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By Dr. Kandis Boyd Wyatt
Faculty Member, Transportation and Logistics

Do personal relationships still matter? Prevailing thought would like you to believe that human interaction is critically important: The keys to success in life, work, and family depend on the ability to navigate human dynamics, both within ourselves and externally with others.

Written, oral and visual communication today connect us on a much broader level than ever before. How people interact with one another helps to define the culture of that group or organization. Groups that bond have a unique culture and chemistry. Teamwork, working under pressure and communication skills propel us forward to use our hard skills to their fullest.

Surprisingly, the key to human interaction is introspection. It’s learning what makes us unapologetically us. These interactions with others depend on connecting on a more meaningful level. Relationships matter; collaboration amplifies productivity. Elevating the team means elevating the individual as well. However, the internet has challenged these core concepts and has engendered a new way of thinking when it comes to human interaction.

Internet Usage as a Gauge of Personal Interaction

So how much time do we spend on the internet? The answer may shock you.

A 2019 report by Digital Information World found that consumers spend more than six hours a day on the internet. This finding would seem to alter the landscape of how people use their time and how they interact with one another. Good physical and mental health requires unplugging the internet from time to time, but that is nearly impossible with social media. Instantaneous notifications of updates or changes or deletions can distract us day and night.

As a result, a work-life balance is never really sustainable. Instead, a work-life balance is an effort to focus our energies where they are needed most and to avoid consistently sacrificing one for another.

Social Media and the Transformation of Personal Relationships

Social media has transformed personal relationships by challenging the concept of a team environment. We are among the new generations that can use the internet to obtain information independently without resorting to personal contact with mentors or experts. The search engine can provide many answers to a single question within moments, far faster than any human expert could do.

Technological features such as chats, email, pop-ups, likes, comment sections and texting challenge previous notions that non-verbal communication is the most important component of human interaction. As a result, a conversation via the internet can have multiple viewpoints on the same topic and can be interpreted (or misinterpreted) in multiple ways, which can have positive and negative consequences.

The Social Dilemma

Netflix’s social dilemma documentary-drama highlights the ethical consequences of social media and search engines. Online advertising is not free communication; to the contrary, advertisers pay the hosting sites to post their ads so consumers will watch, engage, and pay attention to their online content.

While pop-up ads are distracting, many websites now have advertising embedded in their pages, making it hard to ignore their message. It’s a win-win situation for the website and the advertisers.

Social Media’s Impact on People’s Blind Spots and Biases

Algorithms within online platforms can influence viewers’ thinking by analyzing their blind spots and biases, then providing suggestions based on those preconceived beliefs. As a result, traditional human interactions, such as mentoring and coaching, are shifting to internet conversations and open discussions.

These analytically created shifts remove the need to establish the personal relationships that mentors and coaches provide. Consequently, online conversations and open discussions often lack unbiased advice based on personal experience.

Social Media Postings Are Unrealistically Utopian

Because most social media sites promote a utopian society where all is well and there are no mistakes, they promote success instead of failure, which is the opposite of societal norms. Recognition of failure is not only an option, it’s a necessity because we learn from our mistakes.

Learning from failure means to admit it, learn from it and humble ourselves to communicate about our failure. Most people act like they are perfect and don’t discuss the failures in their life.

How can we overcome the social dilemma and reclaim human interaction? Here are a few of my tips:

  1. Turn off notifications. This removes the impulse to constantly check social media.
  2. Develop alternate habits. Quality over quantity means learning to say no. Building habits means setting up an environment for success. Habits are less a matter of willpower and more of a routine.
  3. Use social media to communicate both successes and failures. The fear of failure prevents most of us from taking the next steps toward achieving personal goals. The key is to strive for improvement, not perfection.
  4. Embrace alternate opinions. Use social media to learn about the pros and cons of a topic.

So do personal relationships still matter? The easy answer is yes, but social media will continue to challenge us for the best way to communicate.

Human interaction can be effective using multiple ways of communicating. Social media has made great gains in connecting and reconnecting individuals; however, ethical considerations have opened the door to a new conversation on how to communicate effectively.

Emergency and disaster management briefing for May 1, 2020: States across the country are facing pressure to relax COVID-19 restrictions and reopen businesses; the USDA has declared counties in Colorado and Kansas as primary natural disaster areas; a new study points to major gaps in the use of social media by emergency service agencies; forgiven PPP loans are not eligible for tax deductions; disaster relief teams respond to tornado-stricken Onalaska, Texas; tornado debris clean up will begin in phases in Bradley County, Tennessee; small family farms and ranchers are now eligible for SBA EIDL grant and loan assistance; and 87 people, including 58 patients and 29 employees, have tested positive for COVID-19 at the Life Care Center of Athens, Tennessee.