The Dynamics of Social Interaction and Social Practices in the Context of the Digitalisation

The article explores social interaction in conjunction with digitalisation and virtualisation and considers it as a factor of sustainable development in the context of contradictory processes of massivisation and fragmentation of the Internet environment. The theoretical understanding of classical sociological concepts of social interaction in the context of modern information society is proposed. The aim of the study is to identify the peculiarities of the dynamics of social interaction and social practices in the digital environment. The study considers the impact of factors accompanying the process of globalisation of the information environment, taking into account the persistence of social and digital inequality. The work uses a systematic approach, including secondary analysis of statistical data on Internet consumption and our own empirical research into the virtualisation of social practices among young people. As a result, the features of social interaction in the digital environment were revealed: the contradiction between the trend of global communicative connectivity (standardisation and massivisation) and the fragmentation of social ties in social networks; the increasing speed and opportunities of computerisation, virtualisation and the introduction of new technologies are accompanied by an increase in the processes of audience involvement in digital contexts and the assimilation of the digital environment as an everyday environment; the virtualisation of social practices directly affects the nature of social interaction in the digital environment; the virtualisation of social practices directly affects the nature of social interaction in the digital environment. The study may be of interest and useful for understanding the peculiarities of social management of user interactions in digital contexts.