MARK BENNETT: Fear of flu may have Americans tech-talking more than ever

By Mark Bennett

TERRE HAUTE — Walkie-talkies were the iPhones of the 1960s. A kid with a walkie-talkie was a virtual Elroy Jetson.

When some lucky buddy landed a couple, we’d transfer all communications to the walkie-talkies, even if we were merely stationed on opposite ends of the garage, just a few feet apart. Technology fascinates humans. Today, two teenage girls will sit in the back seat of an SUV, texting each other without exchanging a word, aside from the occasional giggle.

Our preference for techno-communicado could reach epic extremes this winter.

Already, Americans have spent an astounding portion of 2009 online, on cellphones and on Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites. From April 2008 to April 2009, the total minutes spent on Facebook mushroomed to 13.9 billion from 1.7 billion — a 700-percent increase, according to a Nielsen survey. Last winter, the average American teenager sent and received 80 text messages a day, more than double that of the year before, also according to Nielsen.

Those wireless hookups don’t necessarily translate into fewer face-to-face encounters. Sometimes, the texts, cell calls, Facebook posts, e-mails and Tweets lead to more personal interaction, said Lee Rainey, director of the Pew Research Center’s Internet and American Life Project in Washington, D.C. Still, the technology has the potential to make old-school conversation less necessary.

Now, with the H1N1 flu spreading, Americans may fully retreat to the remote safety of their laptops and cellphones.

Tech-talking could increase even more. In-person chats may require more caution, fewer handshakes and a pocket-sized bottle of hand sanitizer. Just like two kids, within eyeshot of each other, babbling on walkie-talkies, people may simply wave when an acquaintance walks into the same coffeeshop instead of greeting them hand-to-hand.

“It’s a big possibility,” said Tyrone Williams, a 22-year-old Indiana State University student.

Late for a class, Williams — a junior majoring in technology management — checked the time on his G1 cellphone Thursday morning. He coughed once, considerately into his jacket-covered elbow, just as flu-conscious health officials suggest.

The heightened awareness about H1N1 means cellphone calls, texts and e-mails could increase. It’s also less likely that people will allow a friend to type on their laptop, even for a moment, in a WiFi restaurant. “You don’t see people sharing [devices] a lot,” Williams said.

Sharing keyboards and phones is risky behavior, said Megan Bland, health educator for the Vigo County Health Department.

“It’s probably not a good idea at this time,” she said. “You don’t know if somebody is infected, and they may not know.”

She suggests waving instead of handshaking. Being less chummy in public this winter “would be a smart thing,” Bland said.

Avoiding unnecessary contact makes sense for health and economic reasons, said Shaniequa Lollis, a 20-year-old ISU junior. “A lot of college kids have jobs and kids, and they [should] do whatever they can to not get [H1N1],” she said.

Her friend, 21-year-old ISU senior Tifinie Garrett, said, “People might stay to themselves more, with, I guess, less face-to-face contact.”

Tech talk would be nothing new for their generation. The largest age-bracket of Facebook users, for example, is the 19.4 million 18- to 25-year-olds, according to the network’s statistics. But the 35- to 65-year-old group has grown rapidly this year, too.

Thanks to the H1N1 threat, the number of Internet users could indeed skyrocket, according to a study released last week by the U.S. General Accounting Office. If the flu reaches a pandemic, the jump in telecommunications and online use could overload local networks, the GAO report stated. The agency warned bogged-down networks could hamper the government’s ability to respond to the public in an emergency.

An even greater increase in online activities has social implications, too. Some are positive, and some aren’t.

Social networks could become a prime place for users to share information and experiences about the H1N1 virus, predicted Rainey, of the Pew Center. “My guess is, this winter, there will be a lot of commotion” through e-mails, instant messages, Facebook postings and Twitter Tweets about the flu, he said.

And, the debate about whether tech reliance fosters less personal interaction will be refueled. “There’s going to be more discussion of this than there probably has been for a while,” Rainey said Wednesday by telephone from Washington. Pew research has shown that frequent tech users “are not virtual hermits,” he added. “They’re very much social animals, and technology helps them do that.

“People who are the heaviest technology users are the most likely to have face-to-face encounters,” Rainey said.

A flood of even more users, cloistered temporarily by the flu, could experience the upside or the downside of cyber communications.

One virtue is that Facebooking, texting, IMs and e-mails allow parents, grandparents and relatives to stay in touch with loved ones overseas or kids in college, said Tara Williams, executive director of Family Service Association Counseling and Behavioral Health in Terre Haute. But those communication methods also can delude users, or complicate their lives, she added.

A long Internet relationship may seem more real than it is, Williams explained. People also can control a conversation with a slow response to texts or e-mails. They think out answers more carefully than they do while talking, and “thus present yourself in a more favorable light,” she said. Also, Williams has seen existing relationships and marriages destroyed after online conversations with outsiders turn sexual. The bottom line, in her view, “is motive — why are you electing to text or e-mail or Tweet or whatever? Is it for the good of a relationship, or for your own comfort level of ease?”

With those cautions to users about increased tech communications this winter, Williams remains concerned about the trend.

“The dearth of ‘old-fashioned’ socializing worries me a bit, because we all seem to be more isolated as it is,” she said. “I think isolation ultimately erodes our society, because it’s hard to get away with crap when you’re face to face with a person.”

That’s one symptom the H1N1 vaccine won’t address.

Mark Bennett can be reached at (812) 231-4377 or mark.bennett@tribstar.com.