Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other

This book is interesting (and moving and melancholy at times), and an insightful journey through social robotics and people obsessed with the internet.For the generalist reader, this deserves five stars. It gives a nice 'tour' of the issues and tells it like it is in a narrative, engaging way. Well written, but several typos in the central chapters; these didn't impede the meaning but do show poor copyediting.As an academic text, this only deserves two or three stars. Although the author is a trained psychologist, the psychological work in this seems very thin at best, and utterly unsubstantiated at worst. In other words, the author makes claims about the mental states of case study participants - particularly the children - which are not supported by references to any studies, theories, evidence etc. This gives the impression of "armchair psychology" - jumping to stereotypical conclusions that any untrained pleb could have made. E.g. that kids whose parents work long hours are neglected and desperate for attention, and suchlike. These inferences may well be true in the cases outlined, but without references to actual *studies* or at least psychological theories, explanations of methodology, how and why conclusions were reached (etc), the book is of little use to the academic reader.But as I said, it's an accessible and enjoyable read for the generalist audience. I would have just liked more endnotes, or a couple of methodological chapters which would be useful to the academic reader.