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In the digital age, information and communication technologies have fundamentally changed the way people are connected, smartphones and wireless Internet have become ports for people to connect with each other, and traditional face-to-face interactions have begun to be replaced by virtual digital connections. In the social platform, everyone seems to be able to conveniently connect with others, get rid of the shackles of traditional social relationships in the real space, build their own social boundaries in the mobile digital space, and gain the autonomy to control social distancing. A kind of "shallow communication" that connects presence, free association, and precise companionship has gradually become a new social mode for young people, and "looking for a partner", "cloud love" and "stopping at likes" are a vivid portrayal of this new social mode, and more and more people are looking for companionship and emotional support through social platforms. But behind the light and fast way of communication, high-quality interpersonal relationships are becoming increasingly scarce. The ambivalence of longing for intimacy and social burnout has caused many young people to lose confidence in the need for deep intimacy, escape the time cost and emotional cost of interpersonal communication, and fall into atomic "digital loneliness".
"Digital loneliness" is essentially the projection of online social networking on people's emotional structure. This kind of network socialization constructed by the interaction between symbols and information only produces a fragmented shallow connection, which is alienated from the interpersonal network intertwined by local relationships, group cooperation, and social activities in the living world, thus promoting a lonely psychological state. Its formation points to three characteristics of the social form of contemporary youth groups.
First of all, the contemporary youth group is addicted to the carnival of online communication, but lacks offline aggregation and communication. More and more young people use the term "social fear" to describe the emotional feeling of losing their sense of freedom and autonomy, trying to escape and return to the imaginary space constructed by digital technology, and their willingness to understand others and adjust themselves has significantly deteriorated.
Second, young people engage with others through digital presences, but they also fall into a crisis of trust in their digital peers. On the one hand, digital media identities are not entirely credible. When the self's understanding of others is completely based on the other person's personal narrative and symbolic performance, it is equivalent to entering a "mimetic environment" created by the other party, and the words and images are likely to be carefully constructed technical obscuration, and the transmission of digital technology and digital objects cannot replace the information disclosure and experience perception brought about by face-to-face interaction. On the other hand, digital media identities are not complete. In the social platform of "dancing in a mask", the elaborate online image can only reflect a part of the characteristics of the individual, and although this perfect illusion can bring people instant satisfaction of the ideal self, it also causes a part of the lack of trust, leading to the simultaneous behavior of beautifying the self and doubting others.
In addition, young people are expecting large-scale shallow interactions, but are repeatedly disappointed in the search for "intimate strangers". The formation of intimate identity depends on the cycle of "self-disclosure and response from others" in the interpersonal process. Digital technology and social platforms have expanded the scope of human communication, and the object of intimate identification seems to be able to jump out of acquaintances and expand into strangers on the Internet, but this intimate and unfamiliar state of communication is easy to break. Due to social overload, people have reduced the average depth of emotional support given to social friends, and it is difficult to obtain sufficient emotional support for self-disclosure, and it is difficult to establish mutual recognition between the speaker and the listener, but there is a competition and calculation of emotional value between the two sides.
"Digital loneliness" reflects the social dilemma of contemporary youth, which involves the combined effect of technological development, group mentality and social change.
On the one hand, the rapid development of the Internet and the portability of mobile devices make it easy for young people to access all kinds of social networks, and social platforms bring together a large number of strangers who are far away and do not know each other, so that distant connections can be established, providing low-cost opportunities for young people to make friends. But rather than face-to-face interactions, connections made on the internet are more of an equal "liking friend," with a large number of undifferentiated digital connections replacing emotionally meaningful relationships.
On the other hand, the emphasis on interpersonal boundaries among young people prevents digital connections from being further transformed into deep connections. In modern society, young people's awareness of privacy and boundaries is increasing, and the demand of young people for interpersonal communication is to maintain their own boundaries while not violating the boundaries of others, which is not only physical distance, but also psychological distance. While the sense of boundaries maintains the social scale, it also makes it more difficult to establish deep connections between people. The Internet has further intensified the creation of social boundaries. Different from face-to-face all-round communication, people can set various digital boundaries on the Internet, such as "the circle of friends is only visible for three days" and "you can't add friends through group chats". As soon as they feel that the border has been violated, they quickly initiate unilateral action to open up social distancing.
At the same time, the rapid changes in society restrict the establishment of deep social relationships. As the German sociologist Zimmer put it, modern society is full of changes and stimuli, and people become numb and lose the willingness to make deep connections with others while experiencing stimuli repeatedly. The fast-paced lifestyle divides people's time into fragmented time, people use fragmented time to interact with others, and talk and communicate with others in fragmented time, once people return to work or leisure for a large period of time, fragmented interactions will be broken and difficult to pick up again, making it more difficult to deepen emotions.
The "digital loneliness" of young people is the product of the comprehensive invasion of digital technology into social life, so cracking the "digital loneliness" is essentially how to make digital technology better serve the relationship between people.
We should recognize the "two sides" of each technology in the process of integrating into society, and realize that it is "not an either/or result, but a product of both advantages and disadvantages". Young people need to be aware that digital technologies can not only facilitate the dissemination of information and dispel loneliness, but can also be alienated into the power of manipulating emotions and judgment, reducing users to digital labor and free traffic on virtual social platforms. In the face of escalating digital social products, young people need to be aware of the marketing strategies and operating logic behind the immersive social environment, so as to keep a distance from the sensory stimulation and virtual self generated by social networking.
For the majority of young people, getting out of digital loneliness depends on building a well-intentioned social outlook. Others in life, like oneself, are emotional and dignified subjects, not digital objects or tools to satisfy one's own needs. It is precisely in the process of interaction with each other that there is cooperation, empathy and touching, and it is possible to give birth to a deep intimate relationship and emotional life. Attempts to objectify and instrumentalize social objects through digital technology will not only amplify the illusory self-subjectivity, but will not enhance real personal happiness. Happiness is a noble gift from the hearts of others, and the rejection of real human connections is equivalent to self-isolation from the happy world, and complete emotional autonomy means absolute spiritual loneliness. Social ** may promise perfect relationships, but the virtual world constructed by symbols and technology cannot be exchanged with the real world that can be perceived and warmed, and the localized relationship, although imperfect, is the password to a real happy life.
In the digital age, it is not realistic or necessary to quit socializing holistically**. Young people need to improve their digital literacy and develop social** as a powerful fulcrum for a healthy lifestyle, rather than a digital barrier to real life. Digital technology is not an enemy to be fought against, but an adversary that coexists and coexists with users. Social** does not necessarily mean atomic survival, it can also become a way to shape the social self, which requires users to exert their initiative to define the way of interaction between social** and themselves, develop a use plan that conforms to their own characteristics, and after arriving at the "far place" in the virtual world, they still maintain interest in the vivid and vivid "nearby" in daily life, and after having instant messaging technology, they still remember how to miss a distant person and touch a nearby person.
Author: Liu Zixi (Associate Professor, School of Sociology and Anthropology, Xiamen University), *Guangming.com].
*Please indicate the source".