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COVID-19 + Online = Cybersickness

We have ALL your misinformation, plus some TRUE FACTS and SCIENCE.
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Lani
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Joined: Mon Feb 22, 2021 11:42 am

COVID-19 + Online = Cybersickness

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Post by Lani »

We spent a lot of time online during the pandemic. It's making us sick.
Once mainly a scourge of VR headsets, cybersickness seems to be on the rise as the pandemic pushes our bodies to their digital limits.
The pandemic has forced most of us online at incomparable rates. It’s where we’ve worked, taken classes, attended parties, and gotten lost in 2020’s voracious news cycles. But our bodies were not designed to primarily exist in virtual space like this, and as our collective digital time creeps upward, something called cybersickness seems to be leaking into the general population.

Characterized by dizziness and nausea, cybersickness has mostly been studied in the context of aggressively submersive niche technologies, such as virtual reality headsets. In 2011, 30 to 80 percent of virtual reality users were likely to experience cybersickness, though improved headset hardware brought the range down to 25 to 60 percent by 2016.

Now, it seems the scrolling movement in a Netflix queue or a social media newsfeed also has the power to cause cybersickness when used under exceptional circumstances: all day, every day. (Also find out how video calls can tax the brain, leading to the phenomenon called Zoom fatigue.)

:snippity:

Sarah Colley, a 30-year-old content marketer in Asheville, North Carolina, noticed the worst of her cybersickness symptoms in March 2021. Her screen time surged during a cumbersome work deadline, when for several days she spent 10 to 12 hours in a row on her computer. In addition to dizziness and nausea, she says that the screen itself appeared to jump around, making it difficult to focus, and a sense of anxiety settled over her.

:snippity:

Now, when we experience the same vestibular and visual mismatch brought on by non-threatening forces, like smartphones, our body thinks we’re in grave danger. It’s an apt metaphor for the emotional toxicity overdoing it online can ignite, and in the end, cybersickness may turn out to be as effective as warding off actual poison.
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/scie ... 48368741AA
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