Jez's Blog

How capable are you to log off for the holidays? According to a survey done in New York, most people (Americans) cannot manage to take a vacation from their electronic devices on Thanksgiving, Christmas, and other days off. A poll of 2,179 people by Harris Interactive in early November showed that more than half of American workers check their email on Thanksgiving Day, Christmas, and other holidays. About 6 in 10 working Americans check their email at least once during holidays, with 55% percent saying they do it daily, and 28% admitted to checking multiple times a day. Nevertheless, most "damningly," suggested by the survey, is that 1 in 10 respondents admitted to checking email at the dinner table, in the presence of family members. Moreover, the study also found that 67% of men logged on during the holidays whereas only 50% of women did so.

Personally, I think the study has smeared the situation in which many people seem to stay "logged on" during the holidays. I believe, as me, myself, is an example, that many people, particularly workers, would stay tune on their jobs through the internet even during the holidays. I am not yet a worker. However, due to our school communicate with students through emails, I check my email multiple times a day. I also check my email with the presence of my family members, but I am not discouraged by the words "the most damningly," which the study uses to describe such behavior. I check my email during holidays as well, maybe not as often as work/school days, but I do. Personally, I only think this as a doing my job of keeping track on my work. Sometimes I do homework on holidays, and I know that I am not the only person who does so. The reason for this, is not to avoid family times, well, not usually, but to use the time provided by these holidays to do things that only work/school days won't be enough time to get them done. Also, the fact that more men logged on during the holidays than that of women do may just because that there are generally more men are involved in business than that of women do.

Anyhow, the survey shows that 42% of respondents said they believed that "staying up to date eases their workloads once the break is over." But Mattew Ingram at Gigaom suggests that staying plugged in "can also suck you into a vortex of work that leads to even more emails." If you have a Facebook account, you might actually agree with Ingram's point. I had a basketball game against another school yesterday. Our team won the game, so everyone were all excited about it last night. As soon as I opened up my Facebook page, I got 3 notifications, all for the posts on the Girls' Basketball Team Group. I replied some of them, because I myself, indeed, was also very excited about the victory. Then, immediately, another 3 notifications popped up. This time, they are for the comments on my posts, and people liking my posts. This urged me to reply the comments, and so I did, commented back. Finally, I spent an extra 10 (or more) minutes on Facebook. I was drawn into a vortex of replying comments on Facebook.

As a result, "About 6 in 10 working Americans check their email at least once during holidays." So what? It is not the end of the world. It is just a trend in people's living style as more people put emphasis on their businesses and jobs. Besides, according to the survey, 19 percent of the respondents actually said that they were grateful for the distraction that checking email brought from family time. However, I do suggest us all to spend as more time with our family as possible because who knows when are we going to miss them eventually?

Reference:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/theweek/20101126/cm_theweek/209679;_ylt=Al4F.x3F6kBoengBkpf_.br9wxIF;_ylu=X3oDMTJoZmw1YmpuBGFzc2V0A3RoZXdlZWsvMjAxMDExMjYvMjA5Njc5BHBvcwMxMQRzZWMDeW5fYXJ0aWNsZV9zdW1tYXJ5X2xpc3QEc2xrA3doeWNhbnR3ZWxvZw- [Yagoo! Opinion. Why can't we log off for the holidays? Nov. 26 2010. Copyright © 2010 Yahoo! Inc.]