Evocative Objects: Things We Think With
This 2007 essay collection, edited by Sherry Turkle, gathers first-person pieces by scientists, designers, and scholars reflecting on specific objects — often from childhood — that shaped how they think, including several essays that touch on early computers and electronic toys. The organizing idea is that people form emotional attachments to objects that go well beyond their practical function, and that studying those attachments reveals something about how identity and habits of mind develop over a lifetime. Several contributors describe childhood devices as companions that structured solitary play. TechKids Foundation includes this volume as part of the broader intellectual foundation behind Turkle's later, more direct arguments about screens and relationships — it does not itself make claims about screen time or mental health.
Turkle, Sherry, ed. Evocative Objects: Things We Think With. MIT Press, 2007.
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