My concerns are for the younger generation. I feel as if kids are going to struggle with communicating in many aspects, especially face-to-face. Whatever happened to playing outside with our friends until dark and hustling home because you knew you were past your curfew? Or what about those times where we would be able to sit and have a conversation with someone for over an hour without any distractions. These times are long gone due to one thing. Technology. More specifically, social media. We find ourselves constantly checking our phones wondering what everyone else is doing instead of living in the moment. Even if we don’t think so, we are constantly comparing ourselves to others based on their social media statuses. We are seeing signs of depression, anxiety, and mental health issues all relating back to this one thing.

Face-to-face communication is important to society for many different reasons. Talking to someone in person, whether it be in a casual setting or a professional one, is a basic skill we all need to be able to get through everyday life.

In the article “Getting Closer Being Apart: Living in The Age of Information and Communication Technologies,” Irshad Hussain, Ozlem Cakir, Burhanettin Ozdemir and Shaheen Ashraf Tahirkhel state that “the conventional face-to-face communication and interactions seemingly are being replaced by the use of social media and cell phones-conversations, texting, instant messaging and emailing. Seemingly, the real life-communication is becoming second chance and lesser among people and they are being apart even living together. People seem to be connected technologically but in fact they are [being] isolated physically.”

With the evidence showing that this is not only a problem for the current generation, but others to come.

This problem is here to stay, and something needs to be done to try and combat the issue. Teenagers around the age of sixteen are always on social media. Snapchat in recent years has been arguably the most popular form of all these social media sites. In spring of 2015 only 11 percent of teens were using Snapchat. In the most recent data from 2017 shows that 47 percent of teens were using snapchat as their main form of communication.

Going along with the idea of needing to reduce the amount of time social media is used. That could be something that is big for helping not only risk factors, but face-to-face communication.

If the younger generation was to reduce their screen time, it could help them gain more of those face to face communication skills that are so important. The younger generation should be allowed to challenge themselves. Take that social media vacation or limit the amount of time spent on each app per day, and once that’s accomplished, take even more time off that original set goal. This will add so much more potential and opportunity for this generation to get out there and talk to people every day, about real-life issues and topics.

I hope people really look at this issue, because it is a big one. Realize that the generation after us is the future and it is up to us to set the example now.