Abstract
Over time, technology has rapidly been implanted and integrated into almost everything in day-to-day life. Of course, technology is a double-edged sword. While technology has made us more efficient, increasing our ability to connect with people, and enhancing our own abilities, it has come with a cost of social and ethical challenges. With the growth of social media and digital platforms, the amount of depression, loneliness, and other “diseases” have plagued us. As of 2023, loneliness has been named as an epidemic. On top of this, nearly 65% of U.S. college students report being lonely, showing a growing need to find meaningful connections in the digital revolution. Thinking beyond the social side and to the ethical implications, we have seen the want to fully integrate ourselves with technology through Brain Computer Interface’s. These push us towards human enhancement and what a human is even capable of. This of course raises privacy questions, autonomy questions, and if these changes still make us even human. Combining these two ideas, it raises a big sociotechnical problem which is how technology can be used to improve human well-being and enhancement without hurting social connection and pushing ethical boundaries. The two issues that can help understand this problem is my portfolio, which is trying to create a digital intervention to reduce loneliness and facilitate in person interactions (capstone), and understanding human enhancement with Neuralink and the ethical implications of the device (thesis)
The mental health impacts of adolescent social media use are complex, with evidence linking to increased anxiety, depression, loneliness, and self-harm, while also offering opportunities for connection among isolated youth. A central sociotechnical challenge presented is youth loneliness: online platforms may support well-being when they strengthen meaningful relationships but may be detrimental when they displace in person interaction. This work addresses this challenge through the co-design of a digital intervention aimed at promoting face-to-face social engagement among adolescents. Building on a youth-generated concept developed during a hackathon, we apply systems analysis and user-centered design processes—including goal definition, alternative generation and evaluation, and iterative prototyping—to translate an early-stage idea into a minimum viable system. A targeted review of prior digital and behavioral interventions informs the design, grounding it in behavioral activation, self-determination theory, and social support theory, and identifying key behavioral targets for sustaining friendships: initiation, follow-through, and relationship deepening. These insights guide the development of core system features centered on a “friendship garden” metaphor, in which peer connections are represented as entities that grow through shared, in-person activities. The prototype is iteratively refined through wireframing and feedback from a Youth Advisory Board (YAB) and is designed to support intentional interaction, shared accountability, and sustained relationship maintenance. Ongoing work includes a feasibility and user experience study with adolescents (target n=10) to evaluate usability, engagement, and potential for reducing loneliness. This work contributes a theoretically grounded, co-designed digital intervention and provides design insights for promoting offline social connection through technology.
My STS research paper examines ethical and societal implications of Neuralink through a framework of Social Construction of Technology (SCOT), and interpretive flexibility, which is a concept that technological artifacts or designs are not fixed, and actors can interpret the device in different ways. My research question is “With this observation, I will explore the controversies of the first successful implantation of Neuralink in a human through understanding the interests and lenses of different stakeholders.” To explain, I am trying to understand how different stakeholders have a different interpretation of Neuralink. To discover this, I stuck to using secondary sources and testimonies. The actors I examined include patients with disabilities, the public, regulators, and investors. To no surprise, there is a lot of interpretive flexibility with Neuralink. For some, it represents a life-changing medical device that can restore day to day activities for those who are disabled. There are also groups that raise questions of exploitation, informed consent, and data privacy. Ultimately the conclusion confirms the fluidity of the meaning of Neuralink, and how it is shaped by stakeholder’s interests, and ethical frameworks, leaving the future of the device very uncertain.
