Studying the coevolution of social distance, offline- and online contacts

We inquire about the correlations between contact and perceived social distance: Whether in line with the contact theory, online as well as offline contacts that Israeli Jews have with Arabs affect their perceived social distances from Arabs, or rather whether Israeli Jews who feel closer to Arabs maintain more offline and online contacts with Arabs, according to the social homophily approach. We found that social distance, online contact and offline contact were mutually supportive, whereas the background variables included in the regression analysis (age, gender, religiosity, place of residence, education and income) had no effect on either of them. While the three are mutually supportive, perceived social distance and offline contacts had greater explanatory value than online contacts.