Connect to disconnect: What an online community for digital disconnection can tell us about digital well-being

IF 4.3 1区文学 Q1 COMMUNICATION

New Media & Society Pub Date : 2025-08-12 DOI:10.1177/14614448251362436

Douglas A Parry, Calvin Kuit, Ané Murray, Albert van der Westhuizen

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Digital media profoundly shape modern life, offering benefits while also prompting concerns that lead many to seek disconnection. This study investigates r/NoSurf , a large online community paradoxically dedicated to digital disconnection. Through computational and qualitative analysis of discussions from over 26,000 active members, we study users’ complex and often ambivalent relationships with technology and their pursuit of digital well-being. The findings show that people see digital technology as both an escape and a source of distress. Motivated by desires to mitigate perceived negative impacts like distraction and diminished well-being, and faced with the difficulty of full withdrawal, members actively develop and share a sophisticated repertoire of strategies to manage their digital technology use. This research characterizes digital disconnection not as mere avoidance, but as a dynamic, skillful, and individually negotiated practice, or literacy, aimed at fostering well-being and intentionality in the face of pervasive connectivity.

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连接断开：一个断开数字连接的在线社区可以告诉我们关于数字健康的什么

数字媒体深刻地塑造了现代生活，在带来好处的同时，也引发了担忧，导致许多人寻求脱离现实。这项研究调查了r/NoSurf，这是一个大型在线社区，矛盾的是，它致力于数字断开。通过对26,000多名活跃会员的讨论进行计算和定性分析，我们研究了用户与技术之间复杂且往往矛盾的关系，以及他们对数字幸福的追求。调查结果表明，人们将数字技术视为一种逃避和痛苦的来源。出于减轻注意力分散和幸福感下降等感知到的负面影响的愿望，以及面对完全退出的困难，成员们积极制定并分享了一套复杂的策略来管理他们对数字技术的使用。这项研究认为，数字脱节不仅仅是一种逃避，而是一种动态的、熟练的、个人协商的实践，或素养，旨在培养面对无处不在的连接时的幸福感和意向性。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

New Media & Society COMMUNICATION-

CiteScore

12.70

自引率

8.00%

发文量

274

期刊介绍： New Media & Society engages in critical discussions of the key issues arising from the scale and speed of new media development, drawing on a wide range of disciplinary perspectives and on both theoretical and empirical research. The journal includes contributions on: -the individual and the social, the cultural and the political dimensions of new media -the global and local dimensions of the relationship between media and social change -contemporary as well as historical developments -the implications and impacts of, as well as the determinants and obstacles to, media change the relationship between theory, policy and practice.