How Technology Has Negatively Impacted Social Interactions And Experiences

Social Technology
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Introduction
In a world that is now largely bent on exhibitionism, the camera has become the central point of focus. Ironically, every time one takes out their camera to take record of a moment, they miss it all together. With smartphones, putting a camera in the hands of most of the people, the first instance an event takes place, people take out their cameras and phones to record. It is a culture of obsession with taking pictures while in the real sense, people lose the opportunity to enjoy every moment as they should without having to be distracted by the camera. It is no longer for the purpose of enjoying one’s self that people take part in activities and attend events. Konnikova, on The Limits of Friendship and Paumgarten, on We are a Camera, provide some very insightful information on how technology has negatively impacted social interactions and experiences. Mainly, it is so that they can take a picture of themselves doing it or at the event so that they can share on the social media. We are a generation that is obsessed with recording every other activity, while missing the fun in taking part altogether for that perfect shot. As such the social media platforms, have changed the way we interact with the world around us and the connections that we form in a negative way (Konnikova, n.d.). Virtual connections are not as healthy as most of the people would want to believe as they do not represent the true nature of interaction. Living in a world where people are more obsessed with posts and likes than meaningful interactions that are basic yet effective experiences.
Thesis statement: Interacting with the environment is affected by the need to take pictures and share, while connections with those around as is reduced to virtual connections on the social media and other virtual platforms.
The social media platforms are quite influential in the way people are able to interact with others near or far. At the same time social media is able to help create the element of connection between people from different walks of life with much ease. However, there is a problem with the level of connection that one is able to achieve through the social media platforms. There a fixed amount of resources available to the users. When creating meaningful relationships, one of the aspects that one has to note is that, there is a lot of work involved. One has to invest in meaningful relationships and this goes beyond a like or a comment.
‘One concern, though, is that some social skills may not develop as effectively when so many interactions exist online. We learn how we are and aren’t supposed to act by observing others and then having the opportunities to act out our observations ourselves. We aren’t born with full social awareness and Dunbar fears that too much virtual interactions may subvert that education’ (Konnikova, n.d.)
Because of the lack of social awareness brought by online interactions, virtual interactions are likely to subvert the education that we have maintained for centuries about social interactions. The virtual interactions are a distraction of what really needs to happen for one to form meaningful relationships. Ideally, when one ...