The Impacts of Digital Media on Empathy

Understanding Empathy

What is empathy? It explores the talent to consider and assess another’s feelings and behavior, to have an intellect of understanding the individuality, to recognize and predict another’s thoughts and emotions. It has certain types like self-empathy, cognitive empathy, affective empathy, imaginative empathy, and empathic concern. When digital media is involved in empathy, a new term “Digital Empathy” arises. My goal in this paper is to study the impacts of digital media on empathy, evaluate the results, and consider certain sources.

The Structure of the Paper

To achieve my objective, I have divided my paper into two parts initially. In the first part, the introduction of the problem and comparing the sources, and the second part consists of the thesis. Today, in the computerized age, online networking is a gigantic piece of our regular daily existences. There are numerous instances where individuals are utilizing their skills via online life. However, there are some in which web-based social networking has played a critical part in demolishing one's professional and personal life as well. This trend is dangerous, and it is viewed as public disgrace. The individual thoughts and attitudes of the general public expressed in digital media might be different from those expressed in real-time. While there are situations where individuals show remarkable acts of kindness, more often than not, individuals in online media tend to be snider.

The Anonymity Factor

Obscurity in digital life grants individuals to have another identity, which liberates them to express hostility and criticism, i.e., trolls. Because of this reason, people involved in internet-based life can dodge the reaction of online talks. The absence of face-to-face contact allows individuals to avoid any sort of non-verbal communication. Empathy in the digital age is becoming a popular topic nowadays, and there are increasingly insightful and non-academic articles dedicated to the theme. In a New York Times article written by Sherry Turkle (2015), the same exact problem was reviewed with facts and figures. Mobile phones are now the most common medium involved in digital life. The young generation uses them when they want to be both with their friends and, as some put it, “elsewhere,” causing a lack of empathy due to the lack of face-to-face connection. According to the Pew Research Center (2014), about 82 percent of adults felt that the way they used their phones in social settings hurt the conversation. Conversations solve problems; when you are not giving attention to another person’s feelings, you directly or indirectly hurt sentiments, and that is the lack of empathy Turkle reviewed in the article.

Confirmation Bias in Digital Life

The limitations made by digital life include affirmation tendencies. Confirmation bias indicates that the individual is just presenting himself to his own particular thoughts repeated in recursive echo chambers of increasingly radical and exclusionary thought. In this way, we can understand and empathize with people who agree with us, but when it comes to people who disagree or the "out-group," we find ourselves unable to sympathize, being very ready to disparage. The hostile attention is the troll post creating havoc in many people’s lives. Turkle (2015) suggested that even a silent phone disconnects us from each other, and we fail to become aware of another person’s posture and tone due to the lack of personal touch, which is decreasing empathy and diminishing intimacy. When people see something unpleasant via social media, they are quick to label the person, who they likely don't know if a racist, a sexist, or a biased person.

The Ethical Implications

The ethical prevalence that they feel over this "other" makes it easier to go on the attack. After all, the individual on the opposite side of the computer is only this screen name with the one quality that they have deemed them to have. Not seeing the entire person and the good parts of them creates a failure to relate to their goals, their mistakes, or their humanity. Turkle (2015) well pointed out that these are psychologically potent devices that change not just what we do but who we are.

Digital Media and Human Relationships

In another article, “When Your Smartphone Is Too Smart for Your Own Good: How Social Media Alters Human Relationships” written by Wagner (2015), it is stated that human beings are social animals who cannot live alone; they are in need of constant communication. Human beings are neurologically attuned to be social creatures. Digital media cannot be solely blamed for the lack of attention in the modern age; in fact, in some cases, it is bringing us together, i.e., the update statuses rather than meet for coffee. This does not mean that human beings are less social; it means that people are getting to know the daily activities of others and getting the attention they require.

The Paradox of Digital Connection

Studies show that people are becoming more social nowadays than ever before, but Wagner (2015) and Turkle (2015) intersect on one point: the lack of personal connection is the downside of digital media life. For example, in a wife-husband relationship, if the digital medium is involved, it will eradicate the involvement of intimacy. The role of five senses in a relationship is declining; for example, the wife could not hear the pain and humiliation beneath the anger in her voice over Facebook chat. However, Wagner is not that worried about the havoc created by digital social mediums, as he quotes Dreikurs (2015) that perfection in relationships is unattainable, and so it is better to have honesty, to have courage, to risk imperfection than to live a lie.

Conclusion

Digital media is responsible for the lack of empathy. It has created more gaps than bridges. Yes, it has many advantages, but when it comes to direct connection, it has minimized the roles of human senses, which are responsible for building empathy.

References

• Turkle, S. (2015). "Stop Googling. Let’s Talk." The New York Times.
• Wagner, K. (2015). "When Your Smartphone Is Too Smart for Your Own Good: How Social Media Alters Human Relationships." Social Media Today.
• Pew Research Center. (2014). "Mobile Technology Fact Sheet."
• Dreikurs, R. (2015). Quoted in Wagner, K. "When Your Smartphone Is Too Smart for Your Own Good: How Social Media Alters Human Relationships."