to see firsthand if they can accurately detect your language (and accent) and support , i.e. the ability to transcribe meetings where speakers switch between multiple languages. This applies to English, too – while it’s supported by all providers today, the quality of notes is not always the same. code-switching Use case Last but not least, you’ll notice that some apps are designed and optimized for specific verticals and use cases, like sales, healthcare, web conferencing, and so on. Best AI note-taking apps to try in 2024 Without further ado, here comes our selection of AI note-taking apps. This is not an exhaustive list – and there’s no order of preferences to it! Just an overview of the projects we tested that exemplify the main categories of note-taking platforms that exist today. #1: One-stop-shop apps In this category, you’ll find some examples of apps perfect for users who look for a single HQ to aggregate all their meeting recordings and notes. Fireflies One of the earliest players in the space, provides an all-in-one solution with a Chrome extension, a bot, and more input options. Fireflies join all the authorized calendar events and send recaps to users of your choice. The meetings are recorded via a bot, with downloadable transcripts, audio, and video available afterward. Past meetings are stored on the platforms and can be accessed via an interactive dashboard. Fireflies Key features and transcripts, including messages that participants may share in the chat. Speaker-based timestamped function allows you to turn specific phrases of the transcript into downloadable soundbites. ‘Soundbites’ are powered by several versions of GPT, free and paid. That means you can play around with prompts if you wish to make customized summaries. Note that the conversational ‘AskFred’ feature is behind a paywall. ‘AI super summaries’ , including sentiment analysis and key info from the meetings like dates, metrics, and action items. Smart insights Languages Fireflies officially supports 60+ different languages. Pricing 7-day free trial, then $18 and $29 per pro and business accounts, with a 40% discount if billed annually. More info . here Why we love it 🖤 Fireflies delivers a highly versatile and robust user experience with a rich spectrum of features. Their platform stands out for a super complete UI dashboard — like a spaceship’s control panel! – and tools, including numerous integrations and an API. It’s also the only platform on our list allowing you to pick a GPT model you want for the summaries, with the unique soundbites feature being a great tool for video editing. For users in search of in-depth info about the meeting, Fireflies could be very valuable – just be prepared, it takes some getting used to. Claap On a mission to provide a single video platform to aggregate all meetings of your organization, offers a versatile platform to record meetings, get AI-powered insights, and share your meeting history with the rest of the team. Claap Key features Be it async or real-time, you can with a Chrome extension and let others comment on it later with video annotation, comment threads, and polls. record your screen and webcam are generated based on contextual templates of your choice (e.g., executive summary, meeting minutes, user research, sales discovery, etc.). You can also see who spoke in the meeting and for how long. AI summaries enables users to collect all your meetings in one place, group them by categories and/or teams, and search through the entire collection. Video wiki Languages 100 languages supported. Pricing Freemium model, with the free tier allowing 10 videos per user of 10 minutes each. AI-powered summaries are available under the third tier at $30/month. Yearly discount of -20 % on all plans. Learn more . here Why we love it 🖤 Claap is a great one-stop-shop tool for people who want to collaborate around meetings – everything you record can be easily accessed by others via a shared workspace. We personally love their UI – it’s intuitive to navigate and use. Their Chrome extension is a good alternative to having a bot join a meeting, enabling you to record meetings asynchronously in a Loom-like way. Other apps to try in this category , a versatile AI Workmate for meetings. Carv #2: Note-taking-first apps This selection is for users who are less concerned with recording and are mostly interested in compact yet exhaustive summaries and bullet-point notes. Supernormal is a core player in the space specializing primarily in note-taking. Meetings with Google Meet are recorded with the help of a Chrome extension, with a bot reserved for Zoom and Microsoft Teams. The notes appear right after the meeting window is closed and are all accessible via a centralized dashboard. Supernormal Key features that are editable with a single click and can be customized, i.e. you can add new thematic sections to the notes and break your library of notes into categories. Meetings notes stored in a dedicated tab can be ticked off as you accomplish them and assigned to other team members. Interactive tasks allow you to tap into each bullet to break down further a specific topic identified in a transcript. Expanded bullets Languages 22, including various English and Spanish dialects. Pricing Freemium: 10 meetings/month for free with the Starter plan – you need to upgrade if you want your meetings recorded, not just transcribed. The Pro plan unlocks access to advanced sharing controls, a full library of note templates, and Zapier integrations at $10/month (- 44% for annual subs). Bonus: you don’t need to put in your credit card details when signing up! More info . here Why we love it 🖤 Supernormal is a highly specialized meeting-recoding tool suitable for individuals and teams alike, integrating beautifully with your existing apps. Its user is easy to find and informative. Their notes are generated on the fly and, at least in our case, appeared just a few seconds after the meeting – probably the fastest we’ve seen! We loved their editing interface, too, and found their automatic action items to be the most accurate. documentation Circleback operates similarly to Supernormal but only with bots. It can join any Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, or WebEx meeting based on your calendar events (that a bot will join by default) or a link. The meeting notes are sent directly to your mailbox and stored in the user dashboard within minutes. Circleback Key features Editable that break the transcript down into topics. meeting summaries The summaries are turned automatically into , which you can tick off later as you complete the task. Key figures in all notes are highlighted in bold, making locating the key info points nice and easy to spot. action items , which provides contextualized answers to questions about your meetings in the form of an AI chat. Meeting assistant Pricing 14-day free trial, after $25.00/month. More details . here Why we love it 🖤 Circleback is among the few players on this list that do not provide video recordings. Instead, they put all their focus and expertise on note-taking – and their default prompts do a superb job, the overall quality of notes is among the finest we’ve seen! This makes Circleback a great option for someone looking to consume high-quality skimmable notes without further need to interact with the app. Great bonus: your notes can be viewed directly from an email – this is not the case for most other apps, which tend to incentivize users to enter the app to view the transcript and/or notes. #3: Apps for sales notes and CRM automation Here, we enter the territory of apps that are optimized for sales teams for note-taking, summaries, and an incredibly valuable CRM enrichment function, powered by AI. Modjo Beyond generating notes, positions itself as a ‘conversational platform’ optimized for salespeople in particular. The platform does note-taking in a similar way to other platforms while also automating the recording of key data from customer and prospect calls in your CRM, like Salesforce. That’s why the first step to setting it up is connecting your business tools to their hub. Modjo Key features that break the call transcript into sales-relevant subtopics, like next steps, pains identified, customer insights, and observations. AI notes , which automatically synchronizes all your notes in your business tools. You’ll benefit from an optimized note-taking interface and templates that facilitate the transmission of information in asynchronous mode. Livenotes A wide variety of including Salesforce, Aircall, Hubspot, Slack, and Gmail. business integrations, Pricing Cannot tell – one has to request a custom quote on their pricing page. Why we love it 🖤 Modjo is among the leaders when it comes to call-to-CRM enrichment. Catering to a specific customer vertical, they’re able to provide a highly specialized experience for customer-facing users in their niche. Spoke Like Modjo, is designed first and foremost for sales teams. It records the video meetings and generates notes based on pre-set templates based on the most used sales frameworks like BANT, which you can modify. In fact, their interface is so customizable that you can ask questions about the notes before, during, and after the meeting. The notes are then synced with the CRM of your choice and complimentary apps like Slack. Spoke Key features in video format, which highlights and lets you skip directly to sections that address the key discussion points of the conversation. Meeting recordings break down the transcript into a Q&A-styled report, which you can modify and interact with via a GPT-like interface by asking specific questions about the meeting. Meeting notes feature, allowing you to add a list of recurrent names and terms to help the tool transcribe them accurately, e.g. company names, jargon, etc. Custom vocabulary Languages 29+ supported languages. Pricing Freemium model, with features like custom meeting templates and workplace collaboration behind the paywall of $24/month. More info . here Why we love it 🖤 Spoke is probably the most customizable tool in the selection, super hands-on, providing highly granular insights into your sales and user research calls. Their ultra-modifiable UI makes it especially suitable for users who like to be in control and want to have the option to ‘dig into’ the transcript rabbit hole. You'll find a nice library of educational resources inside the app's Spoke Academy to help you get the hang of it. Other apps to try in this category , , , and . Gong Praiz PiperAI Cockpit #4 Webinars and online conferences Finally, we wanted to give a shoutout to platforms that specialize in online meetings and events with a lot of participants. Livestorm is an EU-based unified meetings and webinar platform, offering all must-have features for hosting dynamic mult-stakeholder discussions in sectors like healthcare, finance, and tech. It is equally suited for external events, such as webinars or online courses, and internal ones, like product demos, employee onboarding, and so on. Livestorm Key features , meaning that every call window can be customized with nice features like file sharing and custom room design - and can be recorded of course, with an exportable transcript option. You can also determine who has speaking permissions for each event. Custom room experience allowing you to send unlimited customized reminders and follow-up emails to all event participants using plain text or custom HTML. Email cadences, with platforms like HubSpot, Salesforce, and others. CRM integrations Why we love it 🖤 Livestorm is a browser-based app that conveniently aggregates all the functions that someone who organizes and runs multistakeholder meetings would need and enjoy. Technically, it’s not a note-taking app per se, but rather an even hosting platform with the notes and recordings available as a bonus. Languages Currently available in 24 languages. Pricing Free plan with up to 20 minutes/session and 30 live attendees. Then, a Pro plan at 79€/month if billed annually, with up to 100 attendees allowed. More . here Conclusion Finding the AI meeting companion that’s truly right for you may take a few trials and errors. Our goal was to present you with some alternatives, outline their features, and suggest who these platforms may be more suited for. Having tried all of the above, our verdict is that you can expect more exciting experiments and innovation in upcoming years when it comes to AI-powered summaries, action items, and other types of notes. And these breakthroughs will not be attributed to the platform builders alone –  the end users will have a key role to play in turning these tools into real game-changers for productivity. Today, we’re witnessign a real customization trend of note-taking tools, which gives users an unprecedented degree of agency to find the perfect combination of techniques to organize their meeting routine in a way that suits them individually and as a team. As AI continues to augment our collective and individual capabilities, it’s important for all users to assume an active role in adopting and optimizing these tools to make the most of them. If you’re curious to learn how to make great summarization prompts for online meetings, check out this . Taking this one step further, for those of you who like to DIY, you may want to try our open-source code to build your own . actionable guide recording and transcription bot for Google Meet About Gladia Powered by generative AI, provides a speech-to-text and audio intelligence API that turns any audio into text in near real time with exceptional accuracy. Gladia

Best AI Meeting Note-taking Apps to Try in 2024

2024 সালে চেষ্টা করার জন্য সেরা AI মিটিং নোট-টেকিং অ্যাপ

Die besten AI-Meeting-Notiz-Apps zum Ausprobieren im Jahr 2024

Las mejores aplicaciones para tomar notas en reuniones de IA para probar en 2024

Meilleures applications de prise de notes pour réunions IA à essayer en 2024

2024 में आज़माने के लिए सर्वश्रेष्ठ एआई मीटिंग नोट लेने वाले ऐप्स

2024 年に試すのに最適な AI 会議メモ作成アプリ

2024년에 시도해 볼 최고의 AI 회의 메모 작성 앱

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Лучшие приложения для создания заметок на собраниях с использованием искусственного интеллекта, которые стоит попробовать в 2024 году

2024'te Denenecek En İyi Yapay Zeka Toplantısı Not Alma Uygulamaları

Ứng dụng ghi chú cuộc họp AI tốt nhất nên dùng thử vào năm 2024

2024 年值得尝试的最佳人工智能会议笔记应用

THE FUNCTION OF CHASTITY

Prevail in the formation of dreams

174 AI Tools To Try

In this interview, Fardad Zand talks not only about his own personal journey, but his outlook on Artificial Intelligence, Web3 and entrepreneurship… What has been your proudest professional moment? There are quite a few moments in my professional life that come to mind for this question. At this moment, I would say it is establishing and building and working with a world-class team that is busy developing cutting-edge, much-needed tech solutions for the masses to bring further efficiency and intelligence to web3. What keeps me excited and passionate every day with Wisdomise is the opportunity in front of us to empower the masses to create wealth and be the master of their financial future. Wisdomise What is the most interesting story you have read about AI recently? Talking of an interesting, recent piece, the news that just came out about springs to mind. I think it brought a lot of unsavoury thoughts to the AI space. This however only proves that AI is capable of much more than we anticipated or planned for; it is simply another challenge for us to meet with our heads on - apart from the tech and product aspects of AI, there are the ethical and moral aspects of it as well. AI is capable of many advancements and we are still discovering what is to come; if anything, it is only becoming more exciting for us. Google firing one of their engineers over an AI chatbot being sentient What is one message you would give to people trying to adapt their business for Web3 today? Web3 has opened a gate to a new world where everyone can benefit from a shared, decentralized pool of knowledge. Those businesses that fail to adapt to web3 opportunities (whether it is crypto as a currency, blockchain as an infrastructure, NFT as an ownership instrument, and metaverse as an evolving ecosystem, among others) will miss out on a big chance to grow in the future. With decentralization as the core tenet of web3, the wisdom of crowds can be a very potent pool of knowledge that can lead every business towards success. It can also give every individual an equal, fair platform to create wealth, thus, creating a clear value proposition for the masses, something that businesses don’t want to miss out on. What other innovations in this space are especially exciting and close to being launched? We believe that the most exciting innovations in the AI space within financial markets will work to solve inefficiencies and asymmetries. When we talk about inefficiencies, this could mean addressing the boom\bust cycles that investors are able to discern and become used to as a normal part of doing their business. When Artificial Intelligence is helping to guide decision-making at scale, we can encourage trading behaviours which benefit everyone and contribute to the collective outcomes of the markets. Similarly, asymmetries can mean knowledge gaps among different parties participating in the financial markets. AI can surely reduce these gaps by synthesizing the scattered sources of intelligence and extracting meaningful insights for a broader group of participants, hence contributing to the collective value again. It’s important to touch on some of the rather smaller inefficiencies and asymmetries too. When someone begins learning about a new market or financial opportunity they have to trade valuable time and resources to reach a level of understanding that allows them to profit. This is particularly problematic within the crypto market. Crypto projects provide an enormous amount of growth potential but also a great deal of risk. This means that potential investors have to spend thousands of hours learning about projects or put their trust in influencers, copy traders or their contacts on social media. Achieving financial goals doesn’t mean forgoing other important aspects of life like spending time with family or pursuing passions outside of work. With AI agents being designed and employed effectively, anyone can benefit from crypto opportunities while using their time in ways that are more meaningful to them. Are early adopters likely to gain a competitive advantage, or will the bots take over? How should leaders approach this opportunity/challenge? Artificial Intelligence is all about augmenting the abilities that people have rather than replacing the individual. As leaders in the field, we should make sure that no one gets left behind. The truth of the matter is that there is a massive competitive advantage in the global financial ecosystem in the form of asymmetric access to information and historic monetary enfranchisement. The top earners of the world and those that come from generational wealth are capable of growing their fortunes because they have access to expertise, the ability to pay financial managers, or time to research investments which are necessary to yield supernormal profits. Artificial Intelligence actually levels this playing field by reducing the information gap between those that are at the top and those that are still building wealth. In other words, it has the great potential of easing access and enhancing yields for the underprivileged. The question is not necessarily whether or not bots will take over, particularly in financial markets, because these markets exist, in the first place, due to human behaviour and needs. The question is really who stands to benefit most from Artificial Intelligence and how can Artificial Intelligence serve the broader masses, rather than becoming an elite group’s service in the end. The way we see it at Wisdomise AI Labs, everyone should be able to gain a great deal of value by sharing information and having their financial decision-making guided by a dispassionate AI agent. What specifically will sentient AI mean for the workforce? ‘Sentient’ is a tricky word when talking about Artificial Intelligence. For the sake of argument, let’s define it as the ability to understand and convey emotional information. This is where natural language processing (NLP) comes in. This essentially allows an AI agent to explain itself to human counterparts in ways that will be intellectually and emotionally relevant to them. One of the big difficulties with AI is that we can’t ask an agent what it is thinking about or how it reached its conclusions (a trend known as explainable AI). NLP opens up a two-way street of communication between users and AI agents, thus augmenting their abilities. So ultimately, we feel that this will be a huge value addition to the global workforce. To put it simply, imagine an AI agent as your trusted advisor or co-worker, somebody who can not only share rational insights with you and guide you logically (based on facts), but also understands you and communicates with you emotionally. This is surely an advancement in human-AL (human-machine) interactions that expect to yield productivity improvements in the workplace. Yet, this will undoubtedly raise certain ethical and normative concerns with itself, which demand careful considerations and remedies on their own. What’s been a particular failure or success that you learnt the most from? Some time ago, I started a tech company with a friend and two of my university professors. We had access to the best of tech talent out there and managed to raise funds for our startup pretty quickly. In the end, we failed and that gave me a profound lesson that there is way more to entrepreneurship and leadership than pure talent and capital - these are important ingredients of every successful venture, but they won’t last forever without a clear, simple translation of the vision into a product and the effective traction of it within its target market. We learnt this the hard way. Is there a standout moment in your life? A turning point for me was to start working on Wisdomise in the midst of Covid pandemic with all the chaos and uncertainty in the world, let alone in crypto and DeFi spaces. This finally offered me the opportunity to build something for a much broader group of people to help them create and manage wealth - this has always been one of my dreams and crypto paved the path to realizing it. After building the product failed twice, due to its complications and other side challenges, I finally managed to take it off the ground and commence a solid foundation around it. This will continue to be a turning point in my life for the years to come, I’m sure. …And a moment to forget? Every step I took and every situation I’ve faced has led me to this moment now. I’ve learnt and grown from every moment of my life, but if I had the chance or ability to redo an instance of it, that would surely be my dear dad’s passing away. If you weren’t in tech, what other career would you be in right now? I’d probably have gone into snowboarding as a professional or becoming a fighter pilot. I quite enjoyed tackling the ups and downs of the snow-capped mountain ways. It taught me about always finding the smartest way to face a challenge while enjoying what you do. In a way, it's a lot like manoeuvring through entrepreneurship in the tech scene: challenging, exciting, and uncertain. We have to see the big picture and create a seamless path to the finish line, fast, precise, and enjoyable! What I most liked about flying fighter jets, on top of their deep tech nature, is the strong association of risk, speed, precision, and manoeuvrability with the job. Witnessing my dad flying them, it’s always been and will remain one of my dream jobs. Best advice you have ever been given? Not to be afraid of questioning and challenging the norms and habits (the status quo), and not to fear change and failure, as long as there are good rationale and intent behind it.

Past–Present–Future Series: Q&A with Wisdomise CEO & Co–Founder Fardad Zand 

In defense of Ethereum and its fatness: why I’m still bullish on ETH

I wrote a book on my experience with digital addiction. Get your copy from Barnes and Noble or or Kobo (ebook) Now I will talk about pornography. The consequences discussed in the previous two posts pale in comparison to the consequences of heavy interaction with pornography. Based on my review of the research, I believe use of porn — more so than any other digital interaction — is the largest source of repeated cognitive overstimulation and desensitization to stimulation for most people. As a result I believe it explains the increase in states of apathy, ADHD, and depression today that is otherwise hard to explain. Because men heavily use pornography more frequently than women, this also explains why men have comparatively higher rates of these symptoms than women. And it is possible that the acute overstimulation and large resulting magnitude of desensitization to stimulation may explain the higher suicide rate for men as opposed to women. With the level of desensitization that experience from repeated, acute overstimulation from consuming large amounts of porn in single sittings, many are simply unable to derive sufficient stimulation from life to maintain enthusiasm with existence. strongly the vast majority of guys Interaction with today’s TV shows, movies, and video games results in more cognitive stimulation than those of the past. There’s no confusion there. But interaction with pornography today results in a super amount of stimulation. The stimulation delivered from other forms of media mentioned pales in comparison to the stimulation that can be delivered by pornography. Thus the degree of reduced receptivity to stimulation, or excitement, or reward, and the resulting mental health consequences from that reduced receptivity, is far more with porn. For most people, I believe porn is THE greatest driver of desensitization and resulting depression from not deriving enough stimulation from normal life. It is THE greatest driver of ADHD: where we constantly seek more stimulation to maintain engagement with a less stimulating life. Having intensely reviewed the topic of mental health issues, it is really clear to me and undeniable that interaction with porn is the most powerful underlying cause of many mental health issues, particularly depression and ADHD. I dig into why it can be more stimulating than sex, and how porn can also contribute to erectile dysfunction and premature ejaculation, in my book. But quickly, I’ll share how pornography results in overstimulation. When people are watching porn, they are often guzzling novel sexual stimulation: watching multiple videos in one sitting. This results in an incredible amount of stimulation, enabling an artificially heightened rate of masturbation and ejaculation. This leads to an artificially heightened depletion of sexual energy. We may feel more drained and more apathetic. Furthermore, the supernormal mental stimulation from heavy exposure to novel visual sexual stimulation from porn may lead to reduction in sensitivity to mental stimulation and a worn down reward system. It’s difficult to measure, but around 80% of young adult men are consuming porn frequently and around 30% of young adult females are, and I believe those numbers are understated from response bias. Many of these people feel like they are addicted, unable to change their behavior despite recognizing its bad for them. Addiction would be explained by the addictive loop from desensitization mentioned in the previous post: porn makes us less stimulated by normal life, making us more in need of blasts of stimulation from porn. I now want to talk about the study that motivated my entire exploration into this topic. The name of the paper is . Brain Structure and Functional Connectivity Associated With Pornography Consumption In July 2014 this from the Max Planck Institute (published in the prestigious journal JAMA), reported increased use of pornography was associated with reduced grey matter volumes in the mind. Grey matter volumes are responsible for sensitivity to stimulation, receptivity to reward. More volumes result in more sensitivity, less volumes result in less sensitivity and thus more symptoms of depression and ADHD. With porn, people are repeatedly exposing themselves to periods of very acute overstimulation, resulting in heavily reduced receptivity to stimulation and reward. paper The association found between more porn use and less grey matter may be explained by genetics: people with less grey matter may be less stimulated normally and are more hungry for blasts of stimulation from porn. But I think the correlation suggests there is something causal — in that more or less overstimulation can reduce or improve receptivity to stimulation. Since this study found more pornography to be associated with less grey matter volumes, this study found more overstimulation was associated with less receptivity to stimulation. The other way too: less overstimulation was associated with more receptivity. This can come from using porn less and engaging in low stimulation solitude. With more receptivity, we find greater stimulation in the real world (less depression), and less need for distractions to provide more stimulation (less ADHD). We improve our cognitive state. The problem is that, with porn, TV shows, movies, video games, and constant loud EDM, young adults are repeatedly, acutely cognitively bombarding themselves with overstimulation, wearing down their receptivity to stimulation, to pleasure. They are unable to engage in the activities needed to restore sensitivity to stimulation — engaging in low stimulation existence through focused meditation or even just digitally-unaided solitude — because the reduction in sensitivity to stimulation from all the overstimulation makes those periods of low stimulation experience too painful to endure. Instead of going to the bathroom and decompressing, people walk to the bathroom while unnecessarily texting or listening to music. Instead of eating lunch and taking a moment to just exist, we recoil, because to just exist without any additional artificial stimulation means that we are so far away from the baseline level of stimulation that we are used to and expect. Without desensitization to stimulation, we would be fine with that low level of stimulation. But we continually shoot past the pleasure ceiling, and as a result our sensitivity to stimulation is reduced, heightening the baseline level of stimulation that we must get from normal life to maintain engagement with it. We need more stimulation to receive the same amount of pleasure from life as before. So we turn to our devices for constant distraction and stimulation, preventing us from focusing. In addition to withdrawing from pornography, increased meditation is associated with more grey matter volumes. In meditation, people are exposing themselves to periods of low levels of stimulation, which may improve receptivity, and in turn combat symptoms of depression and ADHD. It is possible that naturally having more grey matter volumes enables people to meditate more easily: having more receptivity from the increased grey matter volumes, they can more easily sustain less stimulation. But it is also likely that cutting ourselves off from unnecessary stimulation can improve our receptivity. I think the negative consequences of our relationships with digital media (particularly social media and especially pornography), and the importance of reshaping those relationships are . terribly undervalued In trying to spread awareness about mental health issues, awareness should be spread about these underlying causes of mental health issues that I have mentioned. Addressing these underlying causes will help people better tackle their mental health issues. Understanding interaction with social media, and understanding sensitivity to stimulation and how interaction with porn impacts sensitivity to stimulation, can lead to people first recognizing those underlying problems, and then taking more action addressing those underlying problems, beneath the symptoms. In my book, I pursued these topics in more depth and provide recommendations for changing one’s behavior to most effectively negate the negative consequences. If people can understand and improve their use of new forms of digital media (particularly social media and pornography, and perhaps artificial stimulation across the board), lives may be improved. They can become more. Torches, burning with life. I wrote a book on my experience with digital addiction. Get your copy from Barnes and Noble or or Kobo (ebook)

Part 3: Pornography, Depression, and ADHD

How do products tempt us? What makes them so alluring? It is easy to assume we crave delicious food or impulsively check email because we find pleasure in the activity. But pleasure is just half the story. Temptation is more than just the promise of reward. Recent advances in neuroscience allow us to peer into the brain, providing a greater understanding of what makes us want. In 2011, Sriram Chellappan, an assistant professor of computer science at Missouri University of Science and Technology, gained unheard of access to sensitive information about the way undergraduates were using the Internet. tracked students on campus as they browsed the web. Chellappan was looking for patterns, which not only revealed what students were doing online, but provided clues about who they were. His study “We believe that your pattern of Internet use says something about you,” Chellappan the New York Times. “Specifically, our research suggests it can offer clues to your mental well-being.” Chellappan concluded that there was, in fact, predictive power in the data. He found students with early signs of clinical depression used the Internet differently and he could identify students most likely to face mental health issues simply by looking at how they clicked. wrote in “We identified several features of Internet usage that correlated with depression,” wrote Chellappan. “For example, participants with depressive symptoms tended to engage in very high e-mail usage.” Chellappan developed the technology in hopes of creating an early-warning system to identify struggling students. But his study raised another question, why do people with depression check email more? Alleviating Pain The answer may provide clues about why all of us use the products and services we do in our everyday lives. Psychologists believe people with depression feel negative emotions, like anxiety, more frequently than other people do. There is evidence that the depressed students in Chellappan’s study were using the Internet more because they experience negative mental states more often. To try and feel better, they turned to the web to boost their mood. Finding ways to make ourselves feel better is not something only depressives do. We all seek relief from feeling bad and the brain is primed to help us learn where we can find escape. Just as we might take a Tylenol to relieve a headache, we turn to products to relieve emotional pain. In fact, these two biological processes are so closely linked that taking a Tylenol has to ease both physical and emotional pain. The drug is effective in treating headache and heartache. been shown Having a pain to cure is a necessary prerequisite to using products. Recent neuroscience reveals the brain even adds pain to things that were previously pleasurable to push us to get what our bodies want. When temptation is activated in the brain, it induces a biological process that not only turns on the pleasure response, but also the body’s physiological stress response. Consider a 2005 which looked at the physiological response of women exposed to images of chocolate. Researchers observed that the women experienced a subconscious reaction of alarm similar to seeing a threatening animal in the wild. The women, who had identified themselves as “chocolate cravers,” described feeling not only pleasure at the thought of consuming the chocolate, but also agitation, angst, and a feeling of a loss of control in the face of their desire. For these women’s brains, temptation was stressful. study Since the 1950s, researchers have explored how the brain’s reward system compels behavior. Our understanding of the complex circuitry shows that pleasure and pain work together. Once the brain learns something good is about to happen, it induces a craving we feel as stress. The fastest relief from this discomfort is to get what we want. Exaggeration and Fear Companies, of course, are masters of temptation. If marketing is as, “the process of communicating the value of a product or service to customers,” then implicit in this practice is accentuating the positive aspects of what being sold. This technique is used not only in hawking goods, but is also found in nature. Animals have been tricking each other by accentuating desirable traits for millennia. The process is called “super-normal stimuli” and it is a key to by creating the stress of desire. defined enticing action Another way products induce intense desire is through a certain kind of fear, particularly our innate need to have as much as the next person. The phenomenon is exhibited with a simple experiment conducted by Frans de Waal, a primatologist at Emory University. In the study, de Waal rewarded two capuchin monkeys with a cucumber when they completed a simple task, in this case, handing a rock to the researcher. When both monkeys were given the same reward, they completed the task as prescribed. But when the researcher gave one monkey a grape while offering the other the standard cucumber, were very different. The stiffed monkey, who was perfectly content just seconds before with his cucumber, began shrieking, baring his teeth, thrashing in his cage, and pounding on the table to show his anger. Known in the vernacular as , or “fear of missing out”, marketers utilize this inborn trigger to incite pain akin to what the capuchin monkey felt in de Waals cage. the results FOMO Marketers tasked with increasing consumption of their company’s products have a difficult job; they are often charged with . To do that, they need to find the customer’s problem, their pain, in order to alleviate it. Without the biological basis spurring our desire, there would be no sales. So marketers must at least accentuate, if not induce, a level of discomfort to make us crave their wares. manufacturing desire Like in the undergraduates in Chellappan’s study exhibiting signs of depression, we all seek to escape feeling bad. The products and services that provide immediate relief are those we come to depend upon most. Photo Credit: Orofacial If you found this post interesting, it would mean a lot to me if you could click on the “claps” icon below to let me know. That would really make my day — thanks! Nir Eyal is the author of Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products and blogs about the psychology of products at NirAndFar.com .For more insights on changing behavior, join his free newsletter and receive a free workbook.

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