Bulletin: The Net Isn't Dehumanizing!

Relax -- You're human. A UCLA study has seriously debunked concerns that the Net has dehumanized America. Nearly two-thirds of Americans have ventured online, and a significant majority deny that the Net creates social isolation. Parents say their Net-using kids don't suffer poorer grades, and almost everybody says the Net connects them to family and friends in a "positive" way. The study has other interesting findings about Net use. You might want to commit it to memory.

The results of this study contradict years of short-sighted, phobic reports to the contrary, but you probably won't see them on the front pages of your local paper, or see the study leading the evening news. "The Net is neither isolating nor dehumanizing" would make a lousy headline, and a worse debate soundbite. George Bush won't add this to his "Dark Hearts and the Net" riff, and Gore and Lieberman won't cite it in their anti-"cultural pollution" or stop-the-video-game campaigns.

You can find the study, which was reported by the Associated Press, in the tech section of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune site and a handful of sites and papers here and there.

The findings shouldn't be a huge surprise to Net users, but it ought to come as a huge shock to the rest of this country's grown-ups. More than 75% of the people polled said they don't feel as if they're being ignored by relatives and friends as a result of chat-room activity. In fact, the majority of Net users said e-mail, Web sites and chat rooms have a "modestly positive impact" on their abilities to make new friends and communicative more with family.

If stupidity, hysteria and ignorance were crimes, lots of journalists and polticians would be calling lawyers about now. There are few more widely propagated stereotypes than the idea that the people reading this column are isolated and alienated from other humans as a result of the time they spend online gaming, squabbling, yakking and programming. The study is overdue, but it's probably small comfort to the people who've been berated for the perils of spending time online for much of their lives.

The study surveyed the opinions and online habits of 2,096 respondents -- both Net users and non-users. More than 70% of parents said their children's grades are neither helped nor hurt by Internet activity. Nearly two-thirds said they now buy less from traditional retailers, as opposed to shopping online. Lack of privacy was the biggest concern of the Net users surveyed, who said that few fear the government watching them, but most fear invasive corporations tracking their behavior. Curiously, the study was funded by the National Science Foundation as well as AOL, Microsoft, and the Walt Disney Corp. Officials of the Pew Internet and American Life Project were quoted as saying the report supports their own findings that the Net is a tool that unites more people than it isolates.

The UCLA study has other interesting findings: 66.9% of Americans use the Net; 54.6% use e-mail. More than 86% of Americans with college degrees use the Net regularly; 78.7% of adults say children in their households spend an appropriate amount of time online. More than 70% of adults say the grades of kids who use the Net don't fall. The top five Net activites? Web surfing or browsing, 81.7%; E-mail, 81.6%; Seeking hobby information, 57.2%; finding entertainment information, 54.3%.

Oh, yeah: 75.3% of Internet users say they never feel ignored by other people because of the Net. This is a good survey to print out, store in your computer or print out and put in your wallet. Unfortunately, you still need it.

Comments

It depends on how you use it, I suppose

[adjensen]

When I first got on the Web in 1995, it was more entertaining to "surf around", and I did spend a ridiculous amount of time doing that.

In the ensuing years, however, the rise in commercialization of the whole thing has led me to limit my use to email with friends, information gathering and buying stuff.

I spend about 1/10th of my work day on the net, and maybe 20 minutes a week when I'm home. It has not turned into the "television replacement" that was forecast a while back, and neither myself nor my nine year old daughter finds it all that entertaining.

Chat rooms seem to be a wasteland of children and idiots constantly on with their LOL and BRB, and I can't imagine anyone finding that to be a great use of time.

I think what keeps useage (and social isolation) down is the lack of community with a point -- it's one thing to go sit in a restaurant with friends talking, and quite another to slog through banner ads, only to find your communications inundated with the ROTFLMAO crowd.

Thank God for this

[Rurik]

Why? Because I met my wife on the internet. That has always been a big issue amongst my family. They're all small-town people, farm workers, with no use for a computer, and here their family member got swept up and married to someone he didn't even know. NOT!

The internet supplements your life. It allowed me to find friends that weren't just about drinking, smoking, and football. It allowed me to spend my days hanging with the guys, then go home in the evening and have meaningful discussions about topics that I enjoy.

And that's how I met my wife, as a friend on irc. Then we just decided to meet (2 hours apart), as friends, after talking for over a year. Then we continued meeting as friends every weekend til we began meeting as a couple. Then a year after that, we got married.

Just because a majority of my friends that I enjoy are on the internet doesn't mean that I shut out everyone around me (which my family now believes). They just can't understand that when I go to family reunions, I don't want to talk about deer hunting, or college football, or how Michelle drove the tractor for the first time. I want to talk about life, psychology, why we do the things we do, where we are all going, and how to root a solaris box.