In the previous post, we discussed the role
computer-mediated communication—particularly Snapchat—plays on communication in
long-distance friendships. However, using
such means of communication isn’t necessarily a bad thing, it’s just best in
moderation. Face to face communication
still trumps all other modes of keeping in contact with your friend from afar,
but it is important to recognize how technology can easily heighten a source of
conflict in this friendship.
Fall semester, freshman year, I went home nearly
every weekend. I was still establishing
relationships at college, but hadn’t found my niche quite yet. Plus, to be honest, going home was
easier. I only lived 45 minutes away, my
family always had home-cooked meals for me to eat, and my best friend—who lives
12 minutes away from my house—was living at home and going to community college
at the time. Going home was advantageous
for me; I saw my family and best friend nearly every week!
You see, I had entered college hearing rumors
that “high school friendships fade away” and that my relationship with Bertha (clearly
a pseudonym) “ would change while the two of you are at college.” I was even told that I would establish new core
friendships at school, but I was adamant that this would not change my
relationship with my best friend. I’ll
admit I was a bit naïve, but when you’re fresh out of high school at 18 years
old, nothing bad will happen to you right?
You’re in complete control… or at least that’s what I believed.
Needless to say fall semester worked out well
for Bertha and me. We saw each other
regularly and we would call each other in between classes or on our walks to
get food. But then, as spring semester came around, I started staying at school
on the weekends more often than not. It
started off slow, but eventually it got to the point where I had a solid friend
group established and I wouldn’t go home for weeks at a time. This took a toll on my friendship with Bertha. Our phone calls started to diminish, our
texts would be scattered throughout the week, we no longer held Snapchat
streaks, and I hardly saw her. In fact,
most of the updates she saw of me (and vise versa) were either on Snapchat
stories or on Instagram whenever I would post pictures of my weekend activities
or of something that I was doing that day.
Our friendship began to feel forced like we both felt as if we needed to talk about only good things
and our friendship began to feel superficial.
“How was your day?”
“Good, yours?
“Good.”
“Cool.”
That’s how our conversations went. In this relationship, using only social media
updates to “communicate” with each other was the one of the core issues
surrounding our conflict. The root cause
was the lack of breadth and depth in our conversations, but we pretended that
using such modes of computer-mediated communication was good enough. It was convenient; therefore we thought it
would work.
We were wrong.
Using social media only caused us to shove our problems under the rug because
we could still see how the other was doing—on social media platforms. It gave us a false sense of intimacy in our
friendship and we each felt like we couldn’t bring it up to the other. Time went by and things weren’t the same, but
once spring break came around we were able to talk about it and tackle it head
on.
Now, here’s the fun part… HELPFUL TIPS! First, reflecting on the previous tip from
last blog: try to communicate as often as possible face-to-face or at least
visually (using FaceTime). This
specifically eliminates potential for miscommunication in text messages (as
well as overanalyzing texts—“Did her ‘Okay.’ mean that she was mad? She never
uses periods! Maybe she’s just having a bad day?”). However, our tips for this portion of the blog
would be as follows:
- Clarify: if you didn’t know how to perceive something that your long distance friend said, texted, or posted, ask! Research suggests that clarifying any misunderstandings is substantially better than leaving them be; computer-mediated communication lacks visual and nonverbal cues, which can lead to miscommunication, which then may then lead to increased conflict.[1] Always clarify; you’ll thank us for it.
- Be vulnerable: you’re probably thinking, “whoa, I don’t know how I feel about that.” But what I’m saying is to allow yourself to be a little more open with your friend. Be vulnerable. Self-disclose a little more. Take the time out of your day every once in awhile to tell them when you’re fed up with the world or when you’re actually not okay! This increase in self-disclosure reveals a perceived desire for closeness—which is probably what you and your long distance BFF need right about now anyways—and is a great stepping-stone for relational maintenance.[2]
- Don’t pretend: your long distance friend knows you. There’s no benefit in pretending that everything is “A-okay” just because you post really cool pictures on Instagram or Snapchat. Be honest when answering your friend and let your friend know when you miss him or her. Odds are, they feel the same way.
[1] Amichai-Hamburger, Y., Kingsbury, M., & Schneider, B. H.
(2013). Friendship: An old concept with a new meaning?. Computers
in Human Behavior, 29(1), 33-39. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2012.05.025
[2] Wang, H. (2004). Self-Disclosure
In Long-Distance Friendships: A Comparison Between Face-To-Face And
Computer-Mediated Communication (Doctoral dissertation, San Diego State University). http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~hwang23/Research/JournalArticles/HuaWangMasterThesis.PDF