Some aspects of the impact of information technology on the social processes

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Размещено на http://www.Allbest.Ru/

Размещено на http://www.Allbest.Ru/

Varna university of management

Software systems and technologies

School of computer sciences

Some aspects of the impact of information technology on the social processes

Zhelyazkova P., student bachelor

Vasileva S., PhD, associate professor, lecturer

Varna, Bulgaria

Introduction

Purpose of the article is to describe some issues in the field how the information technologies influence humans, their existence and social processes. What is their role for human development? Is it a new revolution? Theory keeps arguing about heading to "informational" or "network" society, and the effect from global transformations to human civilization.

Results. Many people say that technologies have direct influence to the public relations. The newest trends in these systems, their role of the adolescents and how internet changes peoples' mentality has been researched for years. On one side we can see the negative consequence - people think that all the entertainments, access to information and technology improvement could lead to increase crisis in communication.

Another negative results of the technology, is the total loss of privacy and private space, as well as the permanent digital connection with the working place. Concerns are each and every aspect of our life will be monitored and recorded from the Government, conglomerates and even - banks.

Conclusions. As it became clear, decade after decade the technology and technological innovations are becoming more and more popular among researchers. It can be summarized that there are two main opinions, on the completely opposite ends - first one is the positive - the technology brings joy and happiness, and the other one - the negative - that technology will destroy the mankind. They are dozens of researches, thoughts, developments and expectations. We are aware of the interest of the impact of technology upon life. Researching the influential mechanism and impact of new technology upon society, culture and values, became invariable part of scientific knowledge.

As an addition of the above, it can be summarized that the past time and space oriented limits today are being overcome. Working with network communication environment is an everyday practice now.

Key words: Information technology; impact; social processes; human development; informational globalization; technical revolution.

Желязкова П.К., Василева С.Ж. Некоторые аспекты влияния информационных технологий на социальные процессы

Аннотация. В работе рассматриваются некоторые вопросы в области того как информационные технологии влияют на людей, их существование и социальные процессы. Какова их роль в развитии человечества? Является ли это революцией? Теория имеет разные аргументы об "информационном" или "сетевом" обществе, и о влиянии глобальных трансформаций на человеческой цивилизации.

Ключевые слова: Информационные технологии; влияние; социальные процессы; развитие человечества; информационная глобализация; техническая революция.

Formulation of the problem

Informational technologies (IT) affect all of the social processes in the society both globally and for each separately taken country and region. Nowadays we are talking about informational society and "global village", in which the main problems and tasks are ways for the acquisition, storage, processing and dissemination of information, and also its accumulation and systematization. Now information is resource and commodity. The result of this is the creation and development not only of new industries, new jobs, new science, but also until recently extinction of traditional occupations and industries classic.

Analysis of recent scientific research and publication

Many authors write about new problems facing humanity in connection with qualitatively new stage of development of society and human relationships. We can cite studies and publications: M. Castells [1, p. 82-83] (Manuel Castells is a sociologist, associated with research on the information society and globalization. He is on the fifth place (2000-2006) for most cited social science scholar in rank of Social Scieces Citation Index); S. Crawford [2]; A.S. Duff (In book Information Society Studies Alistair Duff said that the term "information society" is used in research of Japanese scientists for the first time, although we consider that the mass use starts after the publishing of the economist Fritz Machlup, who used it as basic term in his researches, related with creation and spreading of knowledge) [3]; M. Mcluhan [4]; And other authors, but constantly arise new problems and new research. According to many authors (such as Iliev [5]) the impact of IT is done purposefully with public and institutional support.

The purpose of the article

Until recently people talked about another computer wave, that computer is "For the intellect of man" and is "indispensable assistant" in individual and organizational practice. Its implementation, however, remained limited to a few activities, such as control device in robotic systems, as a tool for automation of managerial processes; to build specialized jobs (the head on specialist, technical and support staff). All these applications fit into the "shortcomings of the computer" - spatial, temporal and technical. Everyone had to learn to work with the technique as part of changing yourself.

Therefore we will try to explain with examples how the information technologies influence humans, how exactly they change people, their existence and social processes.

information technology network society

Presenting the main material

Nowadays many professions and communication models are impossible without the proper technical tool. There is no area that is not occupied by developments in computer technology.

The informational globalization becomes popular topic in the 20th century, when the so- called "industrial informational revolution" occurred. From a historical stand point then many technological inventions have been invented, like for example radio and TV transmissions, which are followed by the personal computers in 80s and 90s. And like any revolution, they lead to transformations, crashes, mystery, but also lead to progress.

It's a fact - the faster technologies develop, the faster their get into the different areas of human existence. As an example - the present computer technology and all related branches of science and practice. And again - it's a fact that there is no area, which has not been occupied from the newest technologies, which are mainly informational. In the last few years it's been set a theory that we live in the century of informational systems and technologies. They get into all other areas in our life. The computer has been considered to be the upgrade of humans' intellect.

Many people say that technologies have direct influence to the public relations. The newest trends in these systems, their role of the adolescents and how internet changes peoples' mentality has been researched for years. On one side we can see the negative consequence - people think that all the entertainments, access to information and technology improvement could lead to increase crisis in communication. Isn't it possible social medias to make communication everything else but social? Isn't it preferred for most people to send a message than talk to each other? It's easy to blame technology development for "killing" the ability to communicate, but what could be possible for the future? How will our children communicate in the digital era?

Another negative results of the technology, is the total loss of privacy and private space, as well as the permanent digital connection with the working place. Concerns are each and every aspect of our life will be monitored and recorded from the Government, conglomerates and even - banks. The companies will be able to gumshoe their employees, to know where exactly they are and what exactly they do. This may smother their creativity and may lead to health and social issues.

On the other side, many experts report the positive aspect of the unlimited access to knowledge and information in the World Web, where anyone can hide behind alias or fake identity and then, untroubled, to seek, comment, decide and judge without being snuggled from anyone.

But, is it a global trend, which affects everyone in the society, regardless their specific personality and individuality?

Scientific and technical achievements play a revolutionary role for human development, and like every other revolution - lead to transformations, crashes, mystery, as well as progress. Theory keeps arguing about heading to "informational" or "network" society, and the effect from global transformations to human civilization. The informational globalization becomes popular topic in the 20th century, when the so-called "industrial informational revolution" occurred. From a historical stand point then many technological inventions have been invented, like for example radio and TV transmissions, which are followed by the personal computers in 80s and 90s. Nowadays the globalization is so strong, that it creates new sociocultural environment. Experts share the common belief that the present economic, political and cultural role of information is determined not only by the content and the subject - "The enormous technical, economic, political, cultural role of information explaining exactly that the information is not meaningful ("knowledge") and it is not subject ("product"). Information is operational. The information used to substantiate / justify actions. That is why it is so necessary to modern human. Therefore, in modern society information is idol." [5]. All this is a social process, changing the relationships, characterized new type of culture, which acts in the boundaries of so-called "informational society." [3]. It is a common belief that the term comes from Fritz McCall, in his researches, related with the creating and sharing knowledge [2]. In the late 90s publications has been showed, which developed the theory we observe the "network society", which leads to new paradigm - information-technology [1]. According to Manuel Castells [1], technology now is not enough to determine the modern society, and the cultural, political and economic are being linked together to create a network structure. In his work "The Gutenberg Galaxy" (1962) [4], Marshall McLuhan describes the World as "global village", created by technology, considering the television.

"First - the technology gives enormous military advantage for those who own it. Second - modern natural sciences build a united horizon of economic manufacture opportunities.

Technological development reveals the path of unlimited wealth, and this comes along with the growing spectrum of human desires. The process guarantees bigger and bigger homogenization of all human societies regardless their historical path or cultural heritage" [7, p. XIII].

Other emblematic nationalist, Francis Fukuyama in [8], thinking of the role of democracy in developing the society, keeping his attention of the technology development and their influence upon the society. He shares that modern natural science are the only significant social action, which is both cumulative and linearly oriented. Applying the modern natural science has unify impact on all societies lived through this process for two reasons.

"According to the mechanism of universal history progress, which described in my book “End of the history and the last man”, the development of contemporary science and the following technology is one of the main powers of this process. Many aspects of the technology of 20th century, including the so-called information technology, helped for spreading of the liberal democracy. But we are not even close to the end of science..." [8, p. 8].

In the book "The technological society" [9], Jacques Ellul mentions that all the components of human life, including thoughts and feelings, are fulfilled with technological processes. According to him technology becomes a big human factor. Ellul thinks that technology development is the only revolution, which will release human from all forms of slavery, including the technical one [9].

According to Mcluhan [4], the contemporary era is the era of "New tribal man". He thinks the Planet, mainly with the help of the television, is becoming a global village, where everything is known in every part of the World.

In support of his thoughts about transformations, it may be added that they are still valid. Apparently today man is under the influence of electronic medias, expanded their potential through the internet and online communication.

As it became clear, decade after decade the technology and technological innovations are becoming more and more popular among researchers. It can be summarized that there are two main opinions, on the completely opposite ends - first one is the positive - the technology brings joy and happiness, and the other one - the negative - that technology will destroy the mankind. They are dozens of researches, thoughts, developments and expectations. We are aware of the interest of the impact of technology upon life. Researching the influential mechanism and impact of new technology upon society, culture and values became invariable part of scientific knowledge. As an addition of the above, it can be summarized that the past time and space oriented limits today are being overcome. Working with network communication environment is an everyday practice now.

Nowadays, regardless of the form, information technologies are all around us. Thanks to them, we rive computerized cars, receive instant messages, send people to Space and get them back safely. Informatics significantly changed our World through the progress in the fields of science, medicine, business and education. For a teenager, information technologies might be way of entertaining and rest, but for a programmer - way of living and career development.

Want it or not - it's in our everyday life. Although it may have some bad sides, it brings us together - with people who are far and with those who we wouldn't have been familiar with without a TV, PC and Internet. In these days of advanced technologies, we must learn to find the balance - between mechanized, comfortable life and the purpose of human existence.

References

1. Castells, M. (2004). The Network Society: A Cross-Cultural Perspective. Cheltenham, UK; Northampton, MA, Edward Elgar Pub.

2. Crawford, S. (1983). The Origin and Development of a Concept: The Information Society. In: Bull Med Libr Assoc. 1983 Oct; 71(4): 380-385.

3. Duff, A. (2000). Information society studies. Routledge Research in Information Technology and Society. Routledge Taylor & Francis Group, London and New York.

4. McLuhan, M. (1962). The Gutenberg Galaxy: The Making of Typographic Man. University of Toronto Press.

5. Iliev, P. (2015). Information Technology - Trends and Challenges.

6. Ivanov, D. (2000). The phenomenon of computerization as a sociological problem. Information Society: Phantom of the Post-Industrial Era. Problems of theoretical sociology. Issue 3. SPb.: St. Petersburg State University (In Russ.).

7. Fukuyama F. (1992). The End of History and the Last Man. The Free Press, Macmillan Inc., New York.

8. Fukuyama F. (2004). State-Building: Governance and World Order in the 21st Century. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, United States.

9. Ellul, J. (1964). The Technological Society. Vintage books, Alfred A. Knopf Inc and Random House Inc, New York, USA.

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