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I
know as I begin to write this piece that I run the risk of sounding
like “the Uni-bomber,” but ol’ Ted may have had some valid
points--yet by no means do I endorse his way of getting them across.
I’m as big a user of today’s modern technological
miracles as the next person. I’ve owned close to every electronic
gadget on the market. I wouldn’t be without my email, the Internet
has brought long distance friends to the fore, and there isn’t a
day that goes by that I don’t touch a computer.
In fact, the computer has become a very close friend--and
that’s precisely the problem: we may be too close.
In this fantastic modern world of super-connectivity, are we losing
something in the process? Has
an email replaced a phone call?
Is voice mail sometimes the only way you’re able to hear
the sweet voice of a friend? Do you spend more time chatting to a stranger in a
text room than conversing face to face with your neighbor?
Has getting connected replaced getting contacted?
I don’t know
about you, but I’m torn in a mind/body struggle of sensing a
future filled with virtual friends and the deep longing for those
wonderful simpler days when neighbors came over to borrow that cup
of sugar. Now, instead of “bothering a neighbor” we can just click
and charge a 5 lb bag and have it delivered straight to our door
with little or no human interaction. Oh, that’s right--today with
downsizing, it’s 4 lbs!
Signe
Dayhoff, in her book Diagonally-Parked in a Parallel Universe,
recounts a
2-year study conducted by Robert Kraut at Carnegie
Mellon’s Human-Computer Interaction Institute that indicated much
like television viewing, interactive computer usage tends to reduce
social involvement. Study
participants reported a decline in interaction with family members
and a reduction in their circle of friends as computer online usage
increased. Seems even
one hour a week had the potential to lead to depression and
loneliness. Their
hypothesis was that relationships maintained over long distances
with no face-to-face contact ultimately did not provide the kind of
support and reciprocity that typically contribute to a sense of
psychological security and happiness.
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