Does technology and social media make us feel more alone? 

Does technology and social media make us more alone? Contradictory to the purpose of technology and social media, I believe that in certain cases and to a certain degree, social media can make us feel more alone and lonely rather than feeling connected with others. 

Technology gives people a reason to be more alone. With the internet giving us access to many resources, a lot of people can use it as a means to ease and distract them from their loneliness by playing online games, and consuming entertainment from various websites such as Youtube, Twitch, Twitter and others. 

However, by consuming media that has various internet personalities online, people can become unhealthily and overly attached to them, and develop a parasocial relationship. Parasocial relationships are unhealthy for multiple reasons. It’s a superficial relationship that might ease loneliness at first, but it gives you a reason to be less social and won't get rid of the root of the problem which is not having any real relationships to start with. It’s also harmful because when you become too reliant on a fake relationship for comfort, when the online personality eventually retires and you developed a parasocial relationship with them, you could be mentally devastated at worst and would have to go back to being lonely and seek comfort from the internet once again. These sorts of relationships online are what feeds and fuels a cycle that encourages consumers to use their websites to seek entertainment and fake companionships online in an unhealthy manner, or in other words it’ll make you develop an addiction.

Even non parasocial relationships can be fake online and be unhealthy. For example, on social media you can see many people interacting and forming connections with each other online. However unless you know the person in real life, your online relationships could be very much fake, especially on social media where we show an idealized version of ourselves that seems presentable to others. Not only is keeping up a facade exhausting and tiring, it means that you cannot have a real relationship and connecting to others online would usually mean connecting with a mask or a persona that they developed to seem friendly and approachable to others, meaning that the relationship is superficial or fake. Just like parasocial relationships, these types of relationships can ease loneliness at first, but won’t last for very long. Especially if you try meeting up in real life with internet friends, they can betray expectations you had for others whether it’s appearance wise or personality wise.

The internet can also encourage loneliness by making people self conscious and lowering their self confidence and esteem. Because many social media websites show the amount of likes and followers someone has, by seeing your friends’ posts do much better than your posts you can get self conscious. For example, if you see that your selfie is doing much worse than your friends’, you can get very self conscious and your appearances to an unhealthy level and can make you feel jealous of others. This can make you feel as if you’re not good enough and make you want to go out in public less and less.

Also, these claims are not just baseless personal opinions. Many researchers think that there is a correlation between the rise in depression and declining mental health with the rise in technology and social media. This isn’t hard to believe because in several studies, teenagers and young adults who use social media have a higher rate of depression than those who don’t.

I’m not telling you to never make friends online, or to never use social media. What I want to tell you is that the internet can be a double edged sword. While it can make many others connect, it can also be the cause of loneliness.