Social Impact of Communication Technology

Social Impact of Communication Technology institutionNew colloquy technologies have bend a phenomenon of the mod age. It is employ by millions of people worldwide, and signifi dissolvetly influences their way of living and communicating with bingle a nonher. Rogers (1986) be several societal impacts which have emerged through extensive tradition of juvenile communication technologies. cultivation overload and knowl advance cracking ar examined in this paper as two possible hearty impacts of new communication technology mentioned by Rogers. Practical examples ar reviewed, assessing whether reading is equally distributed among all complaisant groups and how knowledge usage has evolved in modern society.1.0 Information OverloadMost people are unable to frameively govern the core of instruction to which they are constantly exposed. Overloading of our memory fag end be compared to an overflowing glass filled with water. If water keeps flowing continuously into a f ull glass everything above the glass ribbon overflows. . Our training preoccupation is limited, and our brain can only handle a received amount of entering culture. Nowadays, people are flooded with discipline which is coming from heterogeneous sources, and is very difficult to mark off value-add tuition from knowledge noise. As potty Naisbitt in his book Megatrends saidWe are drowning in reading and esurient for knowledge (Naisbitt,1982, p.24). On the other hand, it is good to have so a lot study at our finger tips, while information is unattached more(prenominal)(prenominal) easily than any- eon before.There is very little we cant find verboten within seconds with search engines running on our communication gadgets.Among the many researches documenting information overload, is the most noticeable is research by Reuters agency called Dying for information published by CNI in 1998. The research indicated that people cannot cope with the strength of information w hich they receive every-day. They spend substantial time searching for information, requisite for decision pickings, and information collection distracts them from master(prenominal) responsibilities. whizz disturbing effect is the increase in the level of stress which is linked to enormous amounts of information received. Thus, the finding showed how information overload influences our mental health and social spiritedness.In a second research conducted by University of London, published in 22.4. 2005 by BBC News, that the relation mingled with communication technology and mental sharpness was observed. Distractions from incoming email or phone calls caused up to a 10-point fall in IQ. One can notice that information overload can claver both direct cost linked to cost of information livelihood and indirect cost imposed trough, impact on health or social life.1.1 The blurring of lines mingled with entertainment and information overloadDonald O. Case in book Looking for Infor mation describes difference between informative information and entertaining information (Case, 2007, p. 108). Separating the search of informative information from entertaining information in everyday life is often almost impossible. People day by day receive increasing number of information from news, blogs, tabloids social network- perspective posts and they often cannot differentiate which information is useful and they need to understand versus information which might not be completely accu mark. Does the excessive flow of information necessarily organise to more thinking? Or does it cause the society to think less(prenominal)? There are some writers who believe that too much information can lead to the increase in the level of noise or confusion in understanding the meaning to the message. One of the most raise elements of this noise was caused by development of Internet which gave rise to virtual communities, or virtual cultures. Kovov (2011, p.251) refers to creation of own fantasy world where the individual (subject) can manipulate and recreate his identity according to his or her own imagination. The main aim of this virtual world is to bring into the online world the best edition of oneself, with a new identity.One disturbing impact of virtual identities can be seen in the way how people view relations. In lacquer the growth of virtual world games caused rise of Otaku culture. In BBC, 24.10 2013 has been published an hold about men who prefer virtual girlfriends to sex. Most of those people also decided to change their identity for abetter one. Nowadays, people have surface areal problem to cope with all the information around them and they do not understand difference between reality and fantasy. It seems that quantity of information drop dead more of the essence(p) than the quality.Therefore, one can observe that from all of these examples, it is arrestn for granted(predicate) that information overload brings alot of disadvantages whic h affect us. Our environment is fast-changing and so is the way how we receive, deal out and use information. Amount of information determines the usage and phylogenesis of communication technology.2.0 THE familiarity GAP HYPOTESIS companionship as other kinds of wealth is not distributed equally throughout our society. People who are struggling with financial impoverishment are also often information poor, with limited admission price to newest communication technology. Knowledge gap theory is based on the premise that while the take of mass media increases, the knowledge gap between different social groups widens. One reason is the ability of opposing social groups to respond to changes that are taking place in the society and adapt within a certain time interval. In the first hypothesis about knowledge gap found in the study of Tichenor, Donohue Olien (1970,p.159), the authors wrote As the infusion of mass media information into a social system increases, segments of the po pulation with higher socioeconomic status tend to acquire this information at a faster rate than the lower status segments, so that the gap in knowledge between these segments tends to increase rather than decrease. The author also points out that in criterion the knowledge gap, one should factor in people with access to more information only, and not people who have very little access to new information, as this could incorrectly skew the results. People with low socioeconomic status would most likely have lower access to information. A key indicator of socioeconomic status is study. At the same time, education is also an important factor that influences interest in obtaining information.2.1 DIGITAL selectIn the new era of globalization, communication technology plays an increasingly important role. Number of people is connecting to the Internet to conduct their daily activities and they are bonny more and more dependent on technology. The access to information has become syno nym of access to communication technology. Inability in access to communication technology can result in information inequality. Very often the theory of a digital gap (digital divide) is quoted, which expands the previous concepts of knowledge-gap hypothesis, information poverty and knowledge. Simply the digital divide can be defined as the gap between those who have the possibility of access to modern information and communication technologies and benefit from them and to those who do not have this privilege. Multiple publications examined the phenomenon of digital divide from different angles. Norris (2001) in his work makes a clear greenback of three different aspects of understanding the digital divide. First of all, he defined first aspect as global divide between countries. This delegacy inequality in access to information communication technologies andinternet between certain and developing countries. As a second aspect Norris described social inequality within one nation or state (social stratification within counties), where the inequality is between information poor and information rich. stand firm aspect of digital divide highlights the democratic gap which refers to the difference between those that use digital technology to participation in public life and those who through these technologies do not engage publicly.As an illustration, in Slovakia since 2005, research is being conducted by the Institute for Public Affairs Slovakia, in the area of communication technologies usage in Slovakian households, under the name digital Literacy in Slovakia 2013. The research shows that people with higher education degree are more active users of communication technology than people with lower education degree. Low educated, low-skilled, low-income households and residents of small communities belong to the part of population which stood at the edge of the digital divide (IT News, 2013). It is apparent that the lack of information access is not only an issue of developing countries of the third world but electrostatic a hot topic among developed countries too. The task of a modern society today is to ensure equal access to information and to take appropriate measures ensuring that access to information is available to all.ConclusionThis paper examined the social impacts caused by the implementation and usage of new communication technology in our day-to-day life. Differences were examined between the inequality of those who benefit from technology and those who do not. Although social networks and communication gadgets have become a part of our culture, for the first time in our history, an unintended consequence is that information overload has led to an information crisis. Practical examples examined different angles of social impacts of communication technology and information evolution in modern society. Society as a whole may need to take steps to assure that access to information is available to all, while defining clear r ules and practices to effectively manage and process information inflow.