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Why Americans Suddenly Stopped Hanging Out

theatlantic.com

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Re: Why Americans Suddenly Stopped Hanging Out

#51

Post by jprete »

Dalewyn wrote: post #42
jprete wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

26 minutes a day is not by any means a rounding error.

There are 1,440 minutes or 24 hours in a day. Let's be realistic and generous and consider 16 "useful" hours by assuming 8 hours of sleep, that's 960 minutes. 26 / 960 = 0.027, or approximately 3%; 26 minutes is 3% of one's "useful" day. There is also no standard duration defined for "hanging out", it could be just a few minutes at the water cooler, hours at a restaurant, or days or even weeks on a vacation trip. 3%…

Neither realistic nor generous; you haven't accounted for working, commuting, personal hygeine, cleaning the house, laundry, grocery shopping, errands, etc. etc.

I think if I absolutely ignored the need for rest I could get in 32 hours of social time a week, and in my actual life it's around 12-14 hours, so three hours a week is a huge difference.

Re: Why Americans Suddenly Stopped Hanging Out

#53

Post by alexpotato »

One change I've seen between my parents generation and my generation:

In my parents generation, stay at home moms would primarily socialize during the day. Working dads would, in turn, socialize after work with co-workers or male friends who, generally, also worked in New York City.

In my generation, the stay at home moms socialize a lot more in the evenings and it's expected that the working dad be around to do the evening kid time. Babysitters are an option but it seems frowned upon if they are used too often.

This could also be a factor of having small children as friends who have older children seem to go out much more often given that the kids (usually 13+) can take care of themselves.

Re: Why Americans Suddenly Stopped Hanging Out

#54

Post by chuckledog »

ryandrake wrote: post #10
newsclues wrote: post #2

Hanging out with people glued to phones is boring

You nailed it. I've kind of stopped having get-togethers at my house (either for friends or family) because people show up, do a brief normal-human greeting interaction, and inevitably eventually sit down and just kind of zombie out scrolling their phones. Despite efforts to strike up conversation, play a board game or whatever, people just can't put the fucking things down for even 5 minutes, let alone enough time t…

We (the tech community) have spent 10+ years “growth hacking” entire populations, scaling up the web backends and personal devices capable of connecting that relentless growth into “users’ attention”. All that attention has to come from somewhere. There are only so many hours in a day; more virtual = less RL, human attention is a zero sum game.

Re: Why Americans Suddenly Stopped Hanging Out

#55

Post by maerF0x0 »

whoomp12341 wrote: post #9

the restaurant prices got too high

Even as early as 2015 I was often shocked how few people entertained or wanted to do potlucks. I soon learned why, at least in my circles the lack of effort was mind blowing. Most people balked at the idea of chipping in to buy food, and so when I'd try a potluck everyone would aim at bringing something fully prepared like "Chips and Salsa" (and like 5 people would bring that).

I finally gave up trying to entertain folks, I'd rather go out and eat a good meal and only pay for myself rather than be the only one spending $100s on parties... It saddens me because I had a time in my life where I did have a good circle that was reasonably reciprocal. I guess it's just a gone thing?

Re: Why Americans Suddenly Stopped Hanging Out

#56

Post by jackcosgrove »

iJohnDoe wrote: post #30
whoomp12341 wrote: post #9

the restaurant prices got too high

Also, after the 2008 crash, food doesn’t taste as good at certain places. Chain restaurants that used to be really tasty, started using cheaper ingredients (theory) and just don’t taste as good as they used to and it’s more expensive.

Blandflation?

Re: Why Americans Suddenly Stopped Hanging Out

#57

Post by Dalewyn »

jprete wrote: post #51
Dalewyn wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are 1,440 minutes or 24 hours in a day. Let's be realistic and generous and consider 16 "useful" hours by assuming 8 hours of sleep, that's 960 minutes. 26 / 960 = 0.027, or approximately 3%; 26 minutes is 3% of one's "useful" day. There is also no standard duration defined for "hanging out", it could be just a few minutes at the water cooler, hours at a restaurant, or days or even weeks on a vacation trip. 3%…

Neither realistic nor generous; you haven't accounted for working, commuting, personal hygeine, cleaning the house, laundry, grocery shopping, errands, etc. etc. I think if I absolutely ignored the need for rest I could get in 32 hours of social time a week, and in my actual life it's around 12-14 hours, so three hours a week is a huge difference.

Aside from work and personal hygiene, why are you implying hanging out is mutually exclusive with those activities?

Inviting friends to go shopping or do errands with you is a common way of socializing, among others. Commuting is also an opportunity to socialize if you take public transport or carpool and a friend or co-worker catches the same one as you.

Socializing is tangent to a lot of activities.

Re: Why Americans Suddenly Stopped Hanging Out

#59

Post by smcin »

madboston wrote: post #4

https://archive.is/39Wfh

Here's another version: https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/news/the-decline-of-hanging-... showing the graphs: "% of teens who say they go out with friends 2+ a week" which are essentially static throughout 1976-2010, then dive 20% over 2010-2020 after social media and front-facing cameras became common (and all before Covid).

To the commenter below, the article is not "some Atlantic journalist's opinions", it's citing research by Jean Twenge, who is cited Jonathan Haidt [0] for her research on the correlation in socialization changes and heavy social-media use, esp since 2016. [https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...]

[0]: "Teen mental health is plummeting and social media is a major contributing cause" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31268222

Re: Why Americans Suddenly Stopped Hanging Out

#60

Post by infotainment »

This feels like the "be careful what you wish for" consequence of WFH logic.

Yes, you can never leave your house and do everything via Zoom! After all, why commute to a pointless office when you could be at home meeting people online? If you start thinking this way, suddenly most interactions that can be done from home start to seem like a waste of time.

The question I always ask WFH advocates is this: when was the last time you had a meaningful in-person interaction with someone outside of your household? Most of the time, they can't even remember.

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