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     In today’s modern society, everything is set in motion by technology. The food people eat, the television they watch, it can even affect people’s relationships. While technology helps make people’s lives easier, it only weakens people’s intimate relationship resulting in unhappiness. Some ways it affects people’s relationships are social networks, texting and just all the time being spent using technology. All these things only distract people from the things that really matter in a relationship which are intimacy.
     Dating sites, interest based communities and other social networks such as Facebook are growing increasingly popular everyday. The reason behind this are people are social creatures to begin with, they like to socialize with others whenever given the chance. This doesn’t mean it improves relationships as studies even show it harms relationships. The article Relationships on Facebook, Social Networks by Rick Nauert he talks about interest based communities such as Last.fm stating” You don’t do a variety of activities together. You tend to be kind of specialized in what topics you talk about.” He means that people who socialize in interest based communities usually only talk in what the community is based on. They would barely ever go out of that area and do other activities that aren’t based in the community which in turn limiting the level in which the relationship can go. Another growing issue would be the social network Facebook as its number grows daily as do the problems that grow with it. One major problem would be for intimate relationships as it is shown to reinforce jealously. In the article Facebook Reinforces Relationship Jealously by John M Grohol he states “Researchers discovered that people who are more prone to jealously will find Facebook just reinforces that jealously.” This happens because those who get jealous will only get more jealous when seeing their partner comment on someone of the opposite sex, or even add their old boyfriends or girlfriends. They could even get jealous from having others starting a conversation with their partner or the information that is on their partner’s page. These increasing social networks problems will continue to grow until people learn to rely less on them.
     What are people doing most of the time? Texting. People are texting everywhere from their homes all the way to school everyday. While it keeps them in contact with people which most would look at as a good thing. In reality it is actually limiting face to face communication which weakens relationships intimacy. In the article Text messaging affects student relationships by Theresa Kasallis says “As cell phones go mainstream, more people are relying on text messages to get their word across.” This would be ideal for those who are shy but will only weaken their relationships as they will lack social skills when met face to face. This problem will only continue to grow as people are relying on technology more than they have to which will weaken their social skills needed to be in a strong relationship.
     Technology in general is weakening relationships as it takes time from people that could of used it to spend times with their partners. In the article Is Technology Short-Circuiting Your Relationship? By Suzanne Phillips she states “ When technology disrupts the reality shared with one’s partner it can undermine the very benefits it affords.” This means that when technology takes the time that is supposed to be spent with one’s partner it can be more damaging than beneficial. For example checking email or text messages while on a date with a loved one would be considered using their time. Phillips also says “As we have become increasingly efficient at researching and finding information, we
have become increasingly impatient with human exchange and process.” By this she means while people have become so good at using the internet for finding information they have depended less on spending time with people for it. The reason this is bad for relationship is because being intimacy is important in a relationship. For example laughing at the right or wrong movie names with a special someone is a moment to be remembered but would be lost if they would just search the name over the internet. Technology as a whole takes time that could be spent socializing with people in person which in turn weakens intimacy in relationships.
     Technology in most cases weakens relationships as time is being used on technology rather than with people. People texting all the time which takes away their social skills needed when face to face with others weakens relationships as social skills are an important part of relationships. Also social networks, interest based communities which limits the number of topics one can talk about and reinforces jealously only makes relationships even more unhappy. Technology as a whole mostly distracts people from things in life that matter resulting in being less happy in relationships.