In "Leisure Theory in the Information Age" by Wes Cooper and "Reflections on Recreation, Park, and Leisure Studies" by Daniel L. Dustin and Thomas L. Goodale, the authors raise two very important issues about the growth and impact of an increasingly symbolically constructed culture. This new culture has developed due to information technology and these changes in our culture have created a more narrowly specialized type of education for professional careers which is increasingly taught electronically. In turn, these changes in education have undermined the traditional community of scholars concerned with values and contributing to the public good.

As Cooper describes it, our work and leisure has increasingly taken the form of "symbolic manipulation" rather than manipulating the physical environment, so that more and more "we and our environments are increasingly becoming symbolic constructs." This increasingly symbolization of our society has affected both work and leisure, so that whether one is at work or involved in recreational activities, one is more and more not interacting with the physical world as with a symbolically-created virtual world.

For example, instead of going bowling at a bowling facility with a group of friends, one may participate in an online bowling game with a network of other online bowlers one communicates with electronically. Instead of meeting friends to talk about an event in person or even on the phone, one may experience an event through TV or an online presentation and then text back and forth with others about it. Instead of going to a movie theater with friends and family members, one may download a movie from Netflix or see a video or series of short video Webisodes on Hulu or YouTube, and then share emails about it with other viewers. The rise of video gaming through social gaming sides like FarmVille and Mafia Wars, where one gets virtual supplies and equipment to help one get ahead in the game, are another example of this growing manipulation of symbolic constructs in everyday life.