Online Interactions

In both the lectures on Monday, there seemed to be an overarching theme of the internet and the ways we interact with people while using it.  In Andrea’s lecture, she talked about how we use the internet to help us adapt to an uncomfortable setting.  More specifically, she talked about how people who study abroad use the internet to help them deal with homesickness and the challenges that come with adapting to a new culture.  As much as I would love to have a personal experience with this specific topic, I have never actually been out of the country or in a setting where culture shock set in so much that it made me feel uncomfortable.  That being said, I do believe that her research is going to show that people who have access to their friends/family back home while studying abroad are going to experience less culture shock.  I say this because even though most everything around you is going to be different, you will retain some form of normalcy by checking your Facebook every day, or talking to your parents, etc.  Just being able to talk to someone you know and trust can be very reassuring. 

                Now, in Mastorone’s presentation, she covered quite a few topics, but the one thing that she said that stuck with me was about how people view how we interact over the internet.  She stated that there are really two main arguments when it comes to communicating over the web, the first being that communicating online really hinders the communication process because you don’t get the non-verbal cues and the like when talking over the net.  They feel that the non-verbal aspects of communicating, or in this case lack thereof, can keep a stable relationship from forming.  On the other hand, the main argument for interacting over the internet is it gives you a chance to meet people you never would have met otherwise, which can help you become more acquainted with other cultures/ways of life.  Personally, I tend to agree a lot more with the latter of the two arguments.  As a person who spends a lot of time on the computer and online, I have met a lot of people across not only this country, but across the world.  I have friends who live in Ireland, Sweden, Canada, Great Britain, and Australia that I never would have met without the internet.  I’ve learned things about their culture, about the way they live their lives, and about how they view Americans that have really benefited me.  Until we finally met up a few weeks ago, we had never all had a face to face, in person conversation before, but we all still managed to maintain stable relationships with each other, despite the fact that we had never met face to face, which disagrees with the argument against online communication. 

As for the argument against online interactions, although it is true, there are ways to get as close to actual face to face communication as possible without actually having it.  Things like Skype, Oovoo, and basically any other program that lets you video/voice chat really helps close the gap between online communications and face to face communications.  Obviously, as of right now, there is nothing that can simulate ALL the aspects of face to face communications on a computer, but strides are being made and I wouldn’t be surprised if in the near future a program comes along that changes everything.