The shrinking social space of a digital child
SUJATA C
TIMES HAVE changed. Technology has brought offices into homes, but has life changed for the better?
Children are quick to take to technology, whether it is a cell phone, a computer, or the play station. You see it happening in most urban homes. A child is introducing his grandmother or grandfather to the e-mail and the internet. But what is happening to his childhood? Has the family dynamics changed? Is technology leading society to a future of terra incognita, where the road map is virtually absent?
New technology has chipped away at the authority parents command over the child. There is a reversal of roles. The traditional authoritarian parent has been replaced with a friendlier one.
But research shows that a child who thinks he is smarter than his parent is likely to be less accepting of authority. The child acquires a level of mental maturity much before the physical maturity comes in. This means the natural process of growing has been hampered and it may lead to other complications, physical and emotional, later.
Social cost of technology
The child's sense of family is different. It has many weak links that will threaten to snap under pressure. Technology is creating divisions within the family. It is hijacking the family bonds just as television did when cable TV became a reality. Is technology responsible for the decline of the Indian family? New technology almost always has made things easier and faster but somehow we don't spend the extra time we have gained from these innovations with our families; we just find other things to pass the time.
Were these consequences intended? Having invented something should we fall prey to its unintended consequences?
Research has shown that technology is a great robber of time from social activities. Children who spend free time in front of a machine simply do not know how to make and keep friends or even get along with other family members. The interpersonal skills will be rudimentary, if not absent, they say. Studies also suggest that as the child grows his dependence on the net leads him to experiment and may prompt premature sexual activity.
Technology has induced simultaneousness into our lives. We watch several channels at the same time to escape the commercial breaks. Does switching TV channels lead to short term memory lapse? Does technology induce a trance that numbs the mind? Where will this lead us? Will the young adults be on a quest for identity that is even more elusive?
What about the psychological pressures created by the internet? We have multiple email IDs under different names. Some experts aptly call this phenomenon "techno schizophrenia." The internet has led us to split ourselves into multiple personalities.
This is not an easy time for a child to grow up in. While technology has increased connectedness it also has created an increasingly alienated and fragmented society. Should we disregard the after shocks of technology and surrender to it? The least we can do is to become aware of the consequences. How we deal with them is a different story.
Sujata117@yahoo.co.uk
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