The Effect of Internet Usage on Interpersonal Relationships: A Case Study

The Internet has become the fastest growing electronic technology in world history. The rapid evolution of any technology naturally raises questions about both its potential benefits and possible negative consequences. One of the main issues of concern is the effect Internet is having on interpersonal relationships. This paper investigates the influence of the Internet on social connections among Internet users in Iran. The results show that the Internet has not decreased users´ social contacts. Principal components analysis and the k- means clustering technique are applied to unearth the common patterns that exist in the dataset. Our findings show that gender is one of the main factors in distinguishing among users based on the type of their social contacts.