Authors:
Dominic Reedman-Flint
1
;
John Harvey
1
;
James Goulding
1
and
Gary Priestnall
2
Affiliations:
1
N/LAB, Nottingham University Business School, University of Nottingham, U.K.
;
2
School of Geography, University of Nottingham, U.K.
Keyword(s):
Social Isolation, Loneliness, Human-Computer Interaction, Digital Trace Data.
Abstract:
The harm that social isolation and loneliness can have on physical, mental, and emotional well-being is now well evidenced. With social distancing and remote working now commonplace, the dangers of loneliness are ever more acute. Consequently, information technologies have taken on renewed importance to support healthy communication and reduce the negative impacts of social isolation. However, existing literature remains highly conflicted as to the relationship between technology use and its impact on loneliness. This is perhaps understandable: measures of loneliness have traditionally been examined within clinical settings, far removed from the everyday realities of computational interactions. Yet data logged about such interactions now offers potential to help identify isolation and loneliness and support those experiencing resulting health issues. We present a scoping review of this domain, focusing on detection of loneliness and social isolation through digital data. We interroga
te a corpus of published articles from the HCI literature, identifying a series of methodological, epistemological, and ethical tensions therein, as well as emerging opportunities for future empirical study. We identify a need to examine such phenomena via actual behavioural data, rather than reliance on historical proxies such as age and gender, to help modernize our understanding of this growing social ill.
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