Chastina Tham Ching Teng

S10159862A
T103
Written Communication
Ms Sheela Chandrakala Sarvananda
3 February 2015
The Google Effect
There is the common belief that with search engines like Google and Yahoo, our lives
have become much easier as information is accessible with just a click. Information can
be found by using Google and with a few hyperlinks, thousands of sources appearing at
our disposal, thus search engines are viewed as a godsend for many as research that
once required days to acquire can now be complete in a few minutes (Carr, Is Google
Making Us Stupid?). However, the advantages of search engines are mainly physical in
our interactive lives. Many are not aware that search engines come along with
disadvantages that affect us mentally, like the Google effect. The Google effect is
basically the overall tendency of forgetting easily accessible information due to the
expectation of having future access to this information. This diminishes our mental
abilities in regards to memory, causing us to experience dwindling rates of recollection of
information (Betsy et al.). Search engines affect us mentally in adverse ways that are not
always noticeable. The Google effect brought about by search engines, mainly leads to
the diminishing of our memory, the impairing of our concentration ability and ultimately,
the alteration of the way we think when it comes to information.

Search engines can be found on any technological mediums, and with this
accessibility comes our mind-set that our memory is located on a hard drive, which
ultimately diminishes our retention and recollection of information. If we need
information on a certain topic, we search immediately without trying to recall what
we have beforehand. Carr states that it is seen as inefficient to use our brains to store
information, memory is now seen as a storage index for search engines on the web, so
information can be located (qtd. in Suderman 181). People write their thoughts and
read thoughts others wrote before, causing them to lose dependency on recalling the
contents of their own memory. In addition, with physical copies of the information in
our head through technological mediums, we no longer bring up information from our
memory; instead the information from search engines is used. Our reliance on
personal memories and their content further diminished when publishing and literacy
spread as books and journals become our external storage space for our brain and as a
result, people did not bother with recalling information anymore; they simply looked
it up (Carr 177). Search Engines utilise keywords to bring up results, changing the
way people absorb information. A study done by nGenera showed that people no
longer read a page from left to right, instead they jump around, looking for relevant
information of interest (Carr 9). Furthermore, Joe Oshea, a philosophy major, claims
that there is no reason to read through a full offline text when he can take a minute to
look for relevant information before specifying it online (Carr 8). The ability to retain
information can help us with critical thinking, but search engines lessons our
information pool. A good memory factors into thinking productivity as we think with
what knowledge and information we have and we cannot think with the lack of
resources we have stored in our brains (Klemm, An Old New Way To Fix Our

Schools). Computer memory absorbs information and saves it as it is, while human
memory processes it long after the information have been absorbed, improving the
quality of the memory and making it long term (Carr 191). However, search engines
rob us of this opportunity, as the mind-set now views memorisation as wasting time
and an obsolete skill (qtd. in Tapscott 181). Certainly this shows that with search
engines, we have all started to experience the Google effect, ultimately using the
Internet to store needed information instead of our own brains as we gradually lose
our memory abilities.

While search engines diminish our mental abilities in regards to memory, another
disadvantage to search engines is the fact that is impairs our concentration abilities.
Carr stated that his concentration drifts after a page or two of long stretches of prose
as the Internet chips away his capacity for concentration and contemplation (5-6).
Search engines require little time to fill our screens with information and distribute
information in fast paced streams. We simply skim past them as the more we use the
web; the more we fight to stay focused on long pieces of text (Carr 7). In addition, we
give lesser concentration to what we read as people tend to skim long pieces of text to
select relevant information before specifying the information through search engines
as mentioned before. Distractions like buttons and hyperlinks help command our
attention with far greater insistence than traditional media ever did (Carr 117). When
we are on the receiving end of the mediums rapid-fire delivery of information our
attention is ultimately seized, only to be scattered (Car 118). Search engines often
draw attention to text, related to what we searched for. We do not see a forest or
trees when searching; we see twigs and leaves (Carr 91). The quality of our
thinking and our decision-making is also affected. Digital devices are converting us

into scatterbrains as we lose the ability to concentrate, learn and remember due to the
fact that information is recalled at a click (Watson 3). With search engines throwing
loads of information at us, quality thinking cannot be done in a hurry with an
environment full of distractions and hyperlinks. We lose the ability to produce quality
thoughts when we never truly switch off from receiving information or when we
allow ourselves to be distracted and multi-task (Watson 4). The digital disruptions and
information overload splinters our concentration after gathering our attention (Watson
6). A study done in UCLA showed that multi-tasking led to adverse effects of
learning. We cannot receive information easily when our concentration is split and we
pay less attention (Watson 20). Another study conducted by Jacob Nielsen, tested that
only six out of nearly two hundred and forty people read linearly while the rest
skimmed through the information (Watson 24). We live faster than we think and with
the speed of information, we tend to make decisions and respond without thinking
(Watson 6). Our decision-making abilities are risked when we are too busy to think of
alternatives properly because our brains are processing new information quickly. Thus
we lose the ability to remove irrelevant thoughts and remain objective; our brain
might end up ignoring reason (Watson 19). Search engines flood us with information
from one simple search and in this digital age, we tend to become scatter brained,
allowing the overload of information to adversely affect our quality thinking and
decision making abilities.

However, other than diminishing our memory skills and impairing our concentration,
the most prominent disadvantage of search engines is that it ultimately alters the way
we think. As mentioned before, with search engines providing us with information,
we lose the tendency to remember easily accessible information. But what we do
remember is where to locate the information. In fact, the study of Google effects on
memory did show that we have an enhanced recall of how to search for information
(Betsy et al.). In a way, we trivialise issues when we no longer think critically of how
to solve a problem. Instead, we think of where to search for a way to solve the
problem due to the belief that we can find necessary information through search
engines. The concept of knowledge itself is seemingly linked to search engines and it
appears that when we are faced with a lack of knowledge, we instinctively to turn to
the computer to rectify the situation (Betsy et al.). Furthermore, we do not remember
information that we can still access. This is also shown in the study of Google effects
on memory. It is found that when participants believed that information would be lost,
they attempted retaining it compared as to when they believed they could access the
information again. In fact, the recollection rate increases when one believes that the
information unsaved and cannot be accessed anymore (Betsy et al.). In addition, when
people believe that information can be found again, it is shown that the content of the
information is not remembered, but instead the location. We are ultimately adapting to
technology, becoming more reliant on it where we must remain connected to search
engines to gain information (Betsy et al.). We become more concerned with whether
something can be done instead whether something should be done (Watson 2). The
rapid response culture also encourages mistakes as we think fast but without quality
when we multi-task and we rarely carry out tasks well (Watson 6). Furthermore, with
the rapid flow of information affecting our quality of thinking, we become vulnerable

to information hunger and gullibility. A study done by the University of Connecticut

found that web users are consistently poor at judging whether web-based information
is trustworthy or not. When asked to look at a spoof page, ninety per cent of
participants believed it (Watson 23-24). Ultimately search engines alter the way we
think, making us lack critical thinking in order to solve problems and making us we
believe that when a mistake is made we can simply search how to solve and as a
result, this is probably the biggest disadvantage of search engines.

It is important to understand that while search engines benefit our lives physically
with accessible information, it causes adverse effects mentally. These are mainly the
chipping of our mental memory abilities, the loss of concentration ability and the
alteration of thinking. Search engines provide easy access to information leading to
the development of the tendency to forget information and diminishing our memory.
In addition search engines chip away at our concentration with multiple hyperlinks
and rapid information. Finally, search engines alter the way we think when it comes to
information leading to unintentional trivialisation of matters, gullibility and silly
mistakes. In fact, studies conducted so far suggest that we are in the midst of changing
the way we think and absorb information (Carr, Is Google Making Us Stupid?). The
Google effect occurs even in us and given these points, search engines indeed have
mentally adverse effects.
(1,698 words)

Works Cited
Betsy, Sparrow et al. Google Effects On Memory: Cognitive Consequences of
Having Information at Our Fingertips. Science Express: Department of
Psychology (2011): Web. 3 Feb. 2014.
Carr, Nicholas. The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains. New York:
W.W. Norton & Company, 2010. Print.
Carr, Nicholas. Is Google Making Us Stupid? The Atlantic, 1 Jul. 2008. Print.
Klemm Ph.D., William R. An Old New Way to Fix Our Schools. Psychology
Today, 12 Apr. 2011. Web. 3 Feb. 2014.
Watson, Richard. Future Minds: How the Digital Age Is Changing Our Minds, Why
This Matters and What We Can Do About It. London: Nicholas Brealey
Publishing, 2010. Print.