Welcome to the second installment of our series on demystifying Personalized Attention in an increasingly individualistic world. If you missed the first part, catch up here before diving into part two.

The terms person and individual are often mistakenly thought to be synonymous. However, they are not. These concepts are close yet antagonistic cousins, engaged in a philosophical and cultural battle that dates back to the enlightenment, a period when personhood began to lose ground to individualism.

Evidence of this shift can be found using Google’s Ngram Viewer, a powerful tool that tracks word usage trends across time. If one compares the use of person versus individual from the Enlightenment era (1800) onwards, it becomes evident that “personhood” experiences a sharp decline while “individualism” rises, overtaking it in the 1870s.

Since then, personhood has struggled to regain its place in our literature, and when a word exists less and less in our books and vocabulary, it exists less and less in our day-to-day reality.

Google Ngram Viewer comparing the use of the word Individual and Person from the 1800s to present.

“Numbers don’t lie,” as the saying goes. But beyond the stark figures on the graph above, a brief look at modern society reveals the transformation of persons into individuals. Today, the Individual reigns: an autonomous, self-centered, and self-sufficient approach to life becomes one’s strongest identity. The effect of this is to replace the relational essence of personhood with the isolated self-focus of individualism.

Historically, personhood was linked to relationality in its essence, as its etymology reveals. The Latin term per-sonare means “to sound through,” referring to the theatrical masks worn by actors in ancient Greek and Roman theater. These masks (known as prosopon in Greek), were designed not only to amplify the actor’s voice so it could “sound through” to the audience but would also vividly distinguish characters, ensuring each had a clear identity, visible even from the amphitheater’s farthest seats.

The deeper significance lay in the interplay between actor and audience: the persona only made sense in relation to others, to an audience. Once again, “I am, because YOU are.”

The per-sona It was relational by nature; a way to address and be recognized by another. When relationality is removed, the person turns inward, becoming an audience unto themselves; self-referential and isolated. It is thus not surprising the rising cases of loneliness and self-awareness today.

The consequences of this shift are abundant and concerning. As an educator, my interactions with the youth highlights a growing trend: self-absorbed individuals immersed in the “selfie culture,” endlessly curating and admiring their own images. Many struggle to form or sustain meaningful relationships.

They even lack the tools to end relationships respectfully, as evidenced by a 2020 Washington Post article reporting that 30% of relationships now end with one partner “ghosting” the other. Rather than meet them, face-to-face and have a serious conversation about why things can’t work out, they simply choose to walk away in the same self-absorbed silence.

A related issue is the growing fear of asking questions. In an age where access to information through one’s mobile phone is instant, admitting ignorance is seen as a gross deviation from the idealised paradigm of self-sufficiency. Asking a question inherently involves reaching out to another person for help in understanding some aspect of reality, even if it is as trivial (or not so) as where the washrooms are.

But in a world that prizes self-sufficiency and autonomy, this simple act of relational dependence is abhorred. Ironically, technology that was intended to connect ends up fueling isolation through an illusion of self-reliance, even for happiness… (It is sad and shocking to see the rise of AI “girlfriends” in a 2024 Forbes article).

Undoubtedly, reversing this tide is impossible; powerful, self-absorbing technologies are here to stay. Yet, the human task of recovering personhood is urgent. We must explore ways to repurpose the very tools that deepen individualism, to instead promote altruism and relationality.

For instance, digital platforms have shown their potential to foster solidarity. 2024 was a year that saw millions of young people, strangers to one another, come together through online movements in solidarity to champion a mutual cause. These shared digital experiences may be an avenue for sparking off deep conversations, eventually leading to real-life friendships and connections, proving that technology can serve as a bridge rather than an isolating barrier.

The challenge lies in reawakening the relational core of personhood in an individualistic world. By reimagining our use of technology and fostering spaces for genuine human interaction, we can begin to address this imbalance and rediscover what it means to truly be a person.

Let us end with a quote from the great theologian of our time, Pope Benedict XVI, who in his 2009 encyclical “Truth in Charity” wrote:

“One of the deepest forms of poverty a person can experience is isolation. If we look closely at other kinds of poverty, including material forms, we see that they are born from isolation, from not being loved or from difficulties in being able to love… It is not by isolation that man establishes his worth, but by placing himself in relation with others and with God.”

Article written  by Dr. Jotham Njoroge.