ABSTRACT
Americans feel about new technologies such as smartphones, iPads, e-book readers, and other mobile devices. If you ask a group of high school students, you will likely get enthusiastic responses about how great all of these new technologies are and emerge with a sense that these technologies are heavily used and that we, as a society, are dependent upon them. On the other hand, if you ask a considerably older group of people who did not grow up using these technologies, you may get wildly different answers. Older people tend to read the print version of the newspaper at higher rates and use social media and other smartphone technologies at somewhat lower rates than younger people and may express skepticism about the impact of these new technologies. This example isn’t meant to suggest that one answer is right or wrong but rather to demonstrate that who you ask will affect the answers that you get.
