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Study: App Notifications Worsen the Mood of the User

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7 years ago

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Do you find phone notifications annoying? I certainly do, mostly because they get in the way of my song when I’m listening to music. And when you have multiple apps, all you need is a bit of data connection to ruin your day. And now, a study corroborates that smartphone alerts end up worsening the mood of the user.

Researchers at the Nottingham Trent University in the UK studied the effect on mood in 50 participants who received thousands of digital alerts over a five-week period. Out of more than half a million notifications, they found that 32 per cent resulted in negative emotions.

What are the factors that cause such a negative impact? Well, the context behind the alerts is usually related to non-human activity. A few examples are general phone updates and Wi-Fi availability. The research group found out that Work related notifications also affect people’s mood in a negative way. The problem only worsens when these notifications are received in bulk.

“These digital alerts continuously disrupt our activities through instant calls for attention,” researcher at Nottingham Trent University Eiman Kanjo, said to The Telegraph. “While notifications enhance the convenience of our life, we need to better-understand the impact their obsessive use has on our well-being,”

So, how was the procedure done? The research group created an app called NotiMind. Which the volunteer participants downloaded shortly after. The app collected details relating to the phones digital notifications, as well as participants self-reported moods at various points in the day over a five-week period.

Not everything is doom and gloom though, as there was some positive results when it came to notifications from friends. Especially when the participants received various messages at once. The reason for this is because these notifications created a sense of belonging and feelings of connection to a social group.

So, that’s what the report says. People usually get annoyed by the fact that notifications interrupt the important occasions in life. Often, I hate to be reminded that I didn’t turn my Wi-Fi off and get a notification saying that there’s a network nearby. But hey, maybe someday we can filter out these alerts so that we can focus on the important things.

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Apps

X has decided to remove the option for premium users to hide checkmarks

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3 days ago

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April 12, 2024

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Last year, social network X, owned by Elon Musk, introduced a new feature that allows paid users to conceal their checkmarks from other users. Currently, the company is notifying users about the upcoming removal of the feature.

Similar to many decisions made by X, there is currently no set timeline for when the hide your checkmark feature will be removed.

Before sending notifications to users, the company took down the part of the X Premium help page that explained how to hide the checkmark feature last week. The basic level of subscribers couldn’t use the tool.

If you pay for Premium or Premium+, you can hide your markings from view on your account. There will be no sign of the checkmark on your page or posts. “The checkmark might still show up somewhere, and some features might still let other people know that you have a subscription,” the description said.

The social network started giving blue checkmarks to people with more than 2,500 “verified” followers earlier this month. The company also began giving these users the Premium subscription and users with more than 5,000 confirmed followers the Premium+ subscription.

Musk got rid of the heritage verification checkmark last year after making a subscription service for it. But the company quickly put the blue badge back on top accounts. The proof program is basically going back to what it did at first, which was to check the identities of famous people.

 

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Apps

WhatsApp is testing the Meta AI robot in India and other places

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3 days ago

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April 12, 2024

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Users in India and other markets are currently testing Meta AI, a chatbot with a sizable language model, on WhatsApp. This move indicates the company’s interest in leveraging its extensive user base to expand its AI capabilities.

According to feedback from users in India and select markets, including the U.S., the company has started testing the AI chatbot. India has over 500 million WhatsApp users, making it the largest market for the instant messaging service.

Meta officially announced the move in a statement. “Our generative AI-powered experiences are currently in different stages of development, and we are conducting limited public testing for a range of them,” a spokesperson from Meta informed.

In late September, Meta unveiled Meta AI, its general-purpose assistant. Our AI chatbot is specifically designed to provide direct answers to user queries during chats. Additionally, it has the capability to generate photorealistic images based on text prompts.

With a user base of over 2 billion monthly active users, WhatsApp provides Meta with an exceptional chance to expand its AI offerings on a global scale. With the integration of Meta AI into WhatsApp, Facebook can showcase its cutting-edge language model and image generation capabilities to a massive user base, potentially surpassing its rivals in terms of reach.

Earlier this week, the company confirmed that it will be launching Llama 3, the next version of its open source large language model, within the next month.

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iOS

Apple News is now doing a trial of a game that bears some resemblance to NYT Connections

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4 days ago

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April 11, 2024

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Apple News is now conducting a trial of a new game called Quartiles for iOS 17.5. The objective of the game is for players to arrange a grid of 20 syllables into 5 words, each consisting of four syllables. The New York Times’ most recent successful release, Connections, has a striking resemblance to the UI of Quartiles, as Gadget Hacks has noted. Did Apple News plagiarize or copy the New York Times?

Quartiles differ from connections in that they do not involve the organization of 16 words into four contiguous groups of four. It can be compared to Boggle, as it evaluates your skill in constructing words from their constituent parts. However, the act of discovering sets of four has become particularly captivating to us lately. Currently, Connections has surpassed all other games and is currently the second most popular game in the Times, following Wordle.

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Apple introduced crossword puzzles and small crossword puzzles as a new feature exclusively for Apple News+ subscribers last year. Despite the unconventional nature of a news aggregator investing in gaming, the New York Times has found success in doing so. In 2022, the newspaper acquired the game Wordle for an undisclosed amount in the range of seven figures. This acquisition resulted in the addition of “tens of millions” of new users within a single quarter. According to recent data from the Times, consumers have been dedicating a greater amount of time to playing the newspaper’s games compared to reading the news.

Apple is currently conducting beta testing for Quartiles; however, this does not guarantee its inclusion in iOS 17.5. Considering the fact that the New York Times is discreetly operating a gaming studio at present, it would be advantageous for Apple to provide a selection of fresh, preferably square-shaped games.

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