Why can't we just update one key within user preference instead of the entire thing?

I have an issue where when I try to update one preference key-value pair, it updates the entire preferences. I'd like to only update one of these preferences and not the entire one

Just want to update one preference

TypeScript

 self.users.update_prefs(
    user_id=user_id, prefs={
        key: value}
)

Instead I need to get all of the current preferences and then update the entire preferences.

TL;DR

Developers are unable to update one key within a user's preferences independently; it currently requires updating the entire preference set. This is due to the preferences being stored as a single string in the database. There is a need to fetch all current preferences and then apply updates to the entire set rather than selectively updating one preference. Improvements are anticipated in database enhancements for version 1.7 that might address this issue.