Going the Distance for Love Without Leaving Your room

            Love can be so much more than an emotion.  It can be a choice.  Love can be one choice you can make everyday among your many decisions throughout life.  You choose to love people.  You choose the people you invest your time in, and you choose the people you share your life with.  What if the person you choose to love or get to know does not live in the same area as you.  Maybe you met on a business trip, a weekend out of town, or maybe they were just passing through, but you felt an interest, a connection, chemistry.  Not knowing if they feel the same way you go crazy thinking about the person because the only thing they really left you with was their name.  

            This story might end sadly if we were born a century ago, but thanks to the 21^st century and the business of life, technology has made a way for us to connect with people around the world.  Maintaining a relationship is hard work if you want to continue the relationship in a positive way.  Imagine how hard it be would be to get to know someone in a different state and try to become romantically involved.  What would a relationship be like if you had to wait in anticipation to receive a letter in the mail.  Technology has made a way where you can get a fast response from someone through email of a text message.  Now technology is not only limited to fast e-mails or text messaging, but now we have access to video chats like Skype that was created in 2003 and Facetime that was currently created in 2010.  According to research done by Tonkin (2010) in her article “Getting Hyper-personal,” she goes through the limitations of maintaining a healthy relationship online and the main difference between online relationships and face to face relationships.  The challenging thing about maintaining a relationship online is the non-linguistic cues are missing, but Tonkin goes on to explain in her article that having non-linguistic cues missing are not necessarily a bad thing.  “People who have relationships online must simply be more creative and add elements of fantasy and play to the messages being sent’’.  Online you only have the perception of what someone wrote down and they begin to form an idealized version of themselves.  All throughout her article she refers to the lack of face to face interaction being ok for initiating a relationship, but can eventually cause problems when wanting to have a more intimate relationship. Technology has made a way for that face-to-face interaction making it possible to read peoples nonverbal cues while communicating with them.  Now you can connect face to face with someone who lives in a different state or half way around the world without even leaving your room. 

Computer Mediated Communication (CMC) has made a way through video camera focused websites and live streaming to connect with people.  CMC is simply explained by any type on communication you do online to connect with people.  Skype and Facetime are examples of wonderful ways to connect with people and staying connected, however, it still does not replace the feelings you would have if your loved one was physical in the room.  There is no hug, no touch, or form of a warm embrace, only a sweet face staring at you through a glass screen.  I will go through three steps using the social penetration theory to prove how technology can be an aid to getting to know someone on an intimate level.  I found an interesting statistic in Stephnie Tom Tong’s work focused on technology tools aiding intimate relationships.  She found that couples in long distance relationships and who use CMC to stay in touch with their partner reported greater degrees of love and intimacy than those who were in long distance relationships without CMC.  Studies have shown that couples that use CMC have greater communication in their relationships.

            The social penetration theory shows how interpersonal communication moves from non-intimate outer levels to more intimate deeper levels while developing a relationship.  It can be easily explained using the Onion Analogy determining the breadth and depth of the relationship and each other’s personalities. Personality is like a multi-layered onion with public self on the outer layer and private self at the core. As time passes and intimacy grows, the layers of one's personality begin to unfold to reveal the core of the person. When communication penetrates the inner core of the onion, the degree of intimacy or the depth increases when the individual shares more about their life.

            The first stage of the social penetration theory is the Orientation stage where a person engages in small talk with another individual to see if they even want to move on with a relationship.  The second stage of social penetration theory is the exploratory affective stage where the individuals start to reveal a little about themselves like expressing their personal attitudes and modern everyday topics.  What does this have to do with Computer communication?  Well Facebook is good way to start these first two stages.  You can engage in small talk by adding a new friend and sending a short message with your request.  If the person accepts your friend request you can begin to view their profile to find common interest to talk about.  Facebook is like most social media websites.  You only put what you want others to perceive about yourself online like events and pictures about your life to let friends and others know what is going on in your life.  However, more communication must be involved other then just small talk to get the ending result of being in a romantic relationship. 

            The third stage of social penetration theory is the Affective stage were a couple begins to talk about personal and private matters, and maybe even give some criticism to their partner.  Once a relationship has reached this stage Facebook and social media sites might not be the best things to communicate clearly on what the other person means especially when giving criticism to their partner.  Miscommunication is more likely to occur not being able to hear one’s tone of voice.  It also occurs when one cannot view the other’s facial expression when giving criticism. Now technology has come out with a live video feed where you can communicate with people face to face online at no cost.  This is where relationships can become intimate where you become more real to the other person on the other side of the screen.  They can actually see their friend of loved one making communication easy for when a couple is far apart or not with each other. 

            Video webcams has changed the way we communicate and allow us to connect with more people on a deeper level around the world.  Facetime and Skype has been around since 2010 and more and more people are buying into it.  Skype is a free website you can get on any computer.  Facetime is free for anyone who owns an updated Apple product starting with the Ipad 2 allowing you to connect with other Apple users through the IPhone, IPad, and the IPod Touch.  Skype is the more accessible product for none Apple users and you can video call people as long as they have e-mail and a webcam.  These products allow couples to move into the forth stage of the social penetration theory, called the stable stage.  This stage makes the couple more comfortable to express deep and personal thoughts with one another and discover similar values and beliefs allowing the person to almost predict the emotional reactions of the other person.  This stage is where any couple hopes to stay with their partner to have a stable relationship where both partners benefit from one another.  This can be the deepest expression of intimacy that can be expressed with words and allows people to really get to know each other through technology.  Video websites allow people to expand their options when it comes to who they choose to love no matter where they’re from or where their going.  However, like all relationships in will take effort from both partners to make time to communicate on a daily of weekly basis to keep the other person updated with their life. 

            So back to my scenario from the beginning of the blog, when the person was left with a name all they have to do through technology is type in their name on a social media site like Facebook and pray that the person their looking up is updated with the 21^st century.  From there you can send a request and engage in small talk.  If you see that you have common interest in one another you can now take a chance and have a Skype of Facetime date is see if the two of you can really hit it off.  So many wonderful things can come from engaging in these sites and it can set a firm foundation on getting to know someone or maintain a long distance relationship. 

             Source

Tonkin, S. (2010). Getting Hyper- personal. Global Media Journal: Australian Edition; Vol 4, Issue 1, p 1-9, 9p.  

Tong, S. and Walther J. Computer- Mediated Communication in Personal Relationships. Peter Lang. Relational Maintenance and CMC. Ch. 6, p 100-102.