This could be good news for those of us concerned with turning into Lacie Pound. " Participants' depression levels, the researchers found, increased alongside the total amount of time spent using social media and the number of weekly visits to social media platforms. A January study of 1,787 young US adults sponsored by the National Institute of Mental Health, for example, found a “strong and significant association between social media use andĭepression. Some research suggests the opposite, in fact: that social media use is linked with an increase in negative feelings. Study after study has found that when we engage with social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter, we may feel a temporary boost from likes or favorites, but there's absolutely no link between social media use and long-term happiness.
In the real world, many of us make Lacie's mistake over and over again. Unfortunately, Lacie continues to pursue what she thinks will make her happy, like a high social media rating, while completely disregarding the things that might actually make her happy, like friendships with her co-workers or a real relationship with her brother. And she'll do anything - even if it goes against her instincts, even if it's all, ultimately, a big lie - to get there. In the part of the episode where Lacie views the apartment of her dreams, she's shown a virtual reality scene of herself making dinner in the kitchen with a lover - and it's this romantic vision that seems to goad her into pursuing the 4.5 rating. The wedding she's attending is for a friend who she has not been close with for ages and clearly doesn't trust. But at the end of the day, Lacie is lonely and unsatisfied. She smiles and giggles with a high-pitched glee. Every time she gets a four or five-star rating, her bright blue eyes light up. The episode ends in the middle of a vicious but comical insult-throwing match between Lacie and the man in the cell across from her.Įventually that temporary boost in happiness you get from a job promotion or marriage proposal will abate, and you'll be back to the same baseline level of happiness you were before the exciting change.Īnd that's precisely what Lacie Pound experiences. In the end, after brandishing a knife in the middle of a very public nervous breakdown, Lacie is arrested and jailed.
The remainder of the plot focuses on Lacie's initially promising - but ultimately devastating - attempt to raise her score by speaking at the wedding of a childhood friend with an envious 4.8 rating.
But she's several percentage points away at a meager 4.2. A higher score of a 4.5, the leasing agent tells her, would qualify her for a 20% discount. In one particularly evocative scene, the main character, Lacie Pound (played by Bryce Dallas Howard) discovers the only way she can afford the apartment she wants - in the prestigious Pelican Cove Lifestyle Community - is by raising her rating and becoming a "preferred" member. In essence, because we're always on the hunt for that next thing that'll make us feel good, it's almost impossible for us to just be - and just being, research suggests, is one of the key ways to feel truly happy. Next month.Ī psychological principle called the "hedonic treadmill" is the real fuel that would, in theory, drive us toward this pathetic and debilitating future. It's not your typical science fiction, which envisions the world 100 or 1,000 years from now. This is precisely the reason "Black Mirror" is so compelling.
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