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Absent Friends? Smartphones, Mediated Presence, and the Recoupling of Online Social Contact in Everyday Life

Author

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  • Eva Thulin
  • Bertil Vilhelmson
  • Tim Schwanen

Abstract

This article contributes to the geographical understanding of how mobile online presence enabled by smartphones transforms human spatial practices; that is, people’s everyday routines and experiences in time and space. Contrasting a mainstream discourse concentrating on the autonomy and flexibility of ubiquitous (anywhere, anytime) use of social media, we examine new and mounting constraints on user agency. Building on time-geographic theory, we advance novel insights into the virtualities of young people’s social lives and how they are materialized in the physical world. Critically, we rework the classical time-geographic conceptions of bundling, constraints, rhythms, and pockets of local order; draw on the emerging literature on smartphone usage; and use illustrative examples from interviews with young people. We suggest a set of general and profound changes in everyday life and sociality due to pervasive and perpetual mediated presence of friends: (1) the emergence of new coupling constraints and the recoupling of social interaction; (2) the changing rhythms of social interaction due to mediated bundles of sociality becoming more frequent and insistent; (3) the shifting nature of the streaming background of online contacts, which are becoming more active, intervening in, and intruding on ongoing foreground activities of everyday life; and (4) the reordering of foreground activity as well as colocated and mediated presences, centering on processes of interweaving, congestion and ambivalence, and colocated absence. Key Words: intervening background, local and mediated pockets of order, online copresence, rhythm, spatial practice.

Suggested Citation

  • Eva Thulin & Bertil Vilhelmson & Tim Schwanen, 2020. "Absent Friends? Smartphones, Mediated Presence, and the Recoupling of Online Social Contact in Everyday Life," Annals of the American Association of Geographers, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 110(1), pages 166-183, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:raagxx:v:110:y:2020:i:1:p:166-183
    DOI: 10.1080/24694452.2019.1629868
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Chunjiang Li & Eva Thulin & Yanwei Chai, 2023. "Changes in Everyday Internet Use and Home Activity During and After Pandemic‐Related Lockdowns: A Case Study in Shuangjing Subdistrict, Beijing," Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie, Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG, vol. 114(2), pages 117-132, April.
    2. Belinda Mahlknecht & Richard Kempert & Tabea Bork-Hüffer, 2022. "Graduating during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Digital Media Practices and Learning Spaces among Pupils Taking Their School-Leaving Exams," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(14), pages 1-19, July.
    3. Tandon, Anushree & Dhir, Amandeep & Talwar, Shalini & Kaur, Puneet & Mäntymäki, Matti, 2022. "Social media induced fear of missing out (FoMO) and phubbing: Behavioural, relational and psychological outcomes," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 174(C).
    4. Katja Kaufmann & Christoph Straganz & Tabea Bork-Hüffer, 2020. "City-Life No More? Young Adults’ Disrupted Urban Experiences and Their Digital Mediation under Covid-19," Urban Planning, Cogitatio Press, vol. 5(4), pages 324-334.
    5. Yookyung Eoh & Eunsik Lee & Soo Hyun Park, 2022. "The Relationship between Children’s School Adaptation, Academic Achievement, Happiness, and Problematic Smartphone Usage: A Multiple Informant Moderated Mediating Model," Applied Research in Quality of Life, Springer;International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies, vol. 17(6), pages 3579-3593, December.

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