The term “Ghosting,” derived from the English word “ghost,” was added to the Treccani dictionary’s list of neologisms in 2024. The definition reads as follows: “Suddenly and without explanation, cutting off all contact with a person, making oneself untraceable.” Digital anthropology and psychology, within their respective fields of scientific inquiry, have described this phenomenon, which has become increasingly widespread in the age of online relationships and causes a painful sense of abandonment in those who experience it. Digital anthropology studies and seeks to understand the impact of information technologies on the human beings who use them. “One of the aims of anthropology, as Gaetano Piccolo S.J. states, is to foster self-understanding in human beings, that is, to activate a process of awareness of the existential and cultural dynamics in which they find themselves living.”
In the 1990s, researchers Daniel Miller and Don Slater launched a study to examine the use and influence of the Internet on the inhabitants of the island of Trinidad. Their pioneering studies in digital anthropology contributed to defining the Internet not only as a source of information and knowledge but as a space where individuals develop and experience existing relational dynamics; the people of Trinidad used the web to communicate with distant loved ones, or forged new ones by creating unpredictable forms of connection and new community formations. These findings led to moving beyond the “digital/virtual” and “material/real” dichotomy to highlight the mutual influence of the two spheres. The “real” informs the “digital,” and the “digital” causes the “real” to evolve in new ways. The rapid and pervasive development of digital technologies has profoundly changed culture, the economy, human identity, and interpersonal relationships. For this reason, an increasingly deep understanding of how humans use technologies across various socio-cultural contexts is essential for analyzing the changes occurring in individuals’ mindsets and inner lives. Social networks and social media have become spaces of belonging, social recognition, professional interaction, communication, and the sharing of passions and feelings.
The various actions taken online have a significant impact and entail a specific personal responsibility. An analysis of ghosting must take into account the human need to feel part of a community, to establish lasting relationships, and to feel important to the person with whom one feels connected through friendship, love, or family ties. Communication is an integral part of the relationship and determines its evolution and maintenance. In any relationship, beyond actions, words can build or destroy; they can bring happiness and be the caress that makes one feel good, or cause pain and be the punch in the face that wounds and plunges one into despair and resentment. Online, it is easier to end a relationship; the other person is not physically present, and the screen shields the “ghoster.”
Psychologists have defined a possible psychological profile of those who practice ghosting. It may be that the ghoster considers a relationship insignificant or unimportant from the start and feels they can end it whenever and however they want; or they may fear confrontation with the other person, suffering from the discomfort of conflict or the end of a relationship; ghosting serves as a strategy to avoid or limit the overload of messages. It can also reveal a manipulative and narcissistic personality trait, incapable of empathy and genuine emotional involvement. However, ghosting, even in its milder forms (Caspering: the person explains something before disappearing, or Breadcrumbing: giving small signals or messages that lead the other person to believe they are in a relationship when in reality they do not consider themselves connected in the slightest), is always a serious lack of respect for the other person, a form of “emotional abuse.” The person who experiences ghosting develops trauma linked to the lack of explanation and abandonment; they feel anger, guilt, lowered self-esteem, anxiety, mental rumination of negative thoughts that block the mind (overthinking), and even physical pain. The first step to getting out of such a painful situation is accepting the other person’s decision; the awareness that relationships can end; the decision to work through the pain, to name the emotions—even the negative ones—and above all, not to feel guilty, while seeking a way to rebuild one’s shattered inner self. Cultivating, even online, generative and fruitful interpersonal relationships.
“From the morning onward
Since we are in conversation
And can listen to one another
Great insight has man had; soon, however, we shall be song."
(Friedrich Hölderlin)