Social networking - or should that be anti-social?

There was an interesting article on the BBC web site yesterday in which a psychologist called Dr Aric Sigman claimed that use of social networking services like Facebook and Twitter could harm people's health because it reduces the amount of face to face interaction people have with each other. And he didn't mean it could harm their emotional or psychological health - he's claiming that real health problems could occur, such as increased rates of cancer, strokes, heart disease and dementia. When I mentioned this to Husbandio he said that I'd probably be quite happy to live on social networks all the time and never interact with people face to face ever again. I rather flippantly agreed, but in thinking it over I don't think that's entirely true.

What is true is that I love the online networking capabilities offered to me by Skype, Twitter and Facebook, which are the three services I use most. I was a pretty early adopter of online chat programs since a very good friend of mine used to live in Israel and we'd chat every few weeks using ICQ (it was cheaper than making a phone call!). When my company was acquired by a US operation a couple of years ago we all adopted Skype, since most people in the business work from home and it's a low cost way to keep in touch or to see if colleagues are available to talk. I tend to use Facebook and Twitter for social interaction with friends, and save my use of LinkedIn purely for work.

I think the reason I like these services is that I enjoy the casual nature of the conversations, and the fact that I have control over what's going on. If the phone rings, for example, it's not rude to just stop Skyping and resume a little while later. I can interact with people on my schedule, so if I'm not feeling chatty I won't Twitter, or will change my Skype status to invisible. It also forces you to think about what you want to say - whittering when you see someone in person is fine, but happens less when you actually have to type every word of your whitter. I also like the fact that I can keep up with people quickly and easily, so that when I do see them I know the gist of what's been going on and can have a conversation about things which are of most importance instead of spending ages catching up on all of their activities. Final thing, of course, is that I can update my friends and colleagues all at the same time, which saves telling multiple people the same thing.

I've been thinking about whether I spend less time face to face with people though, and I have to say that I probably do. But that's not just due to social networking, and I do enjoy seeing people face to face as well. It just doesn't happen much for several reasons - I have a small child (and therefore rarely go out in the evenings, sad but true!), my company is very geographically dispersed and we only now have two other people who are regularly in the London office (where I used to be able to see 10 people every day easily), and I'm increasingly working from home because the commute is really long. So actually, social networking came along at a great time for me, since without it I'd probably have lost touch with a lot more people than I have. In twenty years' time I'll try to do more face to face stuff again, but in the meantime my social life will, out of necessity, have to exist more online than in the real world. I'll make sure I eat lots of fruit though, to keep healthy, just in case the rather intense looking Dr Sigman is right. (BTW, anyone else think he looks like a man who is desperately in search of a media career, or is it just me?)