Next Steps

Due to the large impact that social technology has on face-to-face social skills, the technology that was created to bring us together is actually pulling us further apart than we have ever been before. We are currently enveloped by the addictiveness of social media and other social technologies. Unless we limit ourselves in the time that we spend on Facebook, Skype, Instagram, and other social media applications and websites, they will overtake our way of life and completely destroy our abilities to read, respond, and connect to each other in face-to-face situations. By limiting ourselves, we can start to make real connections with other individuals. 

An easy way to help prevent that future is to take a few days with others in a technology-free environment. Situations that could be taken advantage of to have a technology-free environment include going on a vacation, to summer camp, and camping. If people were to take time off to do so, we could minimize the damage that social technology is causing on the Millennials and the generations that are to come.



Works Cited:
Baskin, Steve. "Unplugging Our Kids: Steve Baskin at TEDxSanAntonio." YouTube. YouTube, 23            Jan. 2013. Web. 07 Dec. 2015.
Bindley, Katherine. "When Children Text All Day, What Happens To Their Social Skills?" The                  Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com. Web. 7 Dec. 2015.
Imam, Jareen. "The Anti-social Network: Life without Facebook - CNN.com." CNN. Cable News              Network. Web. 8 Dec. 2015.
Johnson, Chandra. "Face Time vs. Screen Time: The Technological Impact on                                            Communication." Face Time vs. Screen Time: The Technological Impact on Communication.              Web. 7 Dec. 2015.

Turning it All Off

There are multiple benefits to turning logging out of social media sites, even if for only a few days. Logging off can increase privacy, decrease distractions, and even raise a person’s self-esteem. According to a CNN article by Jareen Imam, there are plenty of reasons to deactivate or log off of a social media account. Her evidence includes a study from Utah Valley University that found there was a “direct correlation between the amount of time spent on Facebook and the way people perceive their lives”(1). The results of that study found that users who use social media sites more often think that “their Facebook friends have better lives than themselves”(1). This means that people are basing their self-worth on what others are posting online. Many users also exaggerate the content that they post so that they have a persona that only captures their best qualities. The basis of self-worth on people who create a “perfect self” creates a vicious cycle that chips at the subconscious mind of users. 

Imam also makes the point that logging off of social media accounts encourages users to make “a greater effort to socially engage with others”(1). Also according to the article, the “average Facebook user spends more than six hours a week on the site”(1). That is six hours of time spent in an exaggerated reality that can be put towards practicing our social skills and connecting with the real people who surround us. If we take breaks every so often from social media, we can focus on the skills required to actually connect with others. 

Detachment Between Conversers

Have you ever talked to a person whose demeanor practically screamed that he did not know how to talk and interact with another human being? Believe it or not, that social awkwardness is becoming the norm for the generation of individuals born between 1982 and 2004, dubbed as the “Millennials,” and beyond. Social technology is supposedly designed to make us “more social” is actually detaching us more than ever. Steve Baskin points this out in the TED talks video titled Unplugging Our Kids. Baskin makes an analogy in the video that people today are becoming more and more like Neil Armstrong on his lunar landing in 1969. He made the point that even though he was completely surrounded by the technology that allowed him to walk on the moon and connect to everyone through their television screens, Armstrong was “more isolated and alone than… any human being has ever been”(Baskin). Armstrong was literally alone on the moon with the exception of Buzz Aldrin, yet he was broadcasting what he was doing to the entire world. Similar to Neil Armstrong, people are enveloped in technology which they use to broadcast what they are doing to the world over the internet, yet are alone while they are using social media. 

Baskin also shares a story of one of his former camp counselors who was called to resolve an argument at the college he works at. He says that the two were posting grievances about each other over facebook, and when his former counselor walked in to break it up, neither of the two were talking to each other and were on their laptops. Can you imagine arguing on a website rather than confronting the person you have a beef with? They were in the same room yet they were arguing each other through a screen! Baskin ends his presentation by explaining how summer camps gave a high school teen the “ability to turn [technology] off and turn her personality on”(Baskin). With a little practice in the social skills that we lack, we no longer have to use technology as a crutch, and we learn to make real connections in face-to-face situations. According to Baskin, that connection can be achieved by a mere five-week break in a tech-free environment.

Loss of Social Skills

Everything happens in balance, you have to give something to get something. In the case of communication technology, we trade in our social skills in order to have conversations with anybody around the world at the drop of a dime. Like any skill that goes unpracticed, social skills deteriorate as people talk face-to-face on fewer occasions. In many forms of communication technology, such as texting and instant messaging, it is almost impossible to use sarcasm and other humorous communication through screens because often times the person on the other side will misinterpret what is being said. It is also tough to stress a point because the tone and intensity of what the person is saying is usually only expressible through punctuation, which also happens to have multiple meanings. 

Children who are growing up in the technology-based community we have implemented are the most affected by the epidemic of not being able to hold a conversation. According to an article published by the Huffington Post, “actual conversation is becoming a thing of the past”(1). By "actual conversation," the author of this article means that there is no longer any connection between two individuals who are communicating because they are using screens as a medium of transmission. In the article, Melissa Ortega, a child psychologist at New York’s Child Mind Institute, notes that high school students “check their phones constantly” and suggests that the students check their phones so often as an “avoidance strategy.” Ortega also notices that the students “don’t know how to handle conflict face to face” and have issues in “small talk situations”(1). These are some of the signs that our social skills are degrading at a rapid rate. If we use our phones as a crutch because we are uncomfortable when it comes to small talk, we have a major problem. Small talk is one of the main ways that individuals have connected with others. The article also suggests that because of the incorporation of the internet into our daily lives, there are attention deficits that are being formed. Information is being shoved so rapidly into our brains that we hare having issues with patience and paying attention.

Lack of emotional engagement to a conversation

We live in a world where we can communicate with anybody as many times as we want with ease. This means having conversations with families who might live in different countries, who a person might only get to see once every few years, are can now be made on a daily basis. The communication might be more frequent but according to an article that was covered by Deseret News, the “quality of that communication may be weaker”. The study also suggests that “kids who spend more time [texting or instant messaging through a] screen than with other kids or adults can struggle [when it comes to] understand[ing] emotions and creating strong relationships.” In the same article Denise Daniels, a parenting expert and pediatric nurse, says that “for children, the overuse of technology to communicate affects the brain.” Further explaining her point, Daniels points out that the children who are overexposed to communications technology “lose empathy.” 

Katie Davis, a researcher whose work is also covered in the article, makes the comment that because of the increased amount of communication taking place through technology, adults and children alike are finding it “easier to communicate through a screen”(1). A psychologist named Jim Taylor claims that “children and parents are speaking very different languages now” in the article (1). He states that Parents are not as versed in the digital language, and that “the dinner table talk can suddenly be like someone speaking Spanish to someone who doesn’t” when they have conversations with their children (1). In other words, children and parents are unable to properly pass their ideas and opinions to one another when talking at a dinner table setting. This is because children nowadays are being raised on a basis of mass communication and technology, and the idea that technology is faster and easier is being embedded into their heads at a young age. 

Biologically, humans are naturally wired to adapt to conversations that occur between two people. This includes reading and responding to facial expressions, reading and using body language, and understanding and reacting to pitch and intensity of a voice. Our minds are being hotwired at an early age to only care about passing information because of an early overexposure to communication technology. The change in our brains makes communicating face to face more uncomfortable because we are slowly losing our abilities to read and react to non-verbal stimulants.