Texting’s Effects on Relationships

Communication has made the transition from being face-to-face to phone calls to texting. Almost everyone has benefitted for one reason or another from texting, whether it is the best way to communicate with someone or the convenience that comes from being able to quickly ask a question. It causes the question to be asked though: Is this really the best way for people to communicate with one another or do they lose something in their relationship by not interacting with each other in person. Texting diminishes the ability of people to communicate with others in a deep, relational way.

In the current day and age, they no longer have to engage in face-to-face conversation in order to find something out. They can just quick send a text message and have their answer shortly depending on the length of time waiting for the recipient’s response. The changes in communication have created a channel so that people no longer have to interact with one another in a personal way. The negative effects of texting should be balanced by taking a break from texting and finding other ways to communicate with people in order to have deep relationships.

One of the positive aspects of texting, in regards to relationships, is that it creates an opportunity for people to communicate even when they are not physically present with one another. For instance, texting allows people to stay in contact even though they may be separated by a large distance. As well as being able to stay in contact over a distance, it is a useful tool in being able to communicate short messages. Lynne Kelly et al., who have degrees in communication or are in the process of attaining one, completed a study and reported on their findings in which they point out that there is not a need to for “small talk” (Kelly et al. 5).

Order custom essay Texting’s Effects on Relationships with free plagiarism report

450+ experts on 30 subjects Starting from 3 hours delivery

Get Essay Help

Through texting, the discussion can quickly take place without having to take a lot of either person’s time. Along with being able to communicate with people over a distance, it has been instrumental in building new relationships. Through texting, people can easily contact someone without truly putting themselves out there and investing a lot into the relationship. If the friendship or relationship takes off then it does, but if it does not, there is not major heartache involved because there has not been a lot of investment in it so far. Texting creates an opportunity for people to stay connected with those near and far.

Texting creates a sort of safeguard for people, which shields them from social interaction. Kelly et al.’s research sought to answer why people choose to use the particular form of communication that they do (3) and the results of this research question showed that people use texting to create a “social buffer” for momentary discomfort in social situations (6). This texting buffer gives people something to do when they are in a social situation that they are unsure of how they are supposed to act or are simply trying to escape the situation altogether for the moment. Also, texting is beneficial to the consumer because they are not required to respond immediately to a question or comment from someone, when communicating through text messaging (Kelly et al. 5).

The person who sends the text understands that the recipient may not respond immediately because they are in the middle of something else important at the time. This can be especially helpful if the recipient of the text might not know how to answer the question right away. Either way, the recipient of the text has a gap of time to decide how to respond. Texting lends itself to creating a natural space between people which alleviates some of the social pressures. Especially, in regard to any kind of relationship, texting is beneficial when conflict arises, and the relationship comes to a close because texting creates an easy way communicate thoughts and emotion without having to do it face-to-face (Kelly et al. 6).

Texting helps people to hold relationships of value or even possible value at a distance and keeps them from having to be involved. When the relationship needs to end, it in some ways will ease the process. In a study conducted by Loyd Pettegrew and Carolyn Day, who are communication professors, they found that “people spend 2-6 hours per day being connected through the internet, but don’t want to be disturbed by physically being with people” (134).

This just shows that humans are created to have interactions with other people but dealing with people sometimes becomes inconvenient, so it is easier and safer to just hold everyone at a distance where interactions with them can be controlled. The safeguard that texting creates for people is beneficial because it keeps them from ever getting too close to people and gives them opportunity to step back and consider how they are going to respond when they are in situations that they do not know how to handle.

While texting is very beneficial for creating, maintaining, and ending relationships, it also has many negative effects which come along with it that keep people from experiencing the joys of meaningful, deep relationships. One way in particular that texting has become a hinderance in relationships of any form is in how it affects people socially. One of the major side effects is that some people are beginning to lose their acquired ability to naturally communicate with others in face-to-face settings. This social skill is being lost simply because people do not have to practice it. Being able to communicate well with people is slowly becoming a lost art.

Texting leads to “reduced cues” in communication because with little information coming through the short text and being “tone deaf” it is difficult to communicate with people and to understand what the other person is truly say (Kelly et al. 4-5). Tone deaf means that the fluctuations in the other person’s voice cannot be heard, making it difficult to understand the place in which they are coming from (Kelly et al. 5). It removes the opportunities to hear the emotion in people’s voices and the ability to explain everything that is going on in the current situation. The ability to read into what people are saying and understand is a direct result of spending time with them and observing how they respond to the events taking place around them.

Texting removes the opportunity to understand people in this way and also to be able to communicate with them in social settings. This will begin to play itself out more and more in friendships and dating relationships, but even more probable is that it will begin to manifest itself in interactions with people at work. If people are not developing skills of learning how to interact with others in casual settings, how are they going to know how to interact with them in a formal setting. Texting is diminishing the opportunity for people to cultivate social skills which will benefit them their whole lives.

Not only does texting play a role in the development of social skills, but it also affects the quality of relationships. According to research results conducted and gathered by Betty-Ann Cyr et al., technology is not preventing the formation of relationships, “but it does seem to be related to a decrease in the quality of peer relationships” (89). Meaning, technology has not completely removed the opportunity for relationships, it has just removed how deep people go into relationships. In “ILY & Can U Pick Up Some Milk,” McEwan and Horn observed how quality of relationship is affected from the standpoint of people who are dating and have found that whether or not people think that texting is a good way to communicate is based on how the couple view texting (169), but ultimately their research shows that people use texting “to maintain their romantic relationships” (176).

Basically, it varies from couple to couple in how texting is utilized within their particular relationship, but generally it can be assumed that people involved in a dating relationship will communicate through texting for one reason or another. McEwan and Horn’s study found that when comparing “increasing romantic texting proclivity not related to relational maintenance appears to have a negative impact on relational quality” (176). Meaning that when people who increase romantic texts, but they are not doing anything else to put their feelings into action will probably see a decline in the quality of their relationship.

The findings of these various studies show that the overall quality of relationships, whether they are friendships or dating relationships will probably be of lower value if texting plays a large role in the communication in the relationship. This is due largely in part to the fact that texting does not lend itself to length and being able to be express in detail. Kelly et al. brought out this idea that there is a lack of real communication in the short text messages that people send (5). When sending text messages in an attempt to keep up a friendship, the opportunity is being missed to find out how the other person is actually doing and find out in depth what is really going on in the events of their life because it keeps the details and information at a minimum. Texting to keep up with relationships is causing relational quality to diminish among people.

One of the reasons that the quality of relationships is decreasing is because people are prioritizing responding to text messages instead of spending time with the people that they are surrounded by. Pettegrew and Day found that the people who participated in their study are aware of the effects when they communicate with people through technology instead of the people around them (129). For instance, “more than one-in-ten students say that mobile devices get in the way of their FtF” (face-to-face) “communication” (129). People are aware of the effects of technology in their relationships, but it has not created enough of an in impact that it has changed the way they conduct themselves when using technology in the presence of other people.

Pettegrew and Day summarizes what Rich Ling says, when they cite him in their report saying, “mobile phones strengthen our social ties often at the expense of those who are physically present” (127). When considering whether or not to invest in the person physically present, the consideration ought to be given to the other person who is giving of their time to be there, so it is important to invest in the person who is physically present, rather than to the person at the other end of the text.

Another way that texting diminishes from the quality of relationships is because it has high potential to lead to misunderstandings. Obviously, there are the misunderstandings that are a direct result of the brief messages without surrounding information to give a clear picture of what is going on (Kelly et al. 5). These miscommunications are usually pretty simple to clarify what is going on and get cleared up. But the misinterpretations that hold more of an impact on relationships are the ones that raise a reaction from recipient because of what is said in a text.

Borae Jin, an instructor in communication, addresses this idea in his research which looked into how people respond when hurtful messages are communicated face-to-face or through text messaging and he found that people work through hurtful texts in much the same way as if the comment was made to them in person (154). Even though the mean comment is not made in person, it still has an effect on the recipient. The way that a comment can be better received is if the person is a close friend and they do not perceive the other person’s intentions to be hurtful, which cause them not to respond as negatively to the hurtful comment (Jin 153).

This study shows that the closer the two people are who the hurtful text is sent between, the more likely they will be to forgive or possibly excuse the mean text. These misunderstandings can sometimes be cleared up very easily if they were worked out in person or through another form of communication which lends itself to a lengthier explanation when both parties have opportunity to communicate and fully explain themselves. Unfortunately, texting allows too much room for misunderstanding, which has the potential to lead to broken friendships.

The final problem to be addressed with texting is the affect it has on identity development. Cyr et al. addresses this when sharing the results of their research, they found that “there was a significant correlation in regard to time spent using communication technology with identity distress and with existential anxiety” (89). People develop and grow in situations where they are interacting with other people because they are learning how others around them respond to what they say and can see their reactions. From this, they learn how they should act and should not.

The problem is that when texting, people are not necessarily with others so some of the natural development that comes just from simply being with people is missed out on. In “luv2text,” Natalie Smith quotes Scott Campbell who explains that teenagers are “figuring out who they are and what they are about” (13). This quote simply serves as a reminder that teenagers, who use texting a lot are still in a phase of life where they are trying things, which is part of their development process and of beginning to understand who they are. This is why it is crucial to recognize that it is important to communicate with other people in forms other than through just texting because people need social interaction to develop properly.

After weighing some of the positive and negative aspects of texting, it seems fair to say that while texting is a wonderful tool, it has the potential to be abused. In order to keep texting in its correct place in life it is important to set up boundaries. According Jean Twenge in an article that was an adaption from her book iGen, she recognizes the harmful effects of technology in peoples’ lives and suggests that people should set boundaries now in order to ward off beginnings of poor behaviors (65).

If people begin to be aware when they are spending a large amount of time texting when they could use another form of communication or even meet with the other person face-to-face to do what they are trying to do in a text it would lead to far less miscommunication. They would probably find that they have better relationships with people. Also, by setting restrictions it would cause people to have to find other methods of communication. Twenge reports that the Monitoring the Future survey has found that when teens are doing something other than looking at anything besides a screen they will be “happier” (63). This report gives reason to set restrictions on the amount of time spent on texting.

While setting restrictions on the amount of texting that happens, it is important to find other ways to communicate with people besides through texting. Communication via email gives the opportunity to write out thoughts and explain in detail. Going about communicating in an older sort of fashion would be to call someone. This also creates an opportunity to give more detail and answer questions if the other person has any. Facetime is an option which allows people to be able to see and hear the person they are talking to.

The best way to communicate in regard to having a deep relationship is in person and to leave the phone put away, so that incoming texts are not a cause of distraction. In doing this, communication will flow in the best way possible because there will not distractions and it will be possible to observe body language and the hear the inflections of the other person’s voice. Interacting with people in this type of way has the potential to be awkward, but it will set the foundation for a deeper, more trusting relationship and will become more natural the more often that it takes place.

The ways in which communication takes place has evolved over time, but the reasons for communication have not changed. As people have needed human connection in the past, they will continue to need it in the future. It is at the core of who they are. Texting has helped to fill the gaps of human interaction, but problems have arisen because people have begun to rely solely on texting. While there are many positive benefits to texting, the fact that it takes away from deep, interpersonal relationships is something that needs to be looked into and possibly be changed depending on the person. Both the positive and negative effects of texting need to be balanced, so that people can have deep personal relationships.

Don't let plagiarism ruin your grade

Run a free check or have your essay done for you

Check my essay Hire Writer