Does technology isolate us – or not?
We have been hearing for years that technology tends to make people less social, replacing personal and non-virtual interaction with much less personal activities, but a new Pew poll says that may not be true.
The new poll from Pew asked questions that tried to get to the meat of the possible link between social isolation in America and the increasing use use of digital technologies. The poll wondered if it could not debunk the theory that technology created loners or resulted in social tech users having fewer friends, according to a New York Times article. The results tended toward being a mixed bag of answers, some confirming technology as a potential enemy of social closeness, while other results say that the technically wired are more social than the Luddites among us.
It seems to be undeniable that the size of our average circle of friends is shrinking. Study after study have confirmed that this is the case. The Pew study agrees but takes the position that it is not technology, or not just technology, that is to blame. Here are some of the mixed bag of results from the telephone survey of about 2,500 U.S. adults:
People who use social networks like Facebook or Linkedin are 30 percent less likely to know their neighbors and 26 percent less likely to provide them companionship.
The circle of close friends for mobile phone users tends to be 12 percent larger than for nonusers.
People who share online photos or instant messages have 9 percent larger social circles than nonusers.
On average, the social circles of cellphone and instant-message users were more diverse than those of nonusers.
People still prefer face-to-face communication as the primary means to stay in touch with friends and family.
Social networks are becoming less diverse, where that is defined as relationships with people from different backgrounds.
The trouble with these sorts of studies may be that they fail to adequately account for a subtle shift in relationships from those which occur in person to those which occur on line, or at the remove of cell phone or texting distance. Humans seem to prefer, or at least more highly value, interactions that take place face to face. At the same time, researchers tend to denigrate relationships that take place primarily at a distance. The truth of our relationship needs are almost certainly lie somewhere between those two poles, in a place that we have not yet adequately defined or become used to.
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November 8th, 2009
So this people have so-called larger social circles, but how much of their circle is “online” friends versus “in person” compared to some number of years ago? I contend the circles are larger now but LESS personal than in the days when we actually met with and did stuff with out “friends” face to face.
November 9th, 2009
Social circles may be dwindling, but in my case it’s because I can’t stand to be around the people I come across. It’s not technology that’s turning people away from each other. It’ rude obnoxious behavior that turns people away from each other. I would have to start blaming shock comedians first. Very few people can pull off a good joke by insulting another human being. And when you get average joe trying it b/c he saw a comedian do it, disaster. But that’s my 2 cents.