Richard A. Frank, MD
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Recognizing Insufficient Digital Knowledge Anxiety

11/28/2015

2 Comments

 
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Warning: This post contains tongue in cheek material.  Future posts under this category will be marked TIC.
 
PUE occasionally provides updates for members of the general public trying to keep up with the latest developments in the worlds of animate and inanimate objects. You may wonder why this kind of aid falls under the purview of a psychoanalytically oriented blog.  First, we find that lack of up-to-date information often acts as a trigger for what is known as "Insufficient Knowledge Anxiety,” or IKA. The condition of IKA may lead to frank Panic Attacks when sufferers are trying to meet production deadlines and to states of Depression when untreated for periods longer than six weeks.  Second, passivity with regard to updating knowledge may in itself a symptom of a serious condition, e.g. narcissistic personality disorder marked by delusions of omniscience.

PUE's first ever update is on the subject of a sub-disorder of IKA known as Insufficient Digital Knowledge Anxiety, or IDKA. Armed with the following reprint from the DSM-PUE (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Pyschiatry, PUE edition) you should be able to diagnose yourself and take remedial action if necessary:

Insufficient Digital Knowledge Anxiety
Five or more of the following symptoms have been present during the same three month period.

1.  You spend hours scouring your shelves for books you stored on the Kindle app of your ipad.
2.  You don’t know the difference between Snapchat and Instagram.
3.  You’re still using the previous model of your iphone.
4.  You believe the Help menu on your computer program lists the item you need help with
5.  You think new operating systems improve surgical outcome
6.  You’re looking for the instruction booklet packed with your new digital gadget
7.  You don’t know the difference between a “meme” and a “trope”
8.  Your children laugh at your digital technology questions
9.  Your friends laugh at your digital technology questions
10.You think “user interface” is a meet-up group for drug addicts


2 Comments
Carol Christensen link
6/18/2016 11:45:53 pm

I was going to state I identify the need for such a blog but I don't know Facebook and don't care to learn. It's a matter of prioritizing my time. My life is just fine without it. And I prefer the tweet of Mother Nature's birds.

Yes, I have the anxiety of new devices. I am trusting enough to believe the sales person when they state the product is easy to use and that all of the required information is in the easy to follow booklet in the box. The word "easy " needs to be self-defined by the user. It is my hope the engineer and author uses the user to test their self-proclamation of easy. I certainly wasn't taken into account.

I freely admit this anxiety. I didn't ask for it and I would certainly be happier without it but society deems the cause of my anxiety as progress. For some yes. For me no. Is this passivity? I call it defining my own life.






I learned to type on a typewriter. Keyboards are easier and require no white-out. Thus I am able to make one positive comment on the machines society deems necessary for our daily pursuits. But is the new and better really better? Is the new and better cause for a new field of anxiety. To me new is new as in any genre of society. Better is key. Who has the right to determine what is better for someone else unless it is a procedure to save lives and decrease pain.






Currently I am trying to secure a dial tone on my new telephone so that I may use it. The sales person told me to plug it in and I would be ready to go. Where is his accountability in helping with my technical anxiety.










Reply
Carol Christensen link
6/18/2016 11:46:13 pm

I was going to state I identify the need for such a blog but I don't know Facebook and don't care to learn. It's a matter of prioritizing my time. My life is just fine without it. And I prefer the tweet of Mother Nature's birds.

Yes, I have the anxiety of new devices. I am trusting enough to believe the sales person when they state the product is easy to use and that all of the required information is in the easy to follow booklet in the box. The word "easy " needs to be self-defined by the user. It is my hope the engineer and author uses the user to test their self-proclamation of easy. I certainly wasn't taken into account.

I freely admit this anxiety. I didn't ask for it and I would certainly be happier without it but society deems the cause of my anxiety as progress. For some yes. For me no. Is this passivity? I call it defining my own life.






I learned to type on a typewriter. Keyboards are easier and require no white-out. Thus I am able to make one positive comment on the machines society deems necessary for our daily pursuits. But is the new and better really better? Is the new and better cause for a new field of anxiety. To me new is new as in any genre of society. Better is key. Who has the right to determine what is better for someone else unless it is a procedure to save lives and decrease pain.






Currently I am trying to secure a dial tone on my new telephone so that I may use it. The sales person told me to plug it in and I would be ready to go. Where is his accountability in helping with my technical anxiety.










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