Teens Texting More Than Ever
By Ed Oswald | Tuesday, April 20, 2010 at 9:28 am
Texting has now become the primary means of communication between teenagers according to a new study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project. The average teen will send and receive some 1,500 text messages per month, although many will surpass that. A third send some 3,000 texts per month, and 15 percent 6,000 or more.
Girls by far are the more prolific messagers, as they send some 80 texts per day on average. Boys send much less, about 30.
“The widespread availability of unlimited texting plans has transformed communication patterns of American teens, many of whom now conduct substantial portions of their daily conversations with their friends via texting,” senior researcher Amanda Lenhart said.
Some have bypassed the texting craze, however: Pew found that 22 percent send and receive less than 10 text messages per day.
Pew found that 75% of teens now have cell phones, up from 45% in 2004.
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April 20th, 2010 at 1:34 pm
Not really news to me :p
But this habit comes at a price. In the Netherlands a recent study showed that texting has become a primairy form of communication and writing for youngsters, and as a result spelling skills are deminishing. This is because youngsters are using abbreviations almost all the time to keep the messages as short as possible, because the numerical keyboard on phones just isn’t meant to write proper sentences, or just because they aren’t on an unlimited plan.
I myself am looking forward to 100% internet coverage for eveybody, so texting becomes obsolete and email becomes the standard. This way you’re no longer sending a message to a certain SIM-card, but to a person, who can access the message not only on his phone, but on his PC, laptop, iPod or even YOUR phone :p Same with VoIP: no longer will you be calling to a certain phone, but to a person.
April 21st, 2010 at 7:56 am
Look, here’s the reason why kids use text:
First, you can do it from your phone, so you can send and receive messages just about anywhere.
Second, and I think this is the REAL reason, NO SPAM. With texts, no one is trying to sell you something. If 90% of current email is spam, then 0% of texts are. Wouldn’t you rather use a message system free of the deluge that spam email has become?
April 21st, 2010 at 4:24 pm
jitnol: I get spam on my phone sometimes now! But I agree that texting is a more controlled medium – and when I say controlled, I mean not controlled by parents! I don’t know if that’s a big problem, but some think it is (http://bit.ly/bwzg0s).