How Social Media Is Dumbing Down Our Society

[Foxaèr]

In our digital era of smartphones and social media, it seems nearly everyone suffers from communication overload. Less than 15 years ago, most netizens had just one or two email accounts, texting was tedious and costly, and mobile phones were primarily used to make, well, phone calls.

Today, it’s common for people to manage numerous social media accounts and email addresses. One recent estimate claimed the average internet user has seven social media accounts — excluding email. Chunky mobile phones have been replaced by pocket touchscreen computers that constantly jingle and buzz notifications, pulling their owners away from face-to-face encounters with other human beings into a constantly churning social networking vortex.

Experts who look into such things say that while social networking has its benefits — professionally, personally, politically — it’s also dumbing down the ways people communicate with each other. Having so many channels of communication has overwhelmed our ability to thoughtfully interact online, encouraging cheap and easy forms of communication.

In our digital era of smartphones and social media, it seems nearly everyone suffers from communication overload. Less than 15 years ago, most netizens had just one or two email accounts, texting was tedious and costly, and mobile phones were primarily used to make, well, phone calls.

Today, it’s common for people to manage numerous social media accounts and email addresses. One recent estimate claimed the average internet user has sevensocial media accounts — excluding email. Chunky mobile phones have been replaced by pocket touchscreen computers that constantly jingle and buzz notifications, pulling their owners away from face-to-face encounters with other human beings into a constantly churning social networking vortex.

Experts who look into such things say that while social networking has its benefits — professionally, personally, politically — it’s also dumbing down the ways people communicate with each other. Having so many channels of communication has overwhelmed our ability to thoughtfully interact online, encouraging cheap and easy forms of communication.

Instead of taking the time to formulate a thoughtful reply to an online friend’s social media post, social media users tend to gravitate to using an emoji or firing off a brief comment meant to convey little more than acknowledgment.

“When you look at social media apps, particularly Facebook, the most common action is to ‘like’ something; it’s not to comment, it’s not to post, it’s to ‘like,’” Larry Rosen, co-author of “The Distracted Mind: Ancient Brains in a High-Tech World,” told Salon. “The reason for that is because it takes minimal cognitive effort.”

Indeed, Facebook’s “like” icon has been such a popular way to communicate that last year the world’s largest social network expanded its thumbs-up icon into a suite of five “reactions” icons that represent anger, sadness, surprise, laughter and love, giving users the same depth of communication that could be taught to a chimpanzee.

http://www.alternet.org/personal-health/...munication

[Court Jester]

Tough to disagree with that. I don't have Facebook or twitter, but all of my employees do. Since cellphones came along, the only phone number I can remember is my own cellphone though too. I can get my wife's number but it takes a few tries. Memory loss comes with age though, so I'm probably normal.

[Seraphina]

Which came first - dumbed down people or social media? Shallow people with attention spans of a gnat have been around since time immemorial.
At least now with cell phones it's easier to weed out people I don't want to know. People who will publicly identify themselves as someone who spends their days bent over a tiny screen like a brain dead woodpecker might as well not even exist as far as I'm concerned.

-Teresa

[brewer]

LOL, talk about dumbing down. Did you repeat yourself on purpose to make a point? hahahahahahaha

The article has a point but I think that the "dumb" are now communicating where in the past we would have never heard from them except in person.

[Divinity]

Social Media isn't dumbing people down. The idiots are just more vocal now. And the idiots see what other idiots are saying, and think to themselves "That's right!"

Countering that are the reasonably intelligent people talking to each other, and seeing that everybody in the world hasn't gone fucking crazy.

[Aroura]

Hmm, I shall kudos those post! Lol

I completely agree though. I have FB and mostly hate it. Or is very shallow, but people use it constantly. I can't go out with a friend for lunch without FB sucking the friend in.

I avoid twitter entirely, and all other social media. Call me a dinosaur, I refuse to join a bunch of crap I'm perfectly happy right now without, I won't become an accessory to my phone.