Forming connections amid a digital era is so vastly different from those made during our parents' and grandparents' time. Between a lack of focus and constant distractions, our generation, and the ones to come, are losing the ability to form strong emotional bonds with others. Technology growth is not going to slow down, so we have to decide if we will adapt to it or lose sight of the things that matter most.
Growing up and listening to my parents' stories from their childhood always left me feeling one thing: envious. Their experiences from the late '80s and '90s are so vastly different from the way my generation grew up. I am oddly jealous of the way they met people and built friendships. After growing up amidst the digital age, I learned that the way we interact with others, build relationships and maintain those relationships is setting the pace for how our societies will grow alongside technology and as of right now, it's not building in a positive direction. Because of technology, my generation, and the ones to come are losing the ability to talk to each other face to face, and frankly, it's terrifying. A study by Common Sense Media which compared how teens preferred to communicate in 2012 versus 2018 showed a steady decline in face-to-face and a steady increase in texting, social media, and video chatting (2018). When taking into account the effects that digital media has on our lives, it's fairly positive. There's a multitude of great things that have come out of the advancements of technology, but things start to take a turn for the worse when we consider how digital media affects our interactions with other people. Communication skills are vital to the human race and if we lose the ability to talk to each other, what else will we have left?
When I think back to how I met friends as an elementary school kid, I remember days of running around outside the apartment complex I lived and talking to any new kid we saw. My mom's experience was pretty similar: she said when you moved to a new neighborhood, you went outside to see who lived there as well. With technology and social media, kids are spending less time playing outside than ever before. According to Child in the City, a recent study done in the UK showed that kids today spend approximately 4 hours outside a week compared to the 8.2 hours their parents were spending (Weedy, 2020). I couldn't imagine the place I grew up in not having kids outside playing cops and robbers or drawing huge chalk houses with a room for each person. When kids stop playing outside, it not only affects their health, it affects communities. That isn't to say kids are to blame. Kids and their families stay inside on their phones, video games, TVs, and computers rather than going outside and spending time with the people who are right there in front of them. Neighbors have been known to look out for one another but with people interacting less and less in their communities, you can't do that.
Lack of conversation seems to be a reoccurring problem. Sherry Turkle, the author of Reclaiming Conversation, claims that technology is "killing the art of conversation" (2015). After spending 20 years studying how technology is affecting our communication skills, the sociologist states that even though we know taking out our phone during a conversation is damaging, we do it anyways. Sherry says that when we add a phone to the conversation, two things happen. For starters, we have lower quality conversations and it decreases the empathetic connection people are supposed to be building together. This ultimately decreases the connection people feel towards one another. After being asked why she believes humans continue using phones when we know its damaging, Sherry responds with this:
"Cell phones make us promises that are like gifts from a benevolent genie—that we will never have to be alone, that we will never be bored, that we can put our attention wherever we want it to be, and that we can multitask, which is perhaps the most seductive of all. That ability to put your attention wherever you want it to be has become the thing people want most in their social interactions—that feeling that you don't have to commit yourself 100 percent and you can avoid the terror that there will be a moment in an interaction when you'll be bored. Actually allowing yourself a moment of boredom is crucial to human interaction and it's crucial to your brain as well. When you're bored, your brain isn't bored at all—it's replenishing itself, and it needs that downtime." (2015)
Our brains are muscles that get sore and tired just like any other muscle. Between social media, school, work, and everyday signs/advertisements, we are reading nearly all day long. Before technology, you would come home from a long day and play outside, talk to family, maybe read a book for pleasure or practice a hobby but now, you come home and scroll through social media or watch TV. Between the strain on your eyes from staring at screens and the amount of reading you do; our brains are exhausted, and it leaves little room for engaging conversations.
Nosheen Iqbal, a writer for The Guardian, makes an interesting point while refuting the idea that conversation is dead. She claims that conversation hasn't died, it has instead been "reinvented" (2018). I agree with this to a certain extent. Of course, the terms we communicate on are completely different, but being mindful of how conversing through a phone doesn't allow for us to establish intimacy or form bonds is extremely important. It is a well-known fact that eye-contact helps us form bonds with others, so when we stick a phone or device in between each other why would we expect anything but weaker relationships? Social media is a great way to meet people from all over the world, and I am in no way insinuating that you shouldn't use your technology as a resource. However, when we begin to hide behind it, we lose sight of how important being face-to-face with someone is. Maintaining the ability to meet someone and have a conversation with them spontaneously is important. It teaches us how to read someone's emotions and empathize with them which is something we can't fully do through a screen. Learning to be a strong conversationalist on and off your phone will ultimately lead us to form stronger bonds between our friends, families, and communities.
I encourage you to reflect on how your generation differs from the ones before you and the ones after you. As nice as texting all day long may be, how beneficial is it? Are you really connecting or is it just another way for you to distract yourself from the world? While I know the way we meet and interact with people will never be the same as the way my parents and their parents did, it'd still be nice to see a little more disconnect. Stop saying you wish you were born in a generation without technology and actually look up from your phone long enough to build a bond with someone. The way we interact with others, build relationships, and maintain those relationships is going to shape the connections we have with people in the future. The way we handle technology now will ultimately decide the impact it's going to have on the generations to come. It's up to you to decide how you're going to communicate when you have nothing left but each other and what you choose when you have to decide between a device that can access the world or a person who should mean it.
