Band 6+: Nowadays more and more people are using smartphones and computers to communicate, so they are losing the ability to communicate with each other face to face. To what extent do you agree or disagree with the statement?

The smartphones and computers have become more and more popular communication tools among modern people, therefore, they tend to lose their ability to communicate with others face to face. I completely agree with notion, and the reasons are twofold.

To commence with, the widespread use of smartphones and computers cost people much time on online communication, while reducing the spending time on face-to-face contact. Thus, people tend to become less good at expressing themselves, and their ability to communicate in real-world conversations will degenerate. For example, one may end up being too shy to have conversations with others if he has not been talking to anyone in the real world for a long time. Additionally, the long-term use of electric communication tools makes people accustomed to it, and eliminates the habits of face-to-face talking as they used to.

The communication on phones and computers is so convenient that many individuals have heavy reliance on them and are not willing to meet their colleagues or friends by face to face. For example, if someone encounters a problem in work, he is more likely to send an instant message on his phone to ask the other person questions, rather than taking a longer time to approach the other one by feet or even by car. In this way, people don’t want to make much efforts in communicating with others in a face-to-face manner. In addition, we are able to choose whether reply to others when we are having a chat, in comparison with face-to-face chats, that we can only give our replies immediately. This flexibility provides the catalyst for people to choose electric communication tools instead of real-world talking. As a result, people’s refusal attitudes towards face-to-face conversations further weaken their ability to do so.

Overall speaking, when people spend more time on phones and computers, and find some outstanding benefits that are unique to them, their ability of communication by face to face deteriorates, regardless the objective or subjective reasons that mentioned above.