Review of "The Influence of Technology on the Initiation of Interpersonal Relationships"

In the journal Psychology and Behavioral Sciences Collection, Spring 2003, Vol. 123, Issue 3, Jeffrey S. McQuillen discusses the question scholars and lay people alike are beginning to ask: "How does advancing technologies impact interpersonal relationships?" Much of the focus of this study is shifted toward the internet and use of personal computers to communicate. First, McQuillen gives consideration to technology and its influence on social life. Second, he explores the influence media has on interpersonal relationships. Finally, the implications of technologically based relationship initiation and development are considered. The internet has created what McQuillen refers to as the "global village". In other words, the use of the internet as a communication tool has allowed the world to seem smaller and more accessible. However, as the perceived gaps of time, distance, and cultures seems to shrink, the gaps between people in interpersonal relationships appear to be growing. "Paradoxically, the closer we get, the further apart we appear to be" (McQuillen, 2003). McQuillen blames this enlarged distance on an increased reliance on technology as a means of initiating, developing, and maintaining interpersonal relationships.

McQuillen discusses the use of tools as a way to make tasks easier. For example, women used to gather at the river to wash clothing. This gave them an opportunity to socialize, and develop friendships, and other relationships. With the invention of the newer and easier ways to wash, women gathered less and less, and their chore was done closer to home. Fast forward to today, when women (or men) walk to their laundry room, throw laundry in, turn the machine on, and retreat back to the comfort (and isolation) of their living room, kitchen, or bedroom, (McQuillen, 2003) and you can see a slice of the decrease in interpersonal communication required to function in society. One can even order pizza online, pay with a credit card, and be required only to open the door, take the pizza, and close the door, with little more than a grunt and a nod. McQuillen states, "Tools are intended to make one's work easier. However, the increased ease and time saved, afford people the opportunity to become less interdependent and more autonomous and self-reliant."

He points out that this isolation is even encouraged and marketed to society. "Reach out and touch someone," a popular advertising campaign for a phone company, seems to say that "virtual communication" (through the phone, text message, or computer) is synonymous with actual physical interaction. He advances the notion that the loss of characteristics of a face to face communication can result in a loss of fidelity and increase in interpersonal distance between communicants.

McQuillen goes on to discuss television's role in decreasing the quality of personal communication: Television has created the sense of the sixty-second solution, the presentation of a simplistic solution to a complex human problem. According to Bate and Bowker (1997), television contributes to two serious problems in the area of gender stereotyping: 1) under representation of women by the media tend to devalue women, and 2) the media's portrayal of men and women reinforce stereotypic and destructive patterns for both genders. These two problems contribute to females being caught-up in the "Beauty Myth" (Wolf, 1991). Females become so concerned with their appearance that the tendency toward problems of lower self-esteem and serious eating disorders become commonplace (Wood, 2000). In contrast, men are encouraged to be strong, successful, and sexual. These gender identities are debilitating and maximize incompatibility between men and women. The likelihood of June Clever and the Marlboro Man developing or maintaining a healthy relationship is highly unlikely."

Television tends to further misrepresent genders and idealize gender-matched roles. Bill Cosby (The Cosby Show) is seen as the ideal "Black" Dad. Martin Sheen's President Jeb (The West Wing) is portrayed as a "compassionate, fair, and moral politician." These are some of the excellent examples McQuillen gave of the peers most of the world would like in their social circle. This perception is advanced as dangerous by McQuillen in that: viewers tend to measure the quality of their lives or relationships compared to television relationships, and/or may vicariously fill their own need for interpersonal companionship, affection, and respect, by watching these characters on television. Some viewers may even go so far as to develop a symbolic relationship with the shows' characters, and view them as similar to or the same as actual relationships. According to McQuillen: "...heavy viewers of a particular soap opera may mourn the passing of a personally liked/loved character. Other viewers may correspond, via fan mail, with a host(s) of a particular talk show. Others may obsess over a character of a sitcom or weekly drama." (McQuillen, 2003)

In considering the internet as a tool for initiating, developing, and maintaining relationships, data suggests that tens of millions of emails fly across the internet on a daily basis, making it seemingly easier to communicate with one's family and friends. Chat rooms and instant messaging make it easier to communicate in real time, as well. However, according to McQuillen's research, these types of communication often lack audio and visual cues that face to face communications have present. It is often hard to read the proper tone in a textual conversation, and someone's attempt at humor may come off as insulting, or their attempts at sarcasm may be taken seriously, etc. Further, because of the lack of these cues, the message can be seen as impersonal and lack soico-emotional content. Data suggests that the rate of social information exchanged will be slower, but that the amount, over time, will not differ from face to face conversations. Accordingly, development of interpersonal effects will be slower, but the depth of the relationship will be equal to its face to face counterparts.

Those who make use of these forms of communications may judge their relationship partner on very limited information. They may not be privy to the negative traits of the other; instead, opting to judge the other as ideal. When traditional face to face cues are absent, partners may form impressions are based on limited information, such as, spelling or even excessive punctuation. These impressions are not altogether positive, or negative. In the process, of these types of communications, "selective self-perception or preferred self-presentation," each participant can "impression manage" by sharing information only believed to be favorable. The ability to conceal something negative or positive about themselves, or others is increased with technological communication modes because of the lack of nonverbal information. The receiver has very limited information given to them to determine the validity of the information they are in fact, receiving or perceiving. Because of the absence of physical being, meaning is assigned strictly by verbal behavior, which, according to scholars, is more subject to conscious editing than is nonverbal behavior. Asynchronous textual or verbal communication permits the participants time to plan and/or edit comments with more thought and consideration for the effect they may have.

Most interpersonal communication scholars agree that "interpersonal communication is a quality of communication and not solely a context." Communication between two individuals face-to-face sis more appropriate for "dyadic communication (i.e., communication between two participants)" but isn't precise enough to personify the sophisticated nature of interpersonal communication. Interpersonal communication relies upon strategies that are adapted to a person's psychological status, rather than assumptions of another communicant. The idealized nature of the information often passed in this type of communication does not lend itself to share true pictures of those communicating, or of their feelings or thoughts about that which they are communicating about. The communicants are not being seen for who they are, but for whom they want to be seen as, or who the communicant's partner wants to see them as, in some cases. When someone reveals only positive characteristics that person is not being honest with the person with whom they are communicating. There is a lesser stress level associated with responses to asynchronous exchanges because there is a time to think before responding, and reactions to that just read are not seen, as in face to face communication.

McQuillen theorizes that technology may serve as a tool to encourage, permit, and assist in the development of interpersonal relationships; however, relationships that rely solely on this method of communication will develop differently than face to face communication. Talking to someone on-line compared to talking to someone at a costume party. Technology is allowing each individual to become more and more "self"-sufficient. This increased autonomy has allowed people to become more isolated and reclusive. The need for social contact is often fulfilled by the media - especially television. Answering machines, voice mail, and computer interactions have started to replace face to face communications.

This journal article was easy to read and follow. The data presented was from the author's research on the subject from other researcher's studies. The data is somewhat "secondhand" in this way, but is still reliable, and well-cited. Some type of study, as opposed to simply data research would have been more interesting. Further, several major types of technologically assisted communications were not discussed, such as video-chatting, which would place another factor for consideration into the mix. However, with this article being written in 2003, video chatting was not very main stream, to say the least. It would be interesting to see how webcams may or may not have changed the data or the conclusions drawn from McQuillen's research. A follow-up paper on this subject would be interesting and informative.