Connecting yourself to the virtual world, while disconnecting from reality and the implications, Blog Post #3

While I was on the internet looking up research articles for another class, I came across a specific article that I thought was very relevant to this course, and the content we have learned up until this point. ‘How cellphone use can disconnect your relationships’ is the title of the article that I ended up finding, which proceeds to discuss the implications that technology has on an individual’s relationship with someone else. The author then goes into depth to make reference to the psychological impacts that technological devices have on your partner, resulting in certain emotional states like depression, and even the feeling of rejection, as most people pay more attention and are more involved with their phone, then they are with the other person. This article fundamentally makes reference to the potential issues that could arise due to the lack of face to face communication. One concerning issue, is that this form of communication is becoming gradually obsolete with the advancements made in technology.
This article immediately made me think of the video we watched in class about the social life, staring a young woman who lives in a virtual world, and how this impacts her life outside her phone. The women in this short film becomes so engrossed with her phone that she ends up alienating her friends and family who want to come and physically see her. For example, there was a scene where the woman was on the phone with her mother and she ends up cancelling the plans they had made for dinner that day. She lied to her mother and said that she had already eaten, when in fact she had not, she was at that time strategically placing food on the counter, just so she could take a picture and upload it to her virtual world. This video also fundamentally references the impact that lack of face to face communication can have on an individual and his or her life outside their phone.
These two articles connect with one another in very different ways, but both prove the implication that cellphones can have on a relationship with the people we care about the most. Overall, lack of face to face communication can result in inner hardships, as technological advancements have had a major impact on not only the individual user, but the relationship the cellphone user has with other people and overall reality. This relates to our course, by proving how these advancements are becoming adapted to our culture, which is slowly pushing face to face communication to the side. In your opinion what do you think our world looks like in the future with face to face communication and technological advancements? Please refer below to the link to find the supplementary article I obtained.


https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/the-squeaky-wheel/201501/how-cellphone-use-can-disconnect-your-relationship

Comments

  1. UnknownOctober 16, 2018 at 2:21 PM

    Great post! I really liked your connections you found between the article and the lectures. I completely agree with everything you mentioned I definitely feel that cellphone use can negatively affect relationships between people. There are absolutely psychological impacts that happen as a result of cellphone use on relationships and the feeling of neglect I think is the main one. People get so immersed and obsessed with this virtual world that they forget about aspects of their life that are right in front of them. I really liked how you connected this article to the short video we watched in class as well about the young woman alienating herself from her friends and family while posting pictures on her social media to appear as though she is living her best life as there are definitely connections between the two. This is an unfortunate reality in today's society as people need to feel like they need to impress everyone in their lives through sharing the "fun" and "impressive" things they are doing on social media. Great connections between the two and to the course content! Keep up the great work!

    ReplyDelete
  2. UnknownOctober 21, 2018 at 1:55 PM

    Hey Clare,

    Great post! In regards to your question about what the future will look like in terms of face-to-face communication, I think that there will always be a place for face-to-face communication. In person communication offers so much more than technological communication especially when that communication is text based. The nonverbal aspects of human communication cannot simply be replaced with an emoji. Further, the immediacy of face-to-face communication offers something unparalleled by digital communication. Apps like FaceTime and Skype attempt to close these gaps and do an amazing job bringing friends across the world closer but still do not have quite the same effect. For these reasons, I think in person conversation will have a major presence in the majority of people's lives for centuries to come.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Social Media Anxiety

I came across this article that unfortunately has started to seem a little too relatable for many. It talks about social media anxiety and the obsession over likes, follows, what other people are doing, and all other feelings that are a result of us being over connected with the rest of the world. The article showcases examples of people who even become physically sick when logging on to social media sites. While that may seem as an extreme example, the scary truth is that more and more people are reporting social media anxiety everyday because of pressure, fear of missing out (FOMO), and ‘Compare and Despair’. I found this to be very relatable to the article we previously read about Katherine and her obsession with her phone and social media. Katherine was constantly worried about getting online approval from her friends, how many likes she got on her photos, how many comments and so on. While the article never directly claimed she had social media anxiety, many of her a...
Read more

Blog Post #3

Due to the freedom we have for the post this week, I took the time to really think about what I wanted to write in my post. My first thought was to discuss sports but I wanted to try and discuss a topic that could create more discussion. As most social media users have learned over the last few days, former SNL actor Pete Davidson, and pop star Ariana Grande have called off their engagement. While the speed at which their relationship seemed intense, at the end of the day, shouldn't we be more focused on the wellbeing of each of these individuals who very well may be walking away from the loves of their life? I would think it is safe to say that those of us in this class won't garner as much as attention on social media if and when we find a life partner. These individuals are only a handful of years older than ourselves and are under the microscope of the media every day of their lives. We may never know exactly this relationship didn't work out, and honestly, we as comple...
Read more

Just a social human-being

I want to draw on ideas from this week’s reading to share upon how this perspective has provided me some insights into why social media practices vary from person to person.  In society where there is a strong reliance on social media for interaction, connectivity and information, it is uncommon to encounter someone that does not use any form of social media whatsoever. The social practice of meeting a neighbour or starting a conversation with someone you see on a public bus has decreased because of the overlap of our public and private lives. Therefore, because there is less sharing exchanged exclusively with people solely immersed as beings in a public space, I believe that even those that attempt to resist the use of social media feel the need to be connected. I argue this because Dunbar suggests that it is the animal genetic make-up to innately want to share to build connections and respect.  I chose to address the idea of people resisting social media because I ...
Read more