The amount of time that people spend daily in physical contact has been reduced from six to two hours in the last 20 years. In the same period the amount of hours people spend practicing activities like watching tv, playing video games, or being active on the internet – and thus are prevented from having physical contact with one another – has doubled to 8 hours a day. That concludes a study by Aric Sigman, a member of the Royal Society of Medicine, which will be published in this month's issue of Biologist.
The study, which uses data gathered in Western industrialized countries, shows that the lack of 'real' interaction combined with the dependency on technology bring a change in human physiology which stimulates diseases like cancer, dementia and strokes. The diseases are also getting more severe and the death toll linked to this lifestyle is evolving in a rising line.
'Apparently people have a protective evolutionary system that starts working when we work together and connect to each other physically. Although internet is a beautiful medium, it cannot replace real relationships and our use of internet has fallen completely out of balance,' says Sigman. Research shows that practically all nationalities are reducing the amount of physical meeting hours in a manner never seen before. (From: Express.be)