How Texting has Changed Communication
On average, 23 billion texts are sent each day, and we also make 13.5 billion phone calls a day. This begs the question, how has texting changed our world today? How does it change how we communicate and how we interact with each other?
The first text message was sent only 32 years in 1992 and up until 2007 phone calls were still the most common mobile phone data service. However, texting has become more popular since then. We now have implemented texting to be a part of our daily lives and there are so many ways communication has changed because of it.
Texting has simplified the way we interact with others. You can send a message wherever and whenever you want. It gives us the freedom to reply at our convenience. It is generally less intrusive than a phone call, for instance. It’s also something you can do while you’re busy with other things. Text messages enable us to convey brief points and usually don’t require a formal style like email.
There are numerous ways to express your thoughts through text that are not possible through other forms of communication. One example of this is emojis. They can make conversations fun and lighthearted. Another example is memes; they can provide a sense of humor to an exchange. A fellow student at Davis High, Brynlee Beckstrand, shared her insight on them “I think the gifs and memes are not needed but they’re funny. You’re not just going to talk to someone and say, ‘look at this meme its perfect for our conversation’. I wouldn’t do that in person. Emojis, I like Emojis because they’re your facial expression. I understand the face ones but like the car. Thats unnecessary I think.” Abbreviations are a huge thing at the moment. Some examples are LOL for laugh out loud, BRB for be right back, and BTW for by the way. These are just some of the most popular ones. They make typing much faster and can become muscle memory to type.
There are also some problems and disadvantages with texting. Texting loses the importance of face-to-face conversations. This is due to the fact that while texting we miss out on seeing people’s emotions and body language. These factors contribute to the difficulty of having deep conversations over text. Brynlee adds “I would definitely say my generation is lacking communication skills with each other we don’t know how to have a conversation but not only with each other but with adults and stuff too.” This is something that I personally have been able to see daily with people everywhere I go. Amanda Lenhart at the Pew Research Center states, “There’s now an expectation that teens will contact each other via text, and they expect a kind of constant, frequent response,”.
To conclude, texting has changed communication and the way we interact with people in so many ways. The changes are both good and bad but it’s something that has permanently affected society as a whole.
Citations
Giacomini, Andrea. “Council Post: The Past, Present and Future of Messaging.” Forbes, 12 Aug. 2024, www.forbes.com/councils/forbestechcouncil/2021/01/06/the-past-present-and-future-of-messaging/.
Villines, Zawn. “How Texting Changes Communication.” GoodTherapy.org Therapy Blog, 21 Feb. 2014, www.goodtherapy.org/blog/texting-teens-adults-communication-0726126.
Knight, Steven. “How Many Phone Calls Are Made a Day? (2023 Statistics).” SellCell.com Blog, 16 May 2023, www.sellcell.com/blog/how-many-phone-calls-are-made-a-day-2023-statistics/.
