During my recent conversation with Kelly Quashnie of Studio Cue, a Portland graphic design company, we discussed our experience with how people follow up and how mostly they don’t. She gave an example of a prospective job seeker who would persistently ask for an informational interview only to never be heard from again afterward. Commenting on the episode, Kelly said (I’m paraphrasing), “I sometimes feel like all these online communication tools are making us less human.” She felt that as we come to rely on new communication tools, we increasingly turn away from conventions of personal interactions, common courtesy, or respect.
Is social media making us less human?
A few exhibits in support:
- David Armano advises how to be more human. (I term this social media psychotherapy.)
- The most frequent piece of advice I hear given and myself give to people interested in joining the social media fray is, Be yourself.
- Danny Brown urges to interact offline.
- Twouble with Twitters.
We can talk about conversation and community and micro-interactions until the cows come home (as my former boss used to say). It appears that we assume a different role when interacting online, whatever tool or utility we use, a role that’s slightly removed from our real selves. A sense of invisibility behind the curtain of distance scrapes off the part of us that functions in direct human contact. Virtual proximity lags behind real closeness. The Internet has shrunk distances and something else, too. And, some suggest social media (tools) are just solutions in search of problems.
On the flip side, I’m guessing the telephone had a similar psychological and sociological effect in its time, and here we are, all the better for it. I think it’s just a phase as the technology matures and we incorporate it into our lives. “The virtual shouldn’t be at the expense of the physical,” says Danny Brown, and as long as we learn that and keep it in mind, as we will, we’ll come out on top as better, not lesser, humans. Social media may make us less human only temporarily, as we figure it out, incorporate it fully into our lives and make it work for us.
P.S.: As I’ve been exploring the intersection of social media and sustainability, I extended the line of questioning in that direction as well. As social media temporarily reduces our humanity, social sustainability suffers, too. But again, we’ll make it work.
UPDATE: Research shows continuous partial attention, resulting from online social networking, leads to continuous partial empathy or social numbness.
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I worry about this too. But like any other tool in life, careful use and application is required.
On the plus side – my personal experience with Twitter is that it’s helped me with networking skills. I’ve connected with some local people and in fact will be meeting one face to face tonight. Someone who works in the green space, looking at carbon registries. How’s that for intersecting social media and sustainability? Feels good to live it!