Over-Connected | Weekly Wellness News

March 17th, 2008 12:00 pm

In many ways, the modern world is a true marvel. We have unprecedented access to information of all kinds. In many countries, even the lowest classes have the ability to research and learn from the vast knowledge that exists online. But the information age isn’t just about data, it’s also about communication. More than ever, people anywhere in the world can effortlessly and instantly contact each other and communicate at great length on any topic they please…

Furthermore, social networking sites have become an amazing phenomenon, offering us the ability to meet and share ideas with people from all walks of life, forming groups of friends and associates who exactly match our interests in any subject, giving us the platform on which to find peers wherever in the world they may be…

Other social networking sites are devoted to meeting significant others, to developing relationships of a more personal kind. Site after site promises us the chance to meet the love of our live and live happily ever after. We can finally express exactly what we are looking for and skip past the ‘hassle’ of meeting these people in person and dealing with the awkwardness that comes with trying to figure out if your date is potentially something more…

So why is it, that with communication and networking bringing millions of people together online, that so many people feel alone and estranged in the world? Why is it that at the height of the networking revolution, we are at the most isolated we have ever been?

The answer, as I see it, is exactly because we are conducting all of our communication from within our own bedroom or office or living room. The answer is because we are talking to a computer and not to a real person.

Let me clarify that. I don’t believe for a moment that most of the people I interact with online are imagined people. These are not automated pieces of software simulating humans in an effort to fool me.

Rather, what I mean is that all of the subconscious clues that are present when we talk with others face-to-face are gone. In our most primitive mental maps of the moment, we are talking to machines.

There is nothing new in this belief. It has long been understood that the way we interact in the presence of other people is vastly different from the way we interact online. How we present ourselves, how we judge each other, how we censor our actions and statements: these are all different when we have other humans in the room. And with more time comes deeper comprehension of just how differently we behave behind the keyboard than in person. There has been a growing understanding of the damage this separation is causing, and much of it is worrisome.

For some people, the deepest connections they share with other humans are through an online mechanism. I, personally, have noticed over time that many people either avoid or don’t make time for real-world socialization in their lives. With work and commuting, it just takes too much effort to actually spend the evening with another person. It is so much easier to just jump online and see how everyone around the world is doing than to try to meet up with one or two people per day.

And that’s exactly the problem. It’s so easy to be involved in whatever seems interesting at the moment online that we lose the desire to make an effort to have a real interaction with another person, one which might take hours to prepare for, experience, and clean up after.

What do we lose by making this tradeoff? First and foremost, our subconscious mind loses all the deep-seated cues that we are part of a community. These are the very clues we need for psychological well-being on a daily basis. And by need, I mean ‘Need’, the way we need food and water and air. We can stay healthy for months without chocolate or ice cream, without sports or TV or a car, but we need personal, human connection daily to maintain emotional stability; a few days without socialization and we display the onset of a variety of psychological problems. We need real connection, not just communication.

What people forget is that while it does take more effort to interact with others in person, the rewards are infinitely greater. What people lose touch with is the value of having intimate friendships and communication in physical proximity. When we stop interacting with others in person, we begin eroding our very humanity. When we stop making and spending time with friends, we start to die inside.