People Today Spend Less And Less Time Interacting With Other People In Their Neighbourhood | Band 8 IELTS Essay Sample
People today spend less and less time interacting with other people in their neighborhood and this has a negative impact on communities. What are the possible causes and solutions to this problem?
Here is a band 8 IELTS essay on this topic written by one of our students. Need help with IELTS writing? Get your IELTS essays, letters and reports corrected by me.
Band 8 IELTS essay sample
The previous century witnessed a significant growth in human population. However, despite the increasing number of people, they avoid personal communications and do not know the names of the people next door. Many social and technological developments have caused this trend and, in my essay, I will cover two of them and propose possible ways to encourage neighbours to communicate with each other.
To begin with, people change their place of living more frequently than they did in the past. Today, many people, especially the young generation, tend to move from one town to another in pursuit of / in search of education or better job opportunities. As a result, they do not have enough time to build relationship with people living around. Students studying overseas are a good example of this. They spend a few years in a certain place and then return to their hometown or relocate to a bigger city where they can find a better job.
International students usually are not able to build a strong connection with locals and have a solitary lifestyle. Secondly, some prefer to avoid any personal physical contacts and spend more time on social media or on the phone chatting with friends. Unfortunately, there are more people who have over two hundred friends on Facebook and still they do not have an idea about who lives in the next apartment.
There is no single strategy that we can use to make people talk to their neighbours and only a multilevel approach can change the situation. Firstly, the government should support local community events. Small festivals attract families and young people and give them an opportunity to connect with members of the community. For instance, in Auckland, every suburb has a cultural festival where the public not only learn about different cultures and try international food but also has a chance to get acquainted to their neighbors. Secondly, locals should organize community groups which can support new arrivals, have regular meetings and activities such as art or foreign language classes. Lastly and more importantly, every individual should demonstrate a curiosity about people living around and be more friendly to neighboors. For example, we can start saying “good morning” to each person we meet on the way to our work.
In conclusion, frequent relocations of people and the high usage of the internet are real obstacles to develop contacts with people around. However, with government and community support and a personal will to interact with neighours, we can break these communication barriers and build meaningful relations with our neighours.
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Topic: People are using a lot of online language translation apps. Do the benefits of this outweigh the disadvantages?
It is estimated that there are more than five thousand spoken languages in the world. Owing to the advancements in the fields of IT, it is now possible for people to translate with the aid of applications online. The main advantage of such a crucial innovation is that it allows the world to be more global and accessible, irrespective of ethnicity or cultural background. However, such apps are often prone to errors, and thus many have called into question its efficacy.
Simply put, their biggest benefit is that these translation apps help embrace globalisation and diversity. It allows the user to remain in touch with their culture and native language, whilst simultaneously making it easier to converse and communicate with anyone globally. For instance, in many multi-national corporations, it is now possible for an employee in say India, speaking Hindi to collaborate and liaise with their team in Germany or USA.
In terms of tourism, it helps bridge any gap in communication, leaving no room for confusion for a foreigner. Thus, such apps have helped catalyse the flourishing of tourist industries. Whereas earlier travelling abroad to a foreign country seemed sheer problematic due to language barriers, today millions do it with ease. It has also allowed for easier education abroad for international students. Historically, there is also a pre-conceived notion of English being the ‘universal’ language. Since the advent of such apps, it is possible now to disregard such absurd notions that are entrenched so deeply in our society.
However, these apps must be dealt with great caution. The user must be wary as they are known to be inaccurate. Language is more complex than any application can ever fathom; a simple addition or omission of a word can entirely change the meaning. Many who are sceptical of such apps thus still tend to resort to the more archaic and rather rudimentary ways of translation, such as translation dictionaries, which seem more reliable.
In conclusion, I believe such translation apps help pave a way to a more global future. Its tremendous advantages thus far eclipse any potential drawbacks.
This seems band 7 to me.
good work