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Social Media 'Increases Loneliness', Says Study (bbc.co.uk)
An anonymous reader shares a BBC report: Social media sites like Twitter, Facebook and Pinterest are causing more people to feel alone, according to US psychologists. A report suggests that more than two hours of social media use a day doubled the chances of a person experiencing social isolation. It claims exposure to idealised representations of other people's lives may cause feelings of envy. The study also looked at those using Instagram, Snapchat and Tumblr. "We do not yet know which came first - the social media use or the perceived social isolation," co-author Elizabeth Miller, professor of paediatrics at the University of Pittsburgh, said. "It's possible that young adults who initially felt socially isolated turned to social media. Or it could be that their increased use of social media somehow led to feeling isolated from the real world." Theories in the report suggest the more time a person spends online, the less time they have for real-world interactions.
Back before Facebook bought out MySpace it was actually a great place to meet people with similar interests. It's the move toward user data as the product (and locking down search/browsing functionality to those already in a network) plus the attempt to monopolize a thing (Uber for driving, Facebook for sharing, OKCupid for dating, etc) that is killing the ability to actually socialize because social media platforms are only useful tools to that end when they increase actual connections rather than serve to catalog a person's connections.
Theories in the report suggest the more time a person spends online, the less time they have for real-world interactions.
If time spent on social media was worth as much as time spent in the real world, you could argue that it balances out. Unfortunately, time spent on social media is mostly time wasted on social media. The quality of interactions just isn't there. So in the final analysis, social media degrades the quality of the user's life.
Of course, that void then creates a hunger for contact, which the user tries to fill with still more social media use, because it's easy to do, rather than get off your butt and walk the dog, pick up the phone and call someone, or knock on your neighbor's door and ask them if they want to come over for coffee or tea.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
My problem with facebook, and all social media, is that it doesn't level the playing field. Its all about popularity. Its about the amount of likes you get and the amount of friends you have and the most this and the most that. Its all about metrics for marketing. That's all they care about. From it, we get a lame experience. If you remove the popularity aspect of things from social media it would be a great place.
Less.
But it's not a consequence of Facebook, I've never had an account. It's more likely because I managed to settle down and get married so I don't need to go out to look for that sort of companionship anymore. The friendships that I have now are stronger than those with the acquaintances within the various scenes that I participated in as well, so while I may not socialize as much, when I do I get more meaning from it as it's not mere pleasantries or superficial trappings.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
This is true. Facebookers are lonely. That's why I spend my quality time with my real friends: the Slashdot forum community. The warmth, understanding, and charitable attitudes I find on Slashdot help me make it through the day, and always lead me to an accurate assessment of the tech news.
Cloudiot: A person who does not see offsite storage as a way to lose control over access to his or her own data.
A huge issue with social media is that you are locked into your own beliefs, creating a cult like atmosphere. This is not just time being wasted, it's time being used to self destructive ends. A person can not grow intellectually living in an echo chamber surrounded by controlled thoughts. Companies know this, and cash in on it. This is "The Allegory of the Cave" in action.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Most of my issues with interacting with humans is I'm pretty quiet and introverted. Many times I can't come up with a response quickly enough when speaking. By the time I've thought of something to contribute, the conversation has moved on. And I have a problem with interrupting others when they're speaking that seems absent from others. I'm in a meeting, for example, and my contributions are minimal in part because the talking is non-stop and you can't get a word in edge-wise.
With BBS's back in the 80's, Usenet and EMail in the 80's and 90's, EMail lists and Discussion groups in the '00's, and Forums and Facebook now, I can read and respond at my leisure. I don't even like talking on the phone.
Even this post. I've rewritten bits of it several times, added words, changed structure, and even considered whether or not it would provide any valuable insights before posting it.
[John]
Shit better not happen!
Without getting into the nitty gritty I have had challenges with general anxiety disorder / agoraphobia for a while and the combination of telecommuting / computer-based hobbies I don't leave my house very often. And by "very often" I can probably count on my hands the number of hours I've been outside in the last 2-3 months.
Social media gives me a distraction I can pull up at any time and people to talk to, which is great for the ol' depression (sort of, I'll get into that later) it connects me in ways I never thought were possible before. Whether or not the kind of interactions I have are more or less healthy I can't say but I do know there are a couple things that I see in others that are damaging.
The main things I find actively damaging about having a life through social media as I see them:
1. If somebody is being a jerk you can passive-aggressively remove them from your life, I mean this happens in IRL but sometimes you can't escape people like this (work, family) so there's a tendency to craft the people you follow / interact with socially online. I think this becomes a problem because you get into a group-think type situation where you bury yourself in only one side of anything. If I ONLY loved Star Trek I wouldn't follow a Star Wars person, that makes sense, but when I bury myself solely in Star Trek people it can warp me. I try to be careful about it and ensure I have a good variety of people / communities I take part in but there are some people who are so super-focused they only expose themselves to a narrow world and it really is surprising how it changes their thinking over time.
2. Social media is gamified, that fact is NOT obvious to most people who use it. There are a lot of people who really stress about how many notes, likes, reblogs, +s, thumbs up, etc they are or aren't getting. They associate their personal value to these metrics. I'm aware of this and yet it still invades my thoughts, it's potent and it adds stress to the activity, this kind of stress leads to more depression, you have a social circle and you can now "measure yourself" by these gamified metrics. It's really bad and in general it makes depressed people even more depressed.
The good side is I feel connected and sociable the bad side is it manipulates me into using it more. I think ultimately it's bad for me because it has become a total replacement for going out, it gives me tools that make it easier to not want to go out, which is not good if you're agoraphobic.
On the flipside I have met local people online that have forced me to go out and do things I would not have done otherwise, like attending a comic convention for four days straight / going out to celebrate friends' birthdays / going out for coffee (who does that?). When things are bad though its always there for me, which I don't think is particularly healthy.
As always YMMV
crazy dynamite monkey
It's letting the lonely people tell you about it. Every day, filling up my feed with bleak stock art and Comic Sans overlay text.
Bitter much?
Not sure about GP, but Hell I'm not bitter.
My social life improved greatly once my wife decided she liked another bloke more.
All of a sudden I was able to go to game nights every other weekend at my mate's flat (I have my kids half the time, so I stay home with them on my nights) instead of once in a blue moon if I was lucky.
Turned out my ex was BPD and I was the frog in a pot of water, boiled alive till she decided to go so far that even her gaslighting couldn't keep me a doormat.
To come full circle to TFA, I think that those whose isolation increases with FB and similar use are those predisposed to "keeping up with the Joneses". They see this curated view into their friends' lives and think that they should be like that all the time, not really stopping to look at the friend post ratio. E.g. on average you get one or two curated posts per friend per week (some more, many less?) and thus to keep up you really only need to be like that once or twice a week too.
Instead these people are like my ex, they look at the total feed and think: "Oh shit, look at all the happy I see all the time... Why am I not happy all the time too?" They just can't process that it is coming from multiple sources.
-nB
whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
You basically have two options in the "advanced" society:
1) Accept your media programming to become irrational ravenous consumers that are only drawn to fake boobies, blinky lights, reality television and anything that projects if you just buy X you will live fantasy Y
2) Screw #1 and deal with reality with all its ups and downs, good, bad and indifferent things and just be thankful for having the opportunity to experience existence and admit you don't know a lot of shit
If you pick #2 you will be lonely because you will separate yourself from all the delusional morons in the #1 camp. If you pick #1 and you are actually somewhat intelligent, you will want to shoot yourself. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.
We'll make great pets
I don't use social media and I have no friends. But that's because I put no effort into making any friends. A decade or two ago, after a mostly-friendless youth, I decided that I wanted to have a social life in my college years, and put effort into it. Then I had an enormous number of friends and social things to do every day of every weekend.
In time I realized I wasn't getting enough out of that to be worth the effort, so now I don't try, and besides weekends with my girlfriend (where we still don't socialize with anyone besides each other) the most socialization I get is saying "thank you" and "have a nice night" to the grocery store clerk.
But I'm not lonely. If I wanted to have more of a social life and couldn't, then I would be lonely. But just not having a social life because I can't be bothered isn't loneliness.
Maybe all the people on Facebook and Twitter see other people socializing and imagine that those people are happier than them and that it's because of the socialization, and that makes them want more social life than they have (whether because they're not good at making friends or just don't have the time for it), which makes them sad.
Like the Buddhists say, desire is the root of suffering. Stop wanting to be social, stop thinking it will make you happy, stop thinking those people on your FaceSpace pages are happier than you, because they're not, they're just trying to fill the void in themselves the same as you, but it doesn't really work. Stop wanting something that wouldn't make you happy anyway and you will stop suffering for the lack of it.
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
"I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."