Let’s get hyperpersonal

Why social media can be more rewarding than face to face

There’s a moment from the Emmy’s when Nicole Kidman turns her back on her husband to kiss her co-star.

R. Eric Thomas captured the sentiment in a meme that anyone who has spent time on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram could relate to:

So why do we seek validation from digital strangers we’ve never met when we have real relationships around us?

This isn’t a new phenomenon, even if it’s grown with social media. The reward that we feel when we get validated by likes, hearts, comments and claps can be explained with a theory called the hyperpersonal model of communication.

To understand the concept of hyperpersonal communication, it helps to first understand what we mean by personal and impersonal communication.

In the early days of the internet, it was assumed that communication via computer was by nature impersonal. Early users of computers and the Internet were constrained by the limits of their text-based technology, which was contrasted with the rich meaning of body language, voice and facial cues of face to face communication.