Cyberintimacy/Cybersolitude
Hub Lecturer Sherry Turkle
2/11/2010
As the Abby Rockefeller Mauzé professor of the social studies of science and technology, as well as the founding director of the MIT Initiative on Technology and Self, Professor Turkle explores the nature of people’s experience with all kinds of technology – from computers and cell phones to digital pets and robots – and examines how these tools simultaneously “serve our human purposes” and prey upon our vulnerabilities. Speaking on February 8 as this year’s second Hub Lecturer, she acknowledged the convenience of many technologies, but focused more directly on the “discontents,” or drawbacks, “not to deny the good but to point us to our deeply held values and commitments,” she said.
Since 1995, Professor Turkle has been studying teenagers and their use of “connectivity technologies” – better known as social networking, virtual worlds, and other terms – in the attempt to understand a generation that is almost always technologically connected. “The standard narrative,” she related, “is that the Internet is a place to keep up with friends and to make new ones, but there are a few problems with this story.” Many teens, she found, enjoyed the companionship-without-demands that Facebook affords, and many preferred to text one another rather than risk talking face to face. Teenagers’ sense of privacy was different, too – something they didn’t expect to have or especially see the need for “if you have nothing to hide.”
The illusion of online friendships and the reduction of real human interaction clearly concern Professor Turkle, and her findings have raised many questions for her about the long-term effects of some technologies. What is intimacy and democracy without privacy? What about the human need for stillness and solitude? If the expectation is that everyone will respond immediately, can anyone make a well-considered decision based on thought and reflection?
Some would say that “this is the way it is – accept it,” Professor Turkle allowed. Instead, she contended, “I argue for a habit of mind that says, ‘Don’t just accept that this is the way it is, that it’s all good and it’s all progress.’” Suggesting that students take an active role and view these times as the early days of new technologies, she stressed, “You should be thinking differently about this – not ‘that’s how it is,’ but ‘these are rules that I should be making.’ An open conversation about privacy and democracy is not nostalgic; it’s part of a healthy process, and I encourage you to think about where you fit into that conversation.”
If you are interested in learning more about Professor Turkle and her research you can watch an interview with her here