Social Media is Disconnecting Many Relationships

Social media may be a great tool for meeting new people or staying in touch with those that we may not get to see very often.  However, social media is harming relationships in more ways than one. Marriages are suffering and ideas of divorce are greater these days. According to Joseph Nowinski Ph.D. “Increased use of social networking is correlated with poorer marital happiness and a higher likelihood of a troubled relationship, along with thoughts of divorce.” (1). Research has shown that divorce rates have been on the rise and has correlated with greater usage of social media sites. Social media sites can leave a person feeling lonely and depressed. Sometimes one spouse may be addicted to using social networking and that leaves the other spouse feeling alone and like they don’t even matter. Nowinski  states that “social networking and similar sites could indeed not just play a role in compensating for an unhappy relationship but may actually contribute to that unhappiness.” (1). Many people forget what it was like to just sit down out to dinner and talk to each other  without having a cell phone in their hands and social media at their fingertips.

Social media is also disconnecting relationships between friends and family members. There are many factors that can influence such disconnection, one of which is being misunderstood. Many times we type things out and they come across sounding rude though not intentionally. People can construe things into what they think and this becomes frustrating for everyone involved.  Why can’t we just talk over the phone or face to face and get the words straight from the person’s mouth? I believe that having “friends” online is a problem that people may not even realize. How many of these “friends” does one actually know in real life and are not just someone that they have friended online? These are fake friendships that could potentially be harmful in the hands of many and especially, our youth. There are also the problems that social media poses on our real friendships. Many times people move and that disconnection is already tough but then when one adds in the fact that many of these relationships continue only with acknowledgement by “likes” of each other’s pictures or “comments” left on status updates rather than calling each other, there lies a problem. Social media provides a scape goat for “keeping in touch” which is not really keeping in touch! Let's put away the technology and spend more time together looking at each other instead of screens!!