[Air-l] Americans and social isolation

[Mark Bell]

interesting study....sort of. I doubt it even mentions online social
relationships or concurrent online/rl relationships. It almost sounds to me
to be from some pro-nuclear family agenda (he golden days in the 50's hen we
had the Murphy's over to play cards and we actually talked). For instanced
how many of you would i be contacting in the 80's? I feel more connected
than ever to people. But then I'm a nerd =)

Anyone have a copy of the real study?

On 6/23/06, Richard Forno <rforno at infowarrior.org> wrote:
>
> It would be interesting to see how this fits into the whole "being alone
> together" argument within a technology context....for example, someone who
> doesn't want to be around people but who socializes happily in a MMORPG
> environment or spends hours upon hours on AIM or IRC.
>
> Interesting ponderage for a Friday afternoon....
>
> -rick
> Infowarrior.org
>
>
> Social Isolation Growing in U.S., Study Says
> The Number of People Who Say They Have No One to Confide In Has Risen
>
> By Shankar Vedantam
> Washington Post Staff Writer
> Friday, June 23, 2006; A03
>
> Americans are far more socially isolated today than they were two decades
> ago, and a sharply growing number of people say they have no one in whom
> they can confide, according to a comprehensive new evaluation of the
> decline
> of social ties in the United States.
>
> A quarter of Americans say they have no one with whom they can discuss
> personal troubles, more than double the number who were similarly isolated
> in 1985. Overall, the number of people Americans have in their closest
> circle of confidants has dropped from around three to about two.
>
> The comprehensive new study paints a sobering picture of an increasingly
> fragmented America, where intimate social ties -- once seen as an integral
> part of daily life and associated with a host of psychological and civic
> benefits -- are shrinking or nonexistent. In bad times, far more people
> appear to suffer alone.
>
>
> < - >
>
>
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/22/AR2006062201
> 763_pf.html
>
>
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-- 
Mark Bell
http://www.storygeek.com
"The future is here...it's just not widely distributed." - Tim O'Reilly