Trying to create simplicity in a busy domestic life, a mother of three refuses to buy an answering machine. A college professor has a policy never to check his work e-mail from home. And another man proudly says he’ll never sign up for call waiting on his home telephone line.
“I spend all day at work being interrupted. Why do I want to be interrupted at home?” asked Matthew Neutra, 30, a computer mapmaker from Sherborn, Mass.
There’s a quiet rebellion going on in households throughout the country, led by harried people who refuse to let today’s communications equipment beep and flash its way into the sanctity of their homes. After work days filled with the unpredictable demands that come through multiple phone lines, computer screens, pagers, cellular phones and fax machines, many have chosen to delete these devices from their home life.
Surrounded by high-tech equipment at her office at the Boston College Legal Assistance Bureau, Lynn Barenberg goes home to a low-tech life. She broke down last year and bought an answering machine but has resisted peer pressure to buy a computer, fax machine or cellular phone.
Nor does she have a videocassette recorder, a microwave or a compact disc player.
“My home is a refuge,” said Barenberg, 45, a social worker. “It’s peaceful in terms of communications coming in and the activity level. It’s something that I value. Other people value excitement and information.”
When she told a friend she recently had bought an answering machine, the friend deadpanned, “Welcome to the 1980s.”
Already overloaded with junk mail and telemarketing calls, people say they don’t need additional high-tech avenues for unwanted messages. Junk e-mail is a new annoyance.
While most people aren’t entirely casting off telecommunications devices or refusing to buy them, many put limits on them. Some turn off the phone during three-hour evening “family time” periods, while others refuse to give home e-mail addresses except to family and close friends.
Some also restrict those who know their cell phone numbers or ignore the beeps of call-waiting — considered a rude device by many — unless they suspect it might be an emergency.
While working in the telecommunications sales business, Michael Flynn, 28, of Nahant, Mass., sets limits by storing his work beeper and cell phone every weekend.
Mark Lowenstein, a wireless-phone specialist for a Boston-based telecommunications research firm, said people are understandably ambivalent about all the technology.
While these devices can liberate people, they also contribute to an instant-response culture that puts everyone on edge.
“The world just got faster and more intense,” he said.
Lowenstein said that at his home he sets a three-hour period around dinner when he is off-limits to outsiders while relaxing with his family.
It’s easy to see why Americans feel overloaded and need to put more barriers between work and home. According to a study last year by Yankelovich Partners, a telecommunications marketing firm in Claremont, Calif., workers receive an average of 11 messages from voice mail or answering machines a day while at work and 6.5 messages at home.
And there’s the temptation to check who has called. About 43 percent check their work messages when they’re not working, and 37 percent check home messages when they’re at work. While on vacation, 34 percent have checked their answering machine or voice mail system at work.
But all the checking of messages may not actually be creating anxiety, said Howie Salend, a bond trader in Boston and father of two. He said cell phones and e-mail can alleviate stress, especially if you want to be reachable to a range of people, from key clients to baby sitters. “It really makes me feel more relaxed,” he said.
Not everyone negotiates these devices so well. Larry Rosen, a University of California psychology professor who contributed to the book “Technostress” (Wiley, $22.95) said many Americans are finding the need to adopt new strategies for home life, as cell phones, home computers and pagers are becoming more affordable and ordinary.
“People feel they’re fighting a windstorm and they’re trying to stay sane,” said Rosen, who also has a Web site (www.technostress.com).
Joseph Tecce, an associate professor of psychology at Boston College, said discipline is the key to making these technologies work for you. He said people need to have the self-confidence to feel they aren’t going to be judged if they fail to respond promptly to a message.
And they have to resist the temptation to be everywhere at once. Tecce resolved never to let his home computer be used to check office e-mail.
Neutra, the mapmaker, said he also strives for less beeping and ringing while relaxing at home. For that reason, he’s not buying a cell phone even though all his friends have them.
“My main concern is being able to shut down and not be reached for a while,” he said.
