Social Networking and Human Conversation

Pop culture has increasingly become divided, for many, between those who participate in social networking and those who do not. I have many friends who simply “don’t do” Facebook, much less Twitter or sundry other networking services. I have other friends who would sooner give up a limb than abandon their blossoming Twitter/Facebook communities. I’ve made my views regarding social networking (as it stands) pretty clear in the past. Most often, the arguments I hear from those who abstain goes something along the lines of, “It’s taking away from face-to-face human interaction.” Bishop N.T. Wright recently compared our attraction to internet-based social networks to a form of “cultural masturbation,” which has been challenged by Julie Clawson’s eloquent rebuttal via the Sojourners blog that addresses this issue in a much more satisfying manner, and resonates with much of what I have said about the issue in preceding posts. But that’s not really the subject of this post.

Psychology has taught me analyze behavioral theories in a different light. Evidence overwhelmingly points to the fact that, consciously or subconsciously, everything we do and experience and the way we do and experience everything affects us. So surely there’s some weight to the idea that online interactions can only provide a synthetic, artificial sense of relationship—nothing that approaches the “real” interactions we experience most of the time. The only psychological basis to this argument can be found in the idea that there surely must be a difference, but that difference doesn’t necessarily have to be bad. As evidenced by the references in Clawson’s article, social networking has not affected the percentage of recluses in our society and in fact is often the reason people go out and get together in the first place. Social networking of the scale we see on Facebook and Twitter would have no place without a basis in reality. Facebook isn’t Second Life; it’s an extension of real life.

Examining the issue further, perhaps it’s not really all that different from “real” interactions. Anyone who’s had a good conversation knows that it always begins with something and ends with something else entirely, often after having cycled through many other topics before arriving at the conclusion. Twitter is a conversation that never ends. There’s no closure, no finality, no “see you next time.” It’s a continuous thread, winding and twisting its way through time, weaving the tapestry of our culture. The conversation is always changing, at times active and explosive, at other times dull, rambling, and more like show-and-tell than an exchange of ideas. The face-to-facers don’t know what to do with this because face-to-face, necessarily, cannot continue at all times indefinitely. There must be meetings, dates, appointments, and sessions. Social networking eliminates these constraints and allows us to contact and converse with our friends regardless of where we are and what we’re doing, and vice versa. Effectively, and I’ve argued this before, Twitter allows us to lead normal, active lives rooted in “the outside world” while conversing with those we can’t always (or ever) actually be with. Never in history have we been able to so easily maintain relationships with so many people, near and far, at any given moment in the day.

Perhaps social networking is better for conversation. Responses are delayed, and even as we type things we can read over them and edit them to ensure they convey our intended meaning before publishing. Delays between responses allow both parties space for reflection and thought, which may, in fact, procure an even deeper conversation than would be possible with the demands of real-time response. Conversely, social networking may be harmful to conversation because it allows too much time to respond, crippling our ability to converse in real-time for lack of space to think and process our thoughts, and perhaps also generating responses that do not reflect the commenter’s true beliefs, which may have been evident had the conversation occurred in real-time. Also, people can be tempted to simply rant at another person for paragraphs on end (guilty!) because they have all the uninterrupted time and space in the world to do so. It’s also worth pointing out that some of the most poignant statements are made spur-of-the-moment, without time to reflect or edit before vocalizing.

I am of the opinion that generally, social networking has helped us become more articulate, thoughtful, and responsive human beings. It has also made us more passive-aggressive, more subject to abuse, and more likely to shun or “rank” our friends based on silly but ultimately harmful criteria that we find everywhere from schoolhouses to office buildings throughout the world. This issue certainly offers tremendous variety beyond my tiny view of the matter. What do you think? Do our conversations benefit from social networking, or do they suffer?