• by Erik Sass , Staff Writer @eriksass1, October 13, 2010

I'm not an uncritical supporter of social media, and I certainly don't drink the social media Kool-Aid, as some commentators have uncharitably alleged. I know social media has its problems and drawbacks, and I am troubled by some of its effects on people and society. But I must disagree with the growing chorus of criticism blaming social media "addiction" for all kinds of woes, including the further disintegration of the American family, because this confuses cause and effect, symptom and disease. Facebook isn't killing the American family -- Americans are.

One recent article quoted Michael Gilbert, a senior fellow at the Annenberg Center for the Digital Future at the University of Southern California, sounding the alarm about the growing amount of time spent on social media. Gilbert told the Vancouver Sun that social media usage by teens and adults takes away from family bonding time, with the average amount of time spent on family face-to-face interactions dropping from 26 hours per week in 2006 to 17 hours today, adding: "This is definitely a growing national problem, without a doubt."

But this kind of criticism blames social media for basic family dynamics which existed in our modern society long before the advent of social media. The long-term trend has been one of increased atomization and growing emotional distance between family members, due to a confluence of a number of factors. And this loosening of familial bonds was already evident in previous decades in the increasing amount of time spent consuming other media -- specifically, TV.

The weakening of family cohesion is partly the result of increased time spent outside the home by both parents and children. According to Harvard economist Juliet B. Schor, the amount of time the average American adult spent working increased by about nine hours per year from 1970-1990. Over the last decade the average workday for U.S. adults with full-time jobs increased from 8.22 hours in 2003 to 8.44 hours in 2008, according to the American Time Use Survey from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Part of the increase in time spent working is due to longer commutes: the average U.S. commute increased from 22.4 minutes in 1990 to 25.1 minutes in 2009, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Meanwhile, a study by the economist Victor Fuchs estimated that from 1960-1986, the time parents had available to spend with children fell ten hours a week for whites and twelve hours a week for African-Americans. After a modest reversal in the 1990s, the amount of time spent taking care of other household members (in households with children ages 6-17) tumbled from an average 82 minutes per day in 2003 to 54 minutes in 2008, according to the ATUS.

At the same time, increasing standards of living and changing cultural norms have brought about changes in the shape of the typical household. From 1960-2000, the number of bedrooms per U.S. household increased from 1.61 to 2.01, according to the Census Bureau, while the number of children per household declined from 2.38 to 1.87; as a result, the average number of bedrooms per child increased from .68 to 1.07 -- meaning most kids now have their own rooms. Not coincidentally, in recent years parents have shown growing concern about recognizing children as autonomous individuals, including allowing their children greater privacy.

The combination of longer adult work days, less time available for childcare, and increased autonomy for children has resulted in parents spending less time with children. The gaps in family interaction have been filled, in part, by TV: according to Nielsen, the average time TVs were on in American households increased from 4.6 hours per day in 1950, to 5.9 hours in 1970, 6.6 hours in 1980, 7.1 hours in 1990, 7.6 hours in 2000, and 8.2 hours in 2009. This dwarfs the average amount of time Facebook members spend on the site -- just seven hours per month, according to Nielsen.

Some suggest that TV watching can be a communal familial behavior, but interactions and conversation are inevitably muted by TV's relentless sight, sound, and motion. The slightly desperate attempt to portray communal TV watching as "family time" is yet another symptom of alienation and emotional distance between parents and children.

Communal TV watching is a substitute for real interactions which impinges on other family activities like dinnertime. In any event, paralleling the increase in the number of rooms in American homes and the rising respect for children's privacy, the number of TV sets owned by U.S. households has increased from 2.0 in 1990 to 2.43 in 2000 and 2.86 in 2009, according to Nielsen; 54% of U.S. households had three or more TV sets last year. Tellingly, a 2009 survey by USC Annenberg's Center for the Digital Future found that 44% of respondents said they were ignored by family members who spent too much time online -- while 48% said they were ignored because of TV.

In short, children and adults have come to inhabit increasingly separate personal worlds. And while it may be true that the advent of social media has allowed family members to spend even more time away from each other in these disconnected personal worlds, this is merely the latest step in a process that has been going on for decades.