Tech Take Over

The take off for technology has increased significantly in the past two decades. In the last year alone, we have come up with thousands of new innovations on the modern cellphone alone. From touch screen iPhones to mind reading Samsung Galaxies, we have changed the way we talk to others. And as much as that seems like a great advancement in science and technology, it has begun to eliminate the humanity of communicating.

Why should I, a person who has social anxiety, talk to someone in person when I can shoot him or her an email or send a quick text? Because I didn’t have social anxiety when I was younger and lacked a cellphone and a computer. But because now I do have both, I use them ever so often to communicate, making it harder for me to talk to people in person or even via phone call. The increase usage of technology has created social anxiety amongst many people whom did not have it before.

Social anxiety is basically the discomfort and insecure feeling one gets when communicating with others.

Many of my friends who were once social butterflies have become anxious turtles in the face of others. Some can’t even call and order a pizza without having a nervous breakdown, but when it comes to ordering one online, they can do it without hesitation and in less than five minutes.

Older people who didn’t have cellphones and Internet don’t understand why teenagers feel like they can’t interact with people without cellphones and Internet; truth is, we don’t know how to anymore. We’re so reliant on our technology that without it, we feel helpless and overwhelmed, thus the increase in social anxiety, especially amongst females in their early teens to late twenties.

At the age of 17, a female teenager is learning new things about life and already trying to figure her self out. She is already flooded with insecurities about her appearance, that the addition of a social insecurity causes more emotional turmoil than ever before. She is ultimately feeling like she is judged when she speaks to others all the time that the only way she feels like she can is through the use of a cellphone, so it can eliminate the physical insecurity and leave only one to worry about and handle. But she wouldn’t have had to have that social insecurity if it weren’t for the cellphone taking away her daily face-to-face communication.

Basically, if cellphones hadn’t taken over her, or any other teenagers’ life, they’d be able to feel comfortable with themselves when talking to others, limiting newly developed social anxiety amongst their age group. I know I’d have less fear of social interaction that way. I’ve tried to fight my anxiety by talking to people in person more, or at least through a phone/Skype call. It won’t go away completely because I am still reliant on my cellphone, but that’s because the rest of the world is too.