The Age of Texting

Our phones are getting

bigger and bigger‌

43%

Smartphones from the top 10 phone manufacturers have increased in size over the past 7 years.

43%

…but we talk less on the phone

81%

Over 4 in 5 of American 18- to 34-year-olds list a

text-based medium (texting, email, social media) as their preferred communication channel.

We live in the

Age of Texting

3 hours+

The average American spends over 3 hours texting every day.

- It’s fast - It lowers anxiety - Phones are no longer designed primarily for calling

Texting involves fewer social cues than calling. There’s no voice, no body language, no facial expressions.

In the past, texting was primarily used to simply coordinate appointments.

Today, it has become the main channel many people use to handle complex interactions such as arguments, delivering bad news, and breaking up.

Texting is reconfiguring the ways we interact with each other, the levels of trust we build, and what we expect from each other.

It’s pain-free to break up in a text message‌

39%

39% of young Americans have broken up a relationship in a text.

64% have had an argument on text.

…but afterwards most people regret not doing it in person or on the phone.

78%

More than 3 in 4 who had previously

broken up in a text message subsequently regretted their choice of medium.

Feeling under the weather? Better text your boss‌

51%

Over half of young Americans report sick to work through non-verbal media (texting, email, social media)

…but most employers feel that employees who text in sick cannot be trusted.

67%

Two thirds of managers find texting in sick a completely unacceptable or somewhat unacceptable way for staff to report sick.

Got some bad news?

How would you deliver it?

25%

25% of young Americans prefer to

deliver bad news to other people using text messaging, email or social media.

Texting offers‌ Lower anxiety and fewer social cues

But it also entails‌ More ambiguity and lower levels of trust between people The dramatic increase in use of texting should be viewed in tandem with the facts that trust levels in society are dropping and anxiety levels increasing.

Why do

you text?

All research data used in this presentation originate from the book Texting in Sick: How Smartphones, Texting, and Social Media are Changing Our Relationships (2015).

Available on Amazon (paperback & kindle)

www.textinginsick.com