Zack Larmer research paper intro

Research Proposal Final Draft 1: The Modern Relationship and Social Media

The topic of this paper is essentially the ideas of “love”, or “an intense feeling of deep affection” and the ways in which modern technology - specifically social media, or “websites and applications that enable users to create and share content or to participate in social networking” - can affect the ways in which we give and receive it through the “relationships” (primarily “serious intimate relationships” or relationships involving physical or emotional intimacy which have been ongoing for several years) which social media affects. This topic will cover the common held beliefs about “love” and will describe it as something  much simpler than the “butterflies in your chest, warm feeling” that people often think of “love” as by looking at the idea of “love” and the reasons why we form certain bonds with certain people from a scientific standpoint, focusing primarily on biology and psychology. My paper will also expand on social media and the ways in which it can impact our idea of “love” and whom we give it to.  Essentially, my essay will probe the question, how has social media redefined our understanding of love and relationships (again, primarily in regards to “serious intimate relationships), with one another and the ways - both positive and negative - in which it can affect existing relationships between us? A secondary question which my paper may focus on is how does social media affect the ways in which we sexually identify ourselves? That part may be added later on depending on the amount of data I’m able to find regarding my primary and that secondary topic.

            The biggest controversy here is the idea of “love” in itself. “Love” is often romanticized and made exclusive to one or two “special people” in your life, but looking at the idea of “love” from a scientific standpoint, one which focuses specifically on the psychological and biological processes that create this feeling, I will take a side that refutes these common held beliefs regarding “love” and discuss how the very thing we think we make exclusive to one or two people in our lives is actually something which we display to almost everyone we regularly interact with, including those we interact with through social media. This leads to the hypothesis of how this very uncontrollable, unpredictable, yet very prevalent emotion can not only allow us to form relationships with others which can become intimate and last several years (hence, becoming “serious intimate relationships”), but can also damage the relationships we already have established and that social media can be a contributor to either of those ideas.

The way in which I will address these ideas is first by understanding the biological processes that control the emotion in question and psychological aspects regarding the emotion shown in children, and the means through which they contribute to our making of relationships. The essay, “Love 2.0: How Our Supreme Emotion Affects Everything We Feel, Think, Do, and Become” by Barbara Fredrickson discusses these biological processes by examining three main contributors to this emotion - oxytocin, your vaus nerve (both of which will be described later in the essay), and the human brain.  “Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other” by Sherry Turkle discusses the psychological effects of digital programs and machines designed to act life-like on humans, specifically children, by analyzing the way in which children interact with different toys and what they deem as “living” or “nonliving”. This will be used to describe how a desire for affirmation can be overwhelming to some who will look anywhere to find that sense of safety and social media parallels this idea of finding affirmation in nonliving bots and has implications for the future of relationships. I will additionally refer to outside sources such as the Health Hormone Network, Nature, statistics presented by the Pew Research Center regarding online dating and social media, sources to be determined which contradict my own ideas for a sense of contrast within the essay, as well as other sources yet to be determined, all of which will ultimately support my own ideas.