Science, Technology and Society

Technology and society or technology and culture refers to cyclical co-dependence, co-influence, co-production of technology and society upon the other (technology upon culture, and vice-versa). This synergistic relationship occurred from the dawn of humankind, with the invention of simple tools and continues into modern technologies such as the printing press and computers. The academic discipline studying the impacts of science, technology, and society and vice versa is called (and can be found at) Science and technology studies.

The development in modern cellular phone technology, like increasing speed of phone processors, the use of touch-enabled screens, and the implementation of mobile internet access, are further examples of the cycle of co-production. Society's desire for widespread, frequent, and easy access to communication lead to the research and development of an ever widening array of mobile phone capabilities. Access to these capabilities, in turn, influenced the way humans live. As the populace relies more and more on mobile phones, additional features were requested.

Society also influenced changes to previous generation media players. In the first personal music players, cassettes stored music. However, that method seemed fragile and relatively low fidelity when compact disks came along. Later, availability of MP3 and other compact file formats made compact disks seem too large and limited, so manufactures created MP3 players which are small and hold large amount of data. Societal preferences helped determined the course of events through predictable preferences.