ABSTRACT
Over and above the disproportionate amount of time individuals of all ages now spend online relative to direct personal and social contact, there is a growing concern about the diminution and possible loss of the reading culture that has nourished the critical and imaginative minds vital to modern democracies in an interconnected world of different cultures and mindsets. In its place, personal and immediate access to multiple sources of information all at the same time has led to a drastic shortening of attention spans and the addictive use of social media and search engines as severe as any such behaviours associated with online gaming. Turkle is nevertheless quick to stress that, for the most part people have all been willing participants in what on the surface at least was both presented and broadly accepted as a liberating development. Narcissism itself, Susan Greenfield concedes, is a complex phenomenon covering a range of characteristics, from exhibitionism to feelings of superiority and self-sufficiency.
