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Tiffany Pham
Mrs. Crichton
AP English Language and Composition
08 April 2014
Technology Alienates Social Interaction
Eleven years ago, a girl and her best friend met..Throughout elementary school and even
through high school, the two were inseparablestudying, playing, and going shopping together.
But their friendship experienced an unfortunate hurdle when she had to move. Years later, with
innovations impressing the older generations, people find themselves being introduced to the
social network, Facebook. Through this, the two were able to reconnect and catch up on their
crazy lives through social networking. This only shows how technology is a tool to connect
people closer together, and be beneficial to our social skills as people.
While Facebook has attained an infamous reputation for its addictiveness, it is capable
of reunite people in unimaginable ways. With that said, it is one of the few creations that has
radiated this effect. In general, Facebook has become a boon for talking to (or in some cases,
stalking) your friends, playing games, or revealing to the world anything, or everything, you
like on planet earth and beyond.. Technology has advanced so far that we can see our relatives
across great distances right on our phones. So how could any right-minded person think that
technology is destroying social skills, and argue for the destruction of social media? Those kind
of people clearly feel that society would be better off sending paper notes between each other,
and spending hours to travel to another city, just to speak with their relatives. People must see
that resorting to a time where light bulbs were being invented is not a proper way for a human to
live in when we have technology to help us stay in contact.

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A couple weeks ago the news reported that the game, Flappy Bird, was the most
downloaded game in the App Store, and that teenagers have spent their days glued to their phone
trying to beat their high score as well as their friends high scores. This game led to millions of
frustrated users, who aggressively competed to be the top player. This is a perfect example of
how technology is beneficial to humans because the game is teaching kids how to be
competitive, and working out there thumb muscles as they press the screen repeatedly. Without
technology like this, kids cannot learn how to be competitive. If kids cannot learn to be
competitive, they will have a decrease in ambition. If kids have a decrease in ambition, they will
no longer work hard in school, and most likely drop out. The increase in high school dropout
rates will decrease employment because of uneducated workforce, and would eventually harm
the economy. Thanks to the games technology benefits us with, society never has to worry about
children losing their competitive edge.
At the same time, there are those who assert otherwise believing technology is instead
drawing people together. Text messaging, video calling and instant messaging have also been
contributing factors of increased contact among peoples across the world. Further innovations
including ideas to target simplified and improved group communication through the Internet
have been designed to connect people regardless of location or distance (European
Commission).. These professional statisticians believe technology to be beneficial to our society,
so therefore it must be true, and any argument against them is futile.
Technology has become an important aspect to the way of life in society. Without technology,
we would be stuck in a world deprived of contact with the world, and lose our ability to interact
with a large amount of people. Games that teach kids how to compete, without resorting to
outside activity, would not exist. Our society would transform into land hermits who know
nothing of each other, and sadly be alone besides a select few. The advances in technology have
ensured that such a world will not exist and that people will always be able to connect with one
another.

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Works Cited
Bindley, Katherine. When Children Text All Day, What Happens To Their Social Skills? The
Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 12 Oct. 2011. Web. 24 Nov. 2012.
Haltom, Cynthia. Affects of technology on social skills of kids examiner.com. Clarity Digital
Group LLC, 30 May 2012. Web. 24 Nov. 2012.
Hi-tech brings families together BBC News. BBC, 20 Oct. 2008. Web. 24 Nov. 2012.
How technology can bring people together European Commission. European Union, 1 Oct.
2009. Web. 24 Nov. 2012.
Jayson, Sharon. Technology can push our crazy buttons, rewire brains USA TODAY. Gannet
Company Inc., 26 Mar. 2012. Web. 24 Nov. 2012.
Jones, Tracy Overuse of technology may cause an unintended disconnect from your kids
jacksonville.com. Jacksonville.com, 18 Sept. 2010. Web. 24 Nov. 2012.