Isolation increases with Internet use The Internet connects us with people we might otherwise never meet-and may be leaving us lonelier than ever. By Scott Sleek Monitor staff A clergyman discovered the professional benefits of the Internet when he joined an online discussion group with colleagues in his denomination. There, he got advice on subjects for sermons and effective ways to deal with congregants. But the clergyman also noticed that he was spending less time talking with his wife, whose verbal moral support had once been just as beneficial as-perhaps even more than-the advice he received from his online peers. Psychologist Robert Kraut, PhD, of Carnegie Mellon University’s Human-Computer Interaction Institute, points to the case of the clergyman-whom he talked to as part of his research on computer use-as an example of the paradoxical role that the Internet has come to play in our lives. The technology that has allowed people to keep in closer touch with distant family members and friends, to find information quickly and to develop friendships with people from around the world, is also replacing vital day-to-day human interactions. A computer monitor can’t give you a hug or laugh at your jokes. And some psychologists worry that the Internet’s widening popularity will lead to further isolation among a population that, although gravitating toward virtual communities in cyber-space, seems to have lost a genuine sense of belonging and connection. In fact, Kraut and his colleagues, in a study to be released this month in American Psychologist, report that greater use of the Internet leads to shrinking social support and happiness, and increases in depression and loneliness. The study is the first to look specifically at the impact that Internet use has on general emotional well-being. And the findings were unexpected, Kraut says, given that most people use the Internet for chat lines and e-mail, not just to isolate themselves in mounds of electronic information. 'We were surprised to find that what is a social technology, unlike the television, has kind of antisocial consequences,' Kraut says. Learning from mistakes The Internet could change the lives of Americans as much as the telephone in the early 20th century or the television in the 1950s and 60s, Kraut contends. Numerous research and marketing firms have pegged the number of American households using the Internet at anywhere from 60 million to 70 million. People use it for everything from making plane reservations to downloading games to e-mailing relatives. And some spend many hours on multi-user domains, or MUDS, where they assume fictional identities in role-playing games (see article below). But studies are showing the social prices of online living. Psychologists have already widely publicized their findings about people who are addicted to the Internet. Kraut and his co-researchers are perhaps the first to show how the Internet affects people who log on regularly, but don’t appear to be addicted to cyberspace. They studied 169 individuals from 93 diverse households in Pittsburgh during their first two years online. They recorded each participant’s Internet use by employing custom-designed logging programs. And using self-report measures, they assessed each participant’s level of social involvement and psychological well-being before they went online, and again a year or two later. They found a direct correlation between participants’ level of Internet use and their reports of social activity and happiness. As their use of the Internet increased, the participants reported a decrease in the amount of social support they felt and in the number of social activities they were involved in. They also reported being more depressed and lonely. Psychologist Viktor Brenner, PhD, of Marquette University, has also found some troubling effects of Internet use. In a study reported last year in Psychological Reports (Vol. 80, No. 3, p. 879-882), Brenner posted an Internet usage survey as a World Wide Web page. (The web page is no longer active.) Most of the 563 valid responses came from males who averaged 34 years of age, completed 15 years of education and used the Internet about 19 hours a week. Most reported instances of Internet use interfering with other aspects of their lives, including taking up time that they would have used for other activities. A few reported serious consequences from their time spent online, such as getting in trouble with an employer or becoming socially isolated from people other than Internet friends. A poor substitute Psychologists have yet to pinpoint the reasons Internet use can hamper psychological well being, but they have plenty of theories. Many users, caught in the allure of connecting with a global array of people with similar interests, seem to be substituting weak online friendships for their stronger real-life relationships, says Sara Kiesler, PhD, one of Kraut’s colleagues in the Carnegie Mellon study. In their research, Kraut, Kiesler and their peers found several examples of people who developed seemingly valuable friendships online: • A woman exchanged mittens with a stranger she met on a knitting listserv. • A woman met a couple in Canada, whom she later visited during her summer vacation. • A teen-ager met his prom date online. But national survey data show only 22 percent of people who had been using the Internet for two or more years had ever made a new friend on the Internet, the researchers note. And those friendships tend to be of low quality. 'You don’t have to deal with unpleasantness, because if you don’t like somebody’s behavior, you can just log off,' says Kiesler. 'In real life, relationships aren’t always easy. Yet dealing with some of those hard parts is good for us. It helps us keep connected with people. 'Also, the kinds of people you meet online don’t really know you,' she adds. 'If you need surgery, or you have something wrong in your family, they’re not around-they’re not there for you.' Avoiding the same mistakes Like many technologies, the Internet has lulled people with its novelty and convenience, which will create a sense of dependency and some troubling social consequences, says Allen Kanner, PhD, a Berkeley, Calif., psychologist who teaches ecopsychology and other courses at the Wright Institute and other graduate schools throughout the Bay Area. Kanner said he’s glad somebody is looking at the Internet’s impact, noting that behaviorists produced minimal data on the social effects of the television, the phone or the car until those technologies were heavily embedded into our lives. 'The car allowed people to travel far greater distances,' he notes, 'but it also created suburbs and highways all over the place. So the positive advantages also caused huge social changes, such as traffic jams, pollution and people moving further away from each other. 'We’re so excited about the advantages [of technology] that we quickly dismiss what actually is happening,' Kanner adds. 'As psychologists, we could ask some very good questions about what’s the difference between talking on the phone and talking face to face. We’ve assumed there is none.' But others warn against overemphasizing the negative aspects of technology. Like any technology, the World Wide Web can lead to good or bad behaviors, says John Grohol, PsyD, creator of Mental Health Net (www.cmhc.com/), a massive index of mental health-related web sites, online mailing lists and newsgroups. And he believes it provides some vital societal benefits, such as the large number of online self-help groups that exist today. Those are especially important in small communities that aren’t large enough to sustain a support group, he adds. 'If you lived out in rural Montana or Kansas, you’d have a hard time finding a panic disorder support group,' he says. 'This allows those people to get connected, to share advice.' Another example of the Internet’s social utility is a public electronic network (PEN) set up in Santa Monica, Calif., to facilitate grassroots organizing. The system, set up in 1989 in public buildings, allowed scores of residents-including homeless citizens-to access the network. Some users formed an action group to identify local issues that needed attention and to develop civic projects. One of the group’s biggest accomplishments was developing a service center for job-seeking homeless people. Psychologist Michele Andrisin Wittig, PhD, of California State University, Northridge, and Joseph Schmitz, of the University of Tulsa’s faculty of communication, surveyed participants in the network and reported their findings in the Journal of Social Issues (Vol. 52, No. 1, p. 53-69). 'Our respondents told us that PEN helped foster links among diverse others,' they write. 'They reported enhanced capability to interact with others who differ in socioeconomic status and power. Thus, they formed more diverse social networks that centered on common interests, but transcended economic or geographical bounds.' The right balance Many psychologists say behavioral research should demonstrate ways to find a healthy balance between time spent online and time spent talking with family and friends in person. In fact, people could integrate their online and in-person lives by, say, calling or getting together with friends they’ve met online, suggests John Suler, PhD, who studies online behavior as a psychology professor at Rider University in Lawrenceville, N.J. Kraut says he’s trying to incorporate that balance in his own community. He’s proposing that his local school and synagogue create electronic communication forums for students so they can use to discuss homework assignments, make plans for social gatherings or even receive online tutoring. Kraut has also limited the amount of time his teen-age son spends online. But he’s also seeing the ways the Internet can enhance family connections. 'Every member of our family spends time online,' he says. 'And when we are, we can’t be doing things with each other. But we also keep up with our son in college. Even though he’s distant, when he needed to know how to cook something, we could give the directions electronically.' 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