COLLEGE students tell me they know how to look someone in the eye and type on their phones at the same time, their split attention undetected. They say it’s a skill they mastered in middle school when they wanted to text in class without getting caught. Now they use it when they want to be both with their friends and, as some put it, “elsewhere.”Sherry Turkle has been studying the psychology of online connectivity for more than 30 years. For the past five, She had a special focus: What has happened to face-to-face conversation in a world where so many people say they would rather text than talk? She goes on:
First of all, there is the magic of the always available elsewhere. You can put your attention wherever you want it to be. You can always be heard. You never have to be bored. When you sense that a lull in the conversation is coming, you can shift your attention from the people in the room to the world you can find on your phone. But the students also described a sense of loss.For example, Turkle spoke to one college junior who tried to capture what is wrong about life in his generation. “Our texts are fine,” he said. “It’s what texting does to our conversations when we are together that’s the problem.”
Read the article by Turkle based on her book, “Reclaiming Conversation” (also linked above). Here she makes a case for face-to-face talk, and that direct engagement is crucial for the development of empathy, the ability to put ourselves in the place of others. After you read this article, there is a link to her next article, as she reacts to the comments she received. I found this related article, "Talk to Each Other, Not Your Phone" to be even more powerful. We text because regular conversation is so "pedestrian" and boring. In her book, Turkle asks Randall, 24, a real estate broker,
What happens when there is a lull in the conversation. He looked at me, seeming not to understand. Later he explained that, in his mind, he had just made it clear that there is never a lull in the conversation. Anything like that would be filled by turning to your phone. But I hadn’t understood this yet so I tried again. I said, “Like, if things got quiet among your friends?” Randall said, “Oh, if the conversation was not providing information, I’d check out some YouTube stuff I’m behind on … or take a picture of us and post it.”After you read the articles (very short - not longer than 15 minutes) - with excellent links, what do you think? What has been your experience? Are you comfortable with silence in conversation? Or do you view conversation as transactional; that it has to accomplish something or provide new information?
I especially like this essay by Tristan Harris, "How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds — from a Magician and Google’s Design Ethicist." He is "an expert on how technology hijacks our psychological vulnerabilities. That’s why I spent the last three years as Google’s Design Ethicist caring about how to design things in a way that defends a billion people’s minds from getting hijacked." Tristan then mentions 10 hijacks. Here is one you could imagine (and probably do):
ReplyDeleteFor example, imagine you’re out with friends on a Tuesday night and want to keep the conversation going. You open Yelp to find nearby recommendations and see a list of bars. The group turns into a huddle of faces staring down at their phones comparing bars. They scrutinize the photos of each, comparing cocktail drinks. Is this menu still relevant to the original desire of the group?
It’s not that bars aren’t a good choice, it’s that Yelp substituted the group’s original question (“where can we go to keep talking?”) with a different question (“what’s a bar with good photos of cocktails?”) all by shaping the menu.
Moreover, the group falls for the illusion that Yelp’s menu represents acomplete set of choices for where to go. While looking down at their phones, they don’t see the park across the street with a band playing live music. They miss the pop-up gallery on the other side of the street serving crepes and coffee. Neither of those show up on Yelp’s menu.
The other hijacks are just as good.
Silence in my opinion is both a good and a bad thing. In some ways, silence can be that "awkward" moment when the conversation has hit a lull, or maybe it happens when you said something that came out wrong. On the other hand, silence is also the brief moment where new thoughts and ideas can pop into mind. It can be the moment where the conversation can pick up new life. Personally, I would say that I appreciate silence, but I also enjoy the moments that are filled with conversation or with noise. At the same time, however, I typically fill those moments of silence through the use of technology. I then become guilty of what Turkle discussed at her talk, and in her book, which is similar to what the real estate broker does too.
ReplyDeleteI think that people have become so reliant on technology that it has become a comforting aspect in people's lives in which they use for safety or to not feel "alone". Face-to-face conversations challenge that feeling of safety by exposing people to conversations that leave people feeling vulnerable and like they cannot "control" the conversation as well as they could if it was an online conversation.
Good comment. I'm now reading her book and I will probably share the first chapter with you (and the class). It's called, "The Empathy Dairies." There are also great podcasts on the topic of our digital life. It can be kinda depressing, given that most students (and parents and any age) will probably not change their behavior. Maybe the first step is to just notice others around campus. Also, how long can students read a newspaper article or long in-depth article before stopping? (Forget about textbooks, right?)
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