Teens, language and texting

By Joe Hungler on July 29th, 2008

New Scientist on teens and on-line language. The apocalypse may not be here quite yet when it comes to the impact of Instant Messaging on writing skills. I think something is impacting writing skills though (grumpy old man alert), because too often I see the writing of college graduates that I couldn’t have gotten away with in Junior High. I think that people no longer feel they can criticize students. I saw this long before IM was a fad, so I agree with their research.

Meanwhile, the teens over at Teen Lab want adults to try texting. I have been slow to embrace texting. I don’t do it often enough to do it quickly. I now get about 5-10 texts a week and send about ½ that. They feel like a lot of work to me. Professionally, texting can be a cop out though. Much like people call when you aren’t there to leave a message, they can text bad news so they don’t have to talk to you. I have found that they are good to inform a group (meetings canceled etc.) and to let someone know something without interrupting them. I’m sure I’ll grow to use it more, but I can certainly see why teens take advantage of it. I’ll probably become proficient when the world has moved on to the next form of communication.