Are you a master Twitterer? Do your friends or kids punch their PDAs while eating and driving? I could swear my teenager was texting in her sleep.
A new study suggests that constant texters may be sacrificing accuracy for expediency. One of the convenient features of our handhelds – the program that figures out the word we want to use before we finish typing it – maybe be part of the problem. And, the new research suggests that frequent texting may even rewire the brains of young people.
Dr. Michael Abramson and associates, an epidemiologist at Monash Universtiy in Melbourne, Australia studied over 300 children aged 11 to 14 and found that kids who used mobile phones performed faster on a battery of cognitive tests but they also made significantly more errors. The bottom line is that frequent use of the devices makes kids fast and sloppy.
This is likely a problem for middle-aged and older digital immigrants as well. Todays’ rapid pace of information constantly assaulting our brains challenges our ability to pay full attention to any one thing. Our laptops, fax machines and instant messages pressure us into quick responses that lead us to sacrifice detail and accuracy. Radio and television announcers speak in time-compressed sentences leaving us with mere ideas of what they have said. Many people are replacing depth and subtlety in their thinking with quick mental facts that only skim the surface. The mental clutter, noise and frequent interruptions that assail most of us further fuel this frenetic cognitive style.
Psychology Today (Thanks SuZi)
As a young person I text, Twitter, e-mail, and all that regularly. I always use proper grammar and punctuation in my text messages and would rather pay more for a longer message then be forced to butcher the English language with “txt spk”, which repulses me.
I don’t think the texting trend is making kids stupid. They’re probably already stupid, texting is just making them lazier. You need only look at a packet of “Butchers choice” sausages in Tesco with no apostrophe in sight to realise that an astounding number of people have little to no grasp of basic grammar, not just school children.
I am a prolific Twitter user, though only occasional texter. I *despise* text speak & never use it, even if it means going over the 140 character limit (meaning two+ tweets or extra text messages charges). I do know quite a few like me; in fact, most people on Twitter (that I follow anyway) don’t seem to ever use text speak.
That said, I receive text messages regularly that I can’t understand, and it enrages me. Don’t be so bloody lazy, just type the word!!! These from apparently intelligent people too. So, whilst I don’t think the article is entirely correct, there is no doubt that there is some truth to what it says.
Bring back verbosity!
when was the last time you used a fax machine?
Of course I was being ironic with the “frst” post. I’ve never understood why people are obsessed with being the first to post a comment – even though they probably haven’t read the content! As well as being overloaded with information are we also overspecialising? There is so much info who can take a broad view?
I’m ‘fairly’ young too and i find txt language has made me less literate and forget all the proper spellings and grammer that i was once quite accurate at. So it obviously has it’s good and bad points.
Fast and sloppy : Story of my life…
I agree. I’ve received text messages in the past where so many letters have been dropped it’s almost impossible to understand what the words are.
Also, what makes me laugh is when someone shortens a word, but the word still has the same amount of letters! My sister once during a text to me, said she was off to take a ‘barf”! Unbelievable.
Yes, I text etc, and I do shorten certain words (not cos it costs less, but mainly cos it’s quicker….ok, I’m lazy!) but I do know NOT to do it in other things. I keep it solely for texting and tweets etc. I think some kids nowadays have real trouble separating the two.
LC x
I concur… I love using proper English in texts and tweets, although I have to admit I will occasionally delete spaces between punctuation if I’m a character or two over.
I suspect we’re not the target demographic here though – hands up anyone between the age of 11 and 14?
The same argument can be made for word-processors destroying our ability to spell, or rulers destroying our ability to draw straight lines.
At the end of the day, aren’t tools meant to make life easier? And aren’t computers and mobile phones just advanced tools?
If we all had to live with the tools of 100 years ago, would we be better off?
It seems to me that text speak is just normal speak, but omiting vowels. I really don’t like it.
I find it hard to read and even harder to type. There may be less letters, which should make it quicker to type, but I’ve used full words in everything I’ve written for the past 30-odd years and am finding it hard to adapt.
But then again, WHY should I adapt to using something that I genuinely don’t like?
Now would that be Butcher’s Choice or Butchers’ Choice? Oh the choice.
I don’t know, text speak has its place as a form of communication, language is supposed to evolve to suit our needs,
So long as it stays on twitter and in texts I don’t have a problem,
But I do hate getting emails in text speak… there is no limit on characters in an email so there no need for it!
Fax? heh
I think the fact that my 73-year-old father uses text speak (including l8r, 2mro and so on) shows it isn’t just younsters sacrificing/butchering the English language!
I finished compulsory education in 1997 – people in my class didn’t have mobiles of their own until the last couple of years of school, so I think their general lack of spelling and grammar (shockingly bad despite it being a high performing school) argues the point that not enough attention is paid to hammering the basics into people at a young age.
Texting may not encourage people to perfect their writing and typing but if they were taught properly in the first place (or, those that struggle at school given extra attention and help), more might be encouraged to text/Tweet ‘properly’ rather than hide behind text-speak.
Teeline shorthand is mostly based on the fact that you can still read sentences with most or all of the vowels missing. (Of course, there is a bit more to it, like the shortening of common affixes and simplification of consonants.) I remember learning that the inventor of Teeline noticed that his students frequently omitted vowels when taking notes in lectures – so text-speak has actually been around for decades! I wonder if hand-written text-speak makes you stupid too though?
It could just be the age-old motive that kids want to be different… to have a language that “grown ups” can’t understand, and to be in a secret gang.
Text speak might just be the new “tree house” for the 21st century, somewhere kids can (psychologically) hide and talk about stuff in secret.
Perhaps they’ll grow out of it, or perhaps they’ll be developing the next generation of organic interfaces and neural networks, and we’ll be left out as “grown ups” not being able to get our head around this new fangled technology.
“What!?! Eh?! What’s he saying? What’s that noise – it’s not proper “music” if you can’t hum the tune!!”
people have been fooling around with this since the time of melvil dui…aka dewey.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simplified_Spelling_Board
We could also say that evolving into this use of using texts and shorthands is, well, part of our evolution of language.
And I doubt texting makes you stupid.
Lady Claire – Re. Taking a “barf”, It could be that your sister meant exactly what she’d typed. She might have gastric flu!
While I also despise text shorthand I think this sentence indicates a more serious problem:
“Many people are replacing depth and subtlety in their thinking with quick mental facts that only skim the surface.”
Knowing isn’t the same as understanding, and a world in which facts are at people’s fingertips can still be a largely stupid one if people don’t know how to reason and think critically. September 11th conspiracies are a good example – the facts of that day, video footage, eyewitness accounts etc., are all readily available online in a way far more accessible than taking yourself off to the library used to be, but without a sense of how to interpret and filter them rationally, plus a paranoid distrust of any authority, people come to believe the most wacky and inconsistent theories.
Ehehehe … hm .. not an article that’s based on true facts … where are the conclusions … where is reality in this article? Multitasking can be done quite well, but it depends on what the tasks are about, if they can be combined. That’s common knowledge, in working enviroments this was already known before digitalizing came into this world. So there is no difference in reality. Only complete morrown who adapt completelyto texting, to get back to the headline, might become morrons in the end … but who does?! It’s a bit as with some people who prefer to chitchat, and dont talk ever about other stuff that takes more .. they def. will experience later on that they could not even talk different anymore. That’s how they escaped their depressed psyche.
Stay in control, be on top of digits
Digits ..not attached to a physical thing … writing gives a different feel on the inside and will trigger another self than e.g. writing with a pen … The more digits .. the less we open to the real world .. whereas we do need to open up to the real world to get stuff on the inside (let alone .. light) to boost our true self on the inside .. Different selfes need different things. Use it to your own benefit .. but know what you are dealing with. Keep track of things on the inside .. how it works on you. And then decide ..
txt speak has actually been around for a lot longer than the mobile phone! secretaries have used shorthand for many years and i don’t think anyone ever accused them of being stupid!
Along with a couple of the commenters above, I take the view that text speak is merely an evolution of the way we communicate and not a ‘butchering’ of the English language. So long as people know what i’m saying, i use it liberally in texts and so on as it’s just quicker.
I think text speak (and the resulting loss of accuracy in general spelling etc.) is going to become more widespread in the future and not just restricted to texts, so we may as well embrace the idea and avoid looking at the issue with rose-tinted specs.
I’m a well-educated 20-yr-old at uni and love language and its history, as well as (allegedly) having a good knowledge of grammar/spelling. But with that appreciation comes a realisation that language is continuing to evolve, and as such, we can’t get left behind.
I think texting has its place, as does other shortening of words etc. But I think it’s when it starts creeping into other facets of everyday life that it starts to irk & annoy.
I mean, if this is how the language is going to evolve, will we even need a dictionary in the future?!
LC x
i feel stupid enough without texting. it’s a downward spiral! letters schmetters. faux hoax moseyin’ folks!
Okay as a teen who texts emails and all that stuff i find the text language to be useful. So like if you have around 10 seconds to do something and you need to say got to go we get to say g2g because it increases our time meaning we can get stuff done quicker. In rl i find it useful to use the chat speak because then you can find what to say easier and everyone understands it. Also at school and stuff the chat language hardly affects me, only when I am typing on the computer but then i realize my error and go back and fix it. Plus Texting is a better way to communicate then actually talking… depends on the situation… anyways I find it completely worthless to have to type out everything on your phone when you have a limited choice of characters to type! Another reason I believe texting
See what\’d i tell you I couldnt even finish my typing… EXPLAIN THAT! I could of written so much more if I chosed to type with texting! Anyways Another reason I believe texting is better is because on a hand held phone without the full keyboard you have to continuesly push buttons why not chat in text to not have to push so many damn button.. .right?