Social Media and Social Isolation: Link Debunked

Reduced in-person socialization may not be due to excessive social media usage as per a study at the University of Kansas, published in the journal Current Opinion in Psychology. “The social displacement hypothesis is probably the most well-known, long-lasting explanation for where time spent using new technologies—from the internet to texting, and now social media—comes from. The social displacement argument says that new media cuts into our face-to-face time. The best available evidence suggests it’s just not so,” says Hall, a professor at the University of Kansas.

The new study thereby debunks the older “social displacement hypothesis,” which correlates the social media usage to the reduced in-person socialization.

Social Media Hypothesis on Social Isolation

The study states that there was a uniform decline in FtF time in the United States, Great Britain, and Australia well before even the rise of social media. In addition, the decline also seemed to continue/even exaggerated through the stay-at-home orders and social distancing of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Although the social media rates of consumption have grown across demographic groups, the transformation of social media time is likely being borrowed from time spent watching TV (for decades) and time at work or doing household chores, emphasizing that friendship and social media are not enemies.

“The best available evidence suggests face-to-face is in competition with hours spent at work and commuting." In other words, people who work longer spend more of their leisure time alone. During the pandemic, when people got that time back from commuting, “they still spent it working virtually. They didn’t spend it socializing with each other. It seems we live in a society that privileges working and media consumption over everything else. The decline in face-to-face time is a matter of priority and a matter of availability. And we are neither prioritizing face to face time, nor are we available to do so,” says Hall.

The study thereby suggests that this international trend of reduced time in face-to-face communication may reflect growing rates of loneliness.

Source-Medindia