I was reading Anya Kamenetz's article "The Network Unbound" and her suggestion of the potential power of social networking websites raised a question or two for me. I immediately thought of CNN's collaboration with You Tube to bring us the 2007 presidential primary debates. Never before were the questions to the candidates coming exclusively from a social networking website. Most would agree that both the questions and delivery of such questions were never before so entertaining and maybe even more interesting than the candidates' answers.
As more avenues are created for social networking via the Internet, the general population does not seem to have an issue embracing such technology and using it to its fullest extent. Although such advances in social networking initially appear productive, powerful, and entertaining, I've sometimes wondered if such networks could potentially become harmful and help to destroy our interpersonal skills, or is it possible that our interpersonal skills will evolve with technology? Have they already begun to do so?
6 comments:
Shannon: Your comments about technology destroying our interpersonal skills remind me of sci-fi movies I've seen of the future when everyone has become drones to computers. They no longer have their own individual identities. It's really something to think about. I wonder just how far this thing can possibly go. It seems that every time we turn around there's something new and fascinating that makes us go "WOW!"
danah boyd, who has studied online social networks (SN) extensively, has found that digital social spaces do not replace real-life communication; these spaces reinforce and promote existing peer groups. In other words, users (mostly NGens) use SNs as a recursive presentation of self to those they already know.
I think you have a very valid point about people losing their interpersonal skills when they spend too much of their time online. No matter what the experts say about it, there are people out there that end up spending so much of their time online that they forget how to interact with people face to face. I have experienced it myself and I have seen it in others. I see it every day in the kids and teens I deal with during my workday. They get online and talk and chat and email and IM, yet they don't know how to talk to the kid sitting next to them. I have seen one girl, 12, who is very intelligent, sit at the computer all evening and chat on the computer with a boy 2 seats down from her because she doesn't know how to talk to him in person. I encourage her to just go up to him and talk, but she's too afraid. She insists that all the friends she has on her MySpace account are kids she knows in real life from school and from around her neighborhood. Yet she would rather sit in front of a screen than go out and interact with these kids. And we as a society have let that become acceptable.
But isn't she engaging in "interpersonal" skills online? Just a different type?
In regard to interpersonal skills, I have wondered the same thing. There have been many times that instead of calling a friend, or talking to them in person, I have sent a text message or email. So, while these tools have opened the doors to quicker and more efficient communication, they have taken the verbal communication out of the equation. It scares me that someday when I have children, they will not know a world without texting, email, and other technological communication. These tools have taken the personal touches out of communicating.
Alot of good points here. I originally dismissed the idea of online communication sites ruining our interpersonal skills, and still do for the most part.
I agree strongly with rebeccalynnmedley...(the second comment)
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