tag:theconversation.com,2011:/uk/topics/text-messages-8588/articlesText messages – The Conversation2022-12-08T00:50:18Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1939522022-12-08T00:50:18Z2022-12-08T00:50:18ZPing, your pizza is on its way. Ping, please rate the driver. Yes, constant notifications really do tax your brain<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/493434/original/file-20221104-16-oohqhq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1000%2C666&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/business-lunch-workplace-vegetarian-pizza-sharing-1481255771">Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A ping from the pizza company. A couple of pings from your socials. Ping, ping, ping from your family WhatsApp group trying to organise a weekend barbecue. </p>
<p>With all those smartphone notifications, it’s no wonder you lose focus on what you’re trying to do do. </p>
<p>Your phone doesn’t even need to ping to distract you. There’s <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2015-28923-001">pretty good</a> <a href="https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/691462">evidence</a> the mere presence of your phone, silent or not, is enough to divert your attention.</p>
<p>So what’s going on? More importantly, how can you reclaim your focus, without missing the important stuff?</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/no-youre-probably-not-addicted-to-your-smartphone-but-you-might-use-it-too-much-89853">No, you're probably not 'addicted' to your smartphone – but you might use it too much</a>
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<h2>Is it really such a big deal?</h2>
<p>When you look at the big picture, those pings can really add up. </p>
<p>Although estimates vary, the average person checks their phone <a href="https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/30085/1/PubSub7601_Andrews.PDF">around 85 times</a> <a href="https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/trapped-in-the-net-are-we-all-addicted-to-our-smartphones-20190531-p51t44.html">a day</a>, roughly once every 15 minutes.</p>
<p>In other words, every 15 minutes or so, your attention is likely to wander from what you’re doing. The trouble is, it can take <a href="https://lifehacker.com/how-long-it-takes-to-get-back-on-track-after-a-distract-1720708353">several minutes</a> to regain your concentration fully after being <a href="https://www.ics.uci.edu/%7Egmark/chi08-mark.pdf">interrupted</a> by your phone.</p>
<p>If you’re just watching TV, distractions (and refocusing) are no big deal. But if you’re driving a car, trying to study, at work, or spending time with your loved ones, it could lead to some fairly substantial problems.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/should-mobile-phones-be-banned-in-schools-we-asked-five-experts-98708">Should mobile phones be banned in schools? We asked five experts</a>
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<h2>Two types of interference</h2>
<p>The pings from your phone are “exogenous interruptions”. In other words, something external, around you, has caused the interruption.</p>
<p>We can <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-46276-9_21">become conditioned</a> to feeling excited when we hear our phones ping. This is the <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1046/j.1360-0443.2002.00015.x">same pleasurable feeling</a> people who gamble can quickly become conditioned to at the sight or sound of a poker machine.</p>
<p>What if your phone is on silent? Doesn’t that solve the ping problem? Well, no.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497303/original/file-20221125-22-pcpvqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Woman working with smartphone on desk" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497303/original/file-20221125-22-pcpvqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497303/original/file-20221125-22-pcpvqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497303/original/file-20221125-22-pcpvqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497303/original/file-20221125-22-pcpvqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497303/original/file-20221125-22-pcpvqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497303/original/file-20221125-22-pcpvqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497303/original/file-20221125-22-pcpvqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Is your phone on silent? You can still get distracted.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-writing-on-a-notebook-beside-teacup-and-tablet-computer-733856/">Tirachard Kumtanom/Pexels</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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<p>That’s another type of interruption, an internal (or endogenous) interruption.</p>
<p>Think of every time you were working on a task but your attention drifted to your phone. You may have fought the urge to pick it up and see what was happening online, but you probably checked anyway.</p>
<p>In this situation, we can become so strongly conditioned to expect a reward each time we look at our phone we don’t need to wait for a ping to trigger the effect. </p>
<p>These impulses are powerful. Just reading this article about checking your phone may make you feel like … checking your phone.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/phubbing-snubbing-your-loved-ones-for-your-phone-can-do-more-damage-than-you-realise-194039">'Phubbing': snubbing your loved ones for your phone can do more damage than you realise</a>
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<h2>Give your brain a break</h2>
<p>What do all these interruptions mean for cognition and wellbeing? </p>
<p>There’s increasing evidence push notifications are associated with <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352853217300159">decreased productivity</a>, <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2451958820300051">poorer concentration</a> and <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0927537116300136">increased distraction</a> at work and school. </p>
<p>But is there any evidence our brain is working harder to manage the frequent switches in attention? </p>
<p>One study of people’s brain waves <a href="https://www.hindawi.com/journals/cin/2016/5718580/">found</a> those who describe themselves as heavy smartphone users were more sensitive to push notifications than ones who said they were light users. </p>
<p>After hearing a push notification, heavy users were significantly worse at recovering their concentration on a task than lighter users. Although push notification interrupted concentration for both groups, the heavy users took much longer to regain focus. </p>
<p>Frequent interruptions from your phone can also leave you <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0747563219302596">feeling stressed</a> by a need to respond. Frequent smartphone interruptions are also associated with <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360131519301319">increased FOMO</a> (fear of missing out). </p>
<p>If you get distracted by your phone after responding to a notification, any subsequent <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/2050157921993896">procrastination</a> in returning to a task can also leave you feeling guilty or frustrated.</p>
<p>There’s <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0747563219300883">certainly evidence</a> suggesting the longer you spend using your phone in unproductive ways, the lower you tend to rate your wellbeing. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/constantly-texting-your-friends-about-problems-may-be-increasing-your-anxiety-83960">Constantly texting your friends about problems may be increasing your anxiety</a>
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<h2>How can I stop?</h2>
<p>We know switching your phone to silent isn’t going to magically fix the problem, especially if you’re already a frequent checker. </p>
<p>What’s needed is behaviour change, and that’s hard. It can take several attempts to see lasting change. If you have ever tried to quit smoking, lose weight, or start an exercise program you’ll know what I mean.</p>
<p>Start by turning off all non-essential notifications. Then here are some things to try if you want to reduce the number of times you check your phone:</p>
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<li><p>charge your phone overnight in a different room to your bedroom. Notifications can prevent you falling asleep and can repeatedly rouse you from essential sleep throughout the night</p></li>
<li><p>interrupt the urge to check and actively decide if it’s going to benefit you, in that moment. For example, as you turn to reach for your phone, stop and ask yourself if this action serves a purpose other than distraction</p></li>
<li><p>try the <a href="https://www.themuse.com/advice/take-it-from-someone-who-hates-productivity-hacksthe-pomodoro-technique-actually-works#:%7E:text=The%20Pomodoro%20Technique%20is%20a,are%20referred%20to%20as%20pomodoros">Pomodoro method</a> to stay focused on a task. This involves breaking your concentration time up into manageable chunks (for example, 25 minutes) then rewarding yourself with a short break (for instance, to check your phone) between chunks. Gradually increase the length of time between rewards. Gradually re-learning to sustain your attention on any task can take a while if you’re a high-volume checker.</p></li>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/health-check-can-your-brain-be-full-40844">Health Check: can your brain be 'full'?</a>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sharon Horwood does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Your phone doesn’t even need to ping for you to be distracted. Here’s how to reclaim your focus.Sharon Horwood, Senior Lecturer in Psychology, Deakin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1877642022-07-28T02:09:33Z2022-07-28T02:09:33ZHalf of Australians will experience technology-facilitated abuse in their lifetimes: new research<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/476407/original/file-20220727-27-8zlna4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Technology-facilitated abuse is a form of interpersonal violence using mobile, online and/or digital technologies. It includes four main types of behaviours:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>monitoring and controlling, such as keeping track of where the victim/survivor is and who they are with</p></li>
<li><p>emotional abuse and threats, such as sending put-downs or threatening to harm the victim/survivor</p></li>
<li><p>harassment, such as sending offensive material or maintaining unwanted contact </p></li>
<li><p>sexual and image-based abuse, including sexual coercion as well as the taking or distribution of sexual imagery without consent.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>In <a href="https://www.anrows.org.au/project/technology-facilitated-abuse-extent-nature-and-responses-in-the-australian-community/">a study</a> of 4,562 adult Australians, we explored the prevalence, nature and harms of technology-facilitated abuse. It is the first nationally representative survey of this kind. Our study included interviews with 20 adult victim-survivors and 10 perpetrators.</p>
<h2>How common is it?</h2>
<p>We found technology-facilitated abuse was very common. One in two (51%) Australian adults reported having experienced at least one abusive behaviour in their lifetime. </p>
<p>Most common was monitoring or controlling behaviours (34%). Emotional abuse and threats of harm were also common (31%), as was harassment (27%). A quarter of respondents had experienced sexual and image-based abuse. </p>
<p>A majority of victim/survivors (62%) said the perpetrator was a man. One in three (37%) said the perpetrator was a current or former intimate partner.</p>
<p>As for self-reported behaviour, one in four Australian adults (23%) reported having engaged in technology-facilitated abuse at least once in their lifetimes. Almost one in two perpetrators (48%) said the victim/survivor was a current or former intimate partner.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/technology-facilitated-abuse-of-aboriginal-and-torres-strait-islander-women-is-rife-in-regional-and-remote-areas-171727">Technology-facilitated abuse of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women is rife in regional and remote areas</a>
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<h2>What does the abuse look like?</h2>
<p>Participants described various ways in which they experienced or perpetrated abuse. This included low-tech forms, such as threatening text messages, through to more high-tech behaviours, such as secretly installing malicious spyware on a digital device. Victim/survivors described having their online identities hacked through social media profiles, emails and location services, as well as being monitored through apps and tracking devices. </p>
<p>For many victim/survivors abused by a partner, the abusive behaviours started during the relationship and escalated after separating. This abuse included perpetrators using their children’s digital devices to control and monitor them after separation.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/476417/original/file-20220728-18173-y3ggyl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/476417/original/file-20220728-18173-y3ggyl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476417/original/file-20220728-18173-y3ggyl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476417/original/file-20220728-18173-y3ggyl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476417/original/file-20220728-18173-y3ggyl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476417/original/file-20220728-18173-y3ggyl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/476417/original/file-20220728-18173-y3ggyl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">More than a third of people who had experienced abuse said the perpetrator was a current or former partner.</span>
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<p>Monitoring through technology was reported to have facilitated in-person stalking. It was also used to gaslight and psychologically abuse victim/survivors. Several participants reported that perpetrators would hack into their technologies, rather than directly contact them, as police often could not detect or prove this behaviour. </p>
<p>One of the most common forms of harassment described was repetitive, unwanted contact: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>There was constant harassment via text message […] The amount of calls, there could be 30, 40, 50 calls a day.</p>
<p>I called her about 150 times in, I don’t know, a two-hour period […] It was probably to stress her out or something.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The harassment was often undertaken through multiple channels and platforms, particularly when the perpetrator had been blocked on one platform. Many victim/survivors reported feeling it was impossible to stop the unwanted contact, because perpetrators kept finding new ways to harass them.</p>
<h2>Who is being abused?</h2>
<p>Of those most likely to have experienced victimisation, there were high rates among sexuality diverse populations. Almost three in four (73%) of those identifying as LGB+ disclosed at least one victimisation experience. Indigenous and First Nations people also reported high victimisation, with seven in ten (70%) respondents reporting at least one such experience. Rates were also high for respondents with a disability, with almost three in five (57%) reporting at least one such experience. </p>
<p>We did not have a large enough sample of trans and gender-diverse participants to draw reliable statistics. However, our interview data showed those who were not cis-gender experienced unique forms of technology-facilitated abuse. They were often targeted because of their gender identity.</p>
<p>The high victimisation rate for minority groups could be attributed to their high uptake of communications technologies. Online spaces are an avenue to connect with communities, express their identities, seek help and find a space of belonging that may not be as readily accessible offline. </p>
<p>However, increased use of online spaces can increase exposure to technology-facilitated abuse. As <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1440783319833181">Bronwyn Carlson</a> found in relation to Indigenous Australians, positive use of online spaces can be “circumscribed by broader structural processes of homophobia, racism, and misogyny”. Some rates of victimisation for minority groups may be interpreted within this wider social context of inequality and discrimination. </p>
<p>We also found some differences in abuse according to gender. Women (40%) were more likely than men (32%) to experience abuse from a current or former intimate partner. Women were also more likely than men (28%; 19%) to have experienced repeated abuse from the same perpetrator, feel fearful due to the abuse (26%; 13%), and report that the same abuser had tried to control them in other ways (33%; 25%). </p>
<p>Women victims/survivors also had higher psychological distress scores than men victims/survivors. This indicates higher levels of anxiety and depression. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/reports-of-revenge-porn-skyrocketed-during-lockdown-we-must-stop-blaming-victims-for-it-139659">Reports of 'revenge porn' skyrocketed during lockdown, we must stop blaming victims for it</a>
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<h2>What does it mean?</h2>
<p>Overall, these results show many Australians experience technology-facilitated abuse, causing them great anxiety and distress. We must ensure support and justice responses cater to a diversity of victim/survivors. </p>
<p>Technology-facilitated abuse certainly has gendered dimensions. However, focusing on gender only is not sufficient to fully understand its prevalence, forms and impacts. </p>
<p>This is not a unique form of abuse. Rather, it is a tactic abusers use to target victim/survivors persistently and, often, anonymously. </p>
<p>There have been some recent changes to <a href="https://www.esafety.gov.au/about-us/who-we-are/our-legislative-functions">improve responses and legal frameworks</a> relating to technology-facilitated abuse in Australia. Our research suggests more needs to be done. This relates not only to the law, but also to policy responses within organisations that may encounter victimisation or perpetration disclosures. </p>
<p>Ultimately, efforts to address technology-facilitated abuse need to be integrated into our strategies for responding to and preventing all forms of violence, abuse and inequality.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/187764/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Asher Flynn receives funding from Australia's National Organisation for Women's Safety, the Australian Government Department of Social Services, the Australian Criminology Research Council and the Australian Research Council. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anastasia Powell receives funding from the Criminology Research Council and Australia's National Research Organisation for Women's Safety (ANROWS). Anastasia is also a director of Our Watch (Australia's national organisation for the prevention of violence against women), and a member of the National Women's Safety Alliance (NWSA).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sophie Hindes does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As well as abuse, many Australian have also experienced threats of harm and harassing behaviour.Asher Flynn, Associate Professor of Criminology, Monash UniversityAnastasia Powell, Associate Professor, Criminology and Justice Studies, RMIT UniversitySophie Hindes, PhD Candidate, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1762432022-02-02T12:13:37Z2022-02-02T12:13:37ZTexts reportedly referring to Scott Morrison as a ‘psycho’ are in the public interest - but ethical questions remain<p>The leaking and use of text messages purportedly between former New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian and a member of federal cabinet, in which Prime Minister Scott Morrison is described as “a horrible, horrible man”, “a complete psycho” and “a fraud” raise several serious ethical issues.</p>
<p>Peter van Onselen, the political editor of Network Ten, was the recipient of the leak, and dramatically made its contents public by reading them out in the form of a question to Morrison at the National Press Club on February 1. </p>
<p>He did not disclose the source of the leak, from which it can be inferred it was made in circumstances of confidentiality – in other words, on condition of anonymity. </p>
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<p>This brings us to the first ethical issue. A person who provides information to a journalist on condition of confidentiality is entitled to expect that confidentiality will be honoured by the journalist. </p>
<p>This obligation is enshrined in Australia’s national journalists’ <a href="https://www.meaa.org/meaa-media/code-of-ethics/">code of ethics</a>, that of the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance. </p>
<p>It is reinforced by the existence in all states except Queensland of what are called “shield laws”, which allow journalists to apply for a privilege against disclosing the identity of confidential sources in legal proceedings. Journalists in Australia have gone to jail rather than betray their source in court.</p>
<p>However, the same code requires that journalists should not enter into an obligation of confidentiality without first considering the source’s motives. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/view-from-the-hill-morrison-a-psycho-now-who-would-have-said-that-176259">View from The Hill: Morrison a 'psycho' – now who would have said that?</a>
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<p>This brings us to the second ethical question: did van Onselen try to establish what the motive of this leaker was? If not, why not? </p>
<p>For instance, why are these texts only coming to light now – two years after they were reportedly sent? It strongly suggests they have been stored up as ammunition for a strike against Morrison at a time when someone or some faction in the Liberal Party thinks it will do the most damage. And who is likely to benefit?</p>
<p>Moreover, was it part of the deal with the source that the material would be published in the way it was: as a question to Morrison in front of the cameras and a roomful of journalists at the National Press Club?</p>
<p>He owes the public an explanation about this, without giving away the identity of the source. </p>
<p>The third ethical issue concerns what steps, if any, van Onselen took to verify the provenance of the texts before making them public. This too is a matter on which he owes the public an explanation.</p>
<p>In the fallout from his disclosures, Berejiklian has said she <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-02-01/gladys-berejiklian-cant-remember-sending-text-about-pm/100796434">does not remember</a> sending such a text. But this falls far short of denying that she did. </p>
<p>Had van Onselen at least obtained that much from Berejiklian, he could have included it in his question to the prime minister.</p>
<p>He would have added to the strength of his leak by demonstrating he had taken some steps towards verification. </p>
<p>It also would have equipped van Onselen or any of the other journalists present to tell Morrison that Berejiklian had not denied sending the text, so what did he have to say about that?</p>
<p>This would have undercut Morrison’s strategy of sweeping these epithets aside as mere anonymous sledging. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/444054/original/file-20220202-27-xsgwr9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/444054/original/file-20220202-27-xsgwr9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444054/original/file-20220202-27-xsgwr9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444054/original/file-20220202-27-xsgwr9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444054/original/file-20220202-27-xsgwr9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444054/original/file-20220202-27-xsgwr9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/444054/original/file-20220202-27-xsgwr9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Former NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian has said she has ‘no recollection’ of the text messages.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Dean Lewins</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The fourth ethical issue concerns the extent to which van Onselen informed his editorial superiors at Network Ten about the leak, the circumstances in which he had obtained it and how he proposed to use it.</p>
<p>When journalists who work for a media organisation enter into an obligation of confidentiality, they bind not just themselves but their editor and their organisation.</p>
<p>Whether an editor will ask for the source’s identity is a matter of policy which varies from one organisation to another. Most generally will not, especially in a case like this where the journalist is a senior member of staff.</p>
<p>However, the editor is entitled to ask what steps the journalist has taken to establish motive, what the journalist’s assessment of the motive is, and what steps have been taken to verify the contents.</p>
<p>The objectives here are to be as sure as reasonably possible that the material is genuine, and to be as transparent with the public as possible without revealing the source.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/is-morrison-gaining-a-reputation-for-untrustworthiness-the-answer-could-have-serious-implications-for-the-election-171816">Is Morrison gaining a reputation for untrustworthiness? The answer could have serious implications for the election</a>
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<p>This is at least a partial antidote to the anonymity problem. Morrison has understandably seized on this, using the anonymous nature of the leak to try to detract from its damaging contents.</p>
<p>There is absolutely no question that the contents of the leak are of very significant public interest. Van Onselen was entirely justified in publishing them on public-interest grounds.</p>
<p>One final ethical question remains: has van Onselen been used as a catspaw by Morrison’s factional enemies and even if he has, does it matter? After all, many leaks of high public interest come from people with axes to grind.</p>
<p>Only the people involved will know whether he has been, and it does matter because journalists should take care not to be used as a catspaw. </p>
<p>That is why the questions of motive, verification and timing are so important in cases like this. It is a further reason why van Onselen and Network Ten owe the public as transparent an explanation for their conduct as possible without betraying the source.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/176243/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Denis Muller does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>There are key ethical questions journalists must ask themselves - and be able to answer - in situations such as this.Denis Muller, Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Advancing Journalism, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1701632021-11-23T16:25:38Z2021-11-23T16:25:38ZDo you use predictive text? Chances are it’s not saving you time – and could even be slowing you down<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/431730/original/file-20211112-17-1t9lsia.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C11%2C7951%2C5285&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/beautiful-young-stylish-woman-walking-night-753931645">ImYanis/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Typing is one of the most common things we do on our mobile phones. A recent survey suggests that millenials spend <a href="https://www.provisionliving.com/blog/smartphone-screen-time-baby-boomers-and-millennials/">48 minutes</a> each day texting, while boomers spend 30 minutes.</p>
<p>Since the advent of mobile phones, the way we text has changed. We’ve seen the introduction of autocorrect, which corrects errors as we type, and word prediction (often called predictive text), which predicts the next word we want to type and allows us to select it above the keyboard.</p>
<p>Functions such as autocorrect and predictive text are designed to make typing faster and more efficient. But research shows this isn’t necessarily true of predictive text.</p>
<p>A <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/2858036.2858305">study</a> published in 2016 found predictive text wasn’t associated with any overall improvement in typing speed. But this study only had 17 participants – and all used the same type of mobile device.</p>
<p>In 2019, my colleagues and I published <a href="https://doi.org/10.1145/3338286.3340120">a study</a> in which we looked at mobile typing data from more than 37,000 volunteers, all using their own mobile phones. Participants were asked to copy sentences as quickly and accurately as possible.</p>
<p>Participants who used predictive text typed an average of 33 words per minute. This was slower than those who didn’t use an intelligent text entry method (35 words per minute) and significantly slower than participants who used autocorrect (43 words per minute).</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A man sitting on a couch at home typing on his smartphone." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/432984/original/file-20211121-19-25qbq0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/432984/original/file-20211121-19-25qbq0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432984/original/file-20211121-19-25qbq0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432984/original/file-20211121-19-25qbq0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432984/original/file-20211121-19-25qbq0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432984/original/file-20211121-19-25qbq0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432984/original/file-20211121-19-25qbq0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Research has shown using predictive text doesn’t improve typing speed. But why?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/close-happy-handsome-young-hindu-bearded-1952119267">VAKS-Stock Agency/Shutterstock</a></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Breaking it down</h2>
<p>It’s interesting to consider the poor correlation between predictive text and typing performance. The idea seems to make sense: if the system can predict your intended word before you type it, this should save you time. </p>
<p>In my most <a href="https://doi.org/10.1145/3411764.3445566">recent study</a> on this topic, a colleague and I explored the conditions that determine whether predictive text is effective. We combined some of these conditions, or parameters, to simulate a large number of different scenarios and therefore determine when predictive text is effective – and when it’s not.</p>
<p>We built a couple of fundamental parameters associated with predictive text performance into our simulation. The first is the average time it takes a user to hit a key on the keyboard (essentially a measure of their typing speed). We estimated this at 0.26 seconds, based on <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/2470654.2466180">earlier research</a>.</p>
<p>The second fundamental parameter is the average time it takes a user to look at a predictive text suggestion and select it. We fixed this at 0.45 seconds, again based on <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/1240624.1240723">existing data</a>.</p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/to-drive-ai-forward-teach-computers-to-play-old-school-text-adventure-games-94437">To drive AI forward, teach computers to play old-school text adventure games</a>
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<p>Beyond these, there’s a set of parameters which are less clear. These reflect the way the user engages with predictive text – or their strategies, if you like. In our research, we looked at how different approaches to two of these strategies influence the usefulness of predictive text.</p>
<p>The first is minimum word length. This means the user will tend to only look at predictions for words beyond a certain length. You might only look at predictions if you’re typing longer words, beyond, say, six letters – because these words require more effort to spell and type out. The horizontal axis in the visualisation below shows the effect of varying the minimum length of a word before the user seeks a word prediction, from two letters to ten.</p>
<p>The second strategy, “type-then-look”, governs how many letters the user will type before looking at word predictions. You might only look at the suggestions after typing the first three letters of a word, for example. The intuition here is that the more letters you type, the more likely the prediction will be correct. The vertical axis shows the effect of the user varying the type-then-look strategy from looking at word predictions even before typing (zero) to looking at predictions after one letter, two letters, and so on.</p>
<p>A final latent strategy, perseverance, captures how long the user will type and check word predictions for before giving up and just typing out the word in full. While it would have been insightful to see how variation in perseverance affects the speed of typing with predictive text, even with a computer model, there were limitations to the amount of changeable data points we could include.</p>
<p>So we fixed perseverance at five, meaning if there are no suitable suggestions after the user has typed five letters, they will complete the word without consulting predictive text further. Although we don’t have data on the average perseverance, this seems like a reasonable estimate.</p>
<h2>What did we find?</h2>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/433095/original/file-20211122-13-lzwd4b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/433095/original/file-20211122-13-lzwd4b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=485&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433095/original/file-20211122-13-lzwd4b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=485&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433095/original/file-20211122-13-lzwd4b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=485&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433095/original/file-20211122-13-lzwd4b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=610&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433095/original/file-20211122-13-lzwd4b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=610&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433095/original/file-20211122-13-lzwd4b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=610&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/3411764.3445566">Kristensson and Müllners, 2021</a>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Above the dashed line there’s an increase in net entry rate while below it, predictive text slows the user down. The deep red shows when predictive text is most effective; an improvement of two words per minute compared to not using predictive text. The blue is when it’s least effective. Under certain conditions in our simulation, predictive text could slow a user down by as much as eight words per minute. </p>
<p>The blue circle shows the optimal operating point, where you get the best results from predictive text. This occurs when word predictions are only sought for words with at least six letters and the user looks at a word prediction after typing three letters.</p>
<p>So, for the average user, predictive text is unlikely to improve performance. And even when it does, it doesn’t seem to save much time. The potential gain of a couple of words per minute is much smaller than the potential time lost.</p>
<p>It would be interesting to study long-term predictive text use and look at users’ strategies to verify that our assumptions from the model hold in practice. But our simulation reinforces the findings of previous human research: predictive text probably isn’t saving you time – and could be slowing you down.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/lockdown-and-tech-overload-how-to-escape-your-screens-138654">Lockdown and tech overload – how to escape your screens</a>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/170163/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Per Ola Kristensson receives funding from EPSRC and Facebook Reality Labs. </span></em></p>The idea seems to make sense: if the system can predict your intended word before you type it, this should save you time. But that’s not necessarily the case.Per Ola Kristensson, Professor of Interactive Systems Engineering, University of CambridgeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1619092021-06-01T12:45:31Z2021-06-01T12:45:31ZWhy are there so many text scams all of a sudden?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403823/original/file-20210601-663-4zypfs.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C7%2C4992%2C3502&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/upset-stressed-woman-holding-cellphone-disgusted-236219071">pathdoc/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A new “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/money/2021/may/18/delivery-text-scams-the-nasty-new-wave-sweeping-the-uk">fraud wave</a>” has been reported in the UK, targeting mobile phone users with texts that, at first glance, appear to be from delivery companies or government institutions. </p>
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<iframe id="noa-web-audio-player" style="border: none" src="https://embed-player.newsoveraudio.com/v4?key=x84olp&id=https://theconversation.com/why-are-there-so-many-text-scams-all-of-a-sudden-161909&bgColor=F5F5F5&color=D8352A&playColor=D8352A" width="100%" height="110px"></iframe>
<p><em>You can listen to more articles from The Conversation, narrated by Noa, <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/audio-narrated-99682">here</a>.</em></p>
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<p>You may even have been targeted by the text scams yourself, which often ask you to pay missed delivery charges or tax fees and are sent from numbers that claim to belong to <a href="https://www.royalmail.com/help/scam-examples">Royal Mail</a>, <a href="https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/new-hermes-parcel-scam-text-20625341">Hermes</a> or <a href="https://www.thinkmoney.co.uk/blog/dont-fall-for-the-hmrc-text-scam/">HMRC</a>.</p>
<p>While these scams are actually nothing new, there does appear to have been a <a href="https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/scam-calls-texts-phone-massive-sudden-increase-b932553.html">sudden and dramatic increase</a> in their volume in recent weeks, coming after the recent spike in <a href="https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-vaccine-scams-fraud-experts-give-their-top-tips-to-help-you-stay-safe-154610">coronavirus vaccine scams</a> and scams targeting those seeking to <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-avoid-scams-when-buying-a-pet-online-153138">buy a pet online</a> during the pandemic. </p>
<p>The resurgence of text scams in the spring of 2021 also appears to be taking advantage of circumstances brought about by the pandemic – but learning more about them can help us to stamp them out.</p>
<h2>Increasing text scams</h2>
<p>To understand the apparent increase in text scams, we need to consider two key factors. The first is timing. Missed delivery charge scams are most often rolled out around the busy <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/money/2020/dec/19/missed-delivery-parcel-scams-christmas-dpd-royal-mail">Christmas postal period</a>, while tax scams are <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-47988270">usually timed around April</a> to coincide with the new financial year.</p>
<p>The pandemic has extended the window of opportunity for fraudsters to successfully target people with both types of scam. More of us are expecting a parcel in the post after increasing our <a href="https://blog.ons.gov.uk/2020/09/18/how-the-covid-19-pandemic-has-accelerated-the-shift-to-online-spending/">online shopping</a> since March 2020, while novel financial measures related to the pandemic, such as the furlough scheme, may have given people the impression that HMRC has temporarily altered its operations.</p>
<p>The second factor is volume. These types of scams are delivered en masse, and fraudsters only need to receive responses to a handful of the thousands of texts they send out to make significant sums of money. </p>
<p>That’s not because of the money they’re asking people to send them – which appears tiny in the case of a £1.43 delivery fee – but because criminals can use the card details they’re provided to <a href="https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/munster/arid-40303331.html">empty victims’ bank accounts</a>. Other text scams, which prompt you to click on a link, are designed to <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-56859091">infect your phone with malware</a> that can help criminals steal your personal data. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1385609431598223366"}"></div></p>
<p>The increasing volume of these scams suggests that they do work. And because their success encourages “<a href="https://www.ftadviser.com/your-industry/2019/06/03/hmrc-shuts-down-copy-cat-scams/">copy cat</a>” scams, with new criminal groups experimenting with their own text scams, it’s difficult to stamp them out entirely, despite <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-57226704">recent arrests</a>. The best way to counter these scams is to reduce their success rate, and we can do this by making the public aware of how and why text scams work.</p>
<h2>Why do we fall for text scams?</h2>
<p>Despite the apparent <a href="https://conversation.which.co.uk/scams/dpd-delivery-scam-email-phishing-warning/">crudeness</a> of these fraudulent messages, which often feature misspellings or incorrect grammar, they take advantage of timeworn techniques that exploit our <a href="https://theconversation.com/five-psychological-reasons-why-people-fall-for-scams-and-how-to-avoid-them-102421">psychological vulnerabilities</a>. The aim is to encourage us to respond on impulse rather than thinking through whether we may be being scammed.</p>
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<p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-do-we-fall-for-scams-55543">Why do we fall for scams?</a>
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<p><a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0191886920300374?via%3Dihub">Exploiting emotion</a> is the main method used by scammers to achieve this. The delivery charge scam, for instance, often threatens a loss if you don’t immediately pay for redelivery, with fraudsters issuing a tight deadline before they claim your parcel will be returned to its sender. Emotions such as fear, panic and anxiety can cause us to respond impulsively to scam messages.</p>
<p>On the other hand, positive emotions, such as excitement or hope, can also bias our judgement and encourage impulsive behaviour. The <a href="https://www.lovemoney.com/guides/15794/hmrc-tax-scams-refund-rebate-frauds-email-text-is-this-real-fake-uk">HMRC tax refund scam</a> is built on the promise of financial gain if you click on a link – but instead of transferring you cash, the link is built to facilitate <a href="https://www.actionfraud.police.uk/a-z-of-fraud/phishing">phishing</a> that gives criminals access to your personal data or bank details. </p>
<p>People are far more likely to fall for this scam if they’ve already received a genuine communication from HMRC that they’re due a tax refund. Psychologists refer to this feeling as “<a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/illusory-correlation">illusory correlation</a>”, which happens when we see events as linked when they’re not. Illusory correlation tends to confuse or relax our natural caution, making us more vulnerable to scams.</p>
<h2>Who are scammers targeting?</h2>
<p>Anyone can fall victim to scams. Contrary to popular opinion, <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-loneliness-in-older-people-makes-them-more-vulnerable-to-financial-scammers-73483">older people</a> are not more likely to be victims of text scams, partially because many older people may be less likely to bank and shop online, have dealings with HMRC, or even use mobile phones. </p>
<p>It’s the use of <a href="https://www.arunvishwanath.us/2019/05/10/why-smartphones-are-more-susceptible-to-social-attacks/">mobile devices</a> for these text-based scams that may actually make <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0747563216303624?via%3Dihub">younger people more susceptible</a>. While we’re somewhat used to scam emails, scam texts are relatively new. Texts also feel more intimate – we expect them to be from people we know, or from institutions we’ve trusted with our mobile number. And we often access texts on the go, when we’re <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11747-018-0604-7">busy or distracted</a> and less likely to question their veracity.</p>
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<p>To avoid falling victim to text scams, we suggest you take <a href="https://takefive-stopfraud.org.uk/">a few simple steps</a> before choosing to respond. First, make sure you take some time to properly look at the content of any message you receive. Any written message containing email addresses, phone numbers or language errors could help you spot a scam.</p>
<p>If you can’t spot any blatant errors, just wait – even for a few minutes – before responding. This will allow you time to think whether it’s normal for a company to communicate with you via text.</p>
<p>For delivery scams in particular, which are currently <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/money/2021/may/18/delivery-text-scams-the-nasty-new-wave-sweeping-the-uk">surging in the UK</a>, it’s well worth interrogating everything about the text you receive. Checking websites for the delivery companies they use, or even making a quick call to the delivery company the text claims to be from, can help clear things up. And at the end of the day, it’s better to miss your parcel than to lose thousands of pounds to scam artists.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/161909/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Crude text scams, sent en masse, only have to work a handful of times to make criminals significant sums of cash.Gareth Norris, Senior Lecturer, Department of Psychology, Aberystwyth UniversityAlexandra Brookes, Associate lecturer / PhD researcher, Aberystwyth UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1387552020-09-21T12:15:12Z2020-09-21T12:15:12ZWhy you’re getting so many political text messages right now<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/358862/original/file-20200918-24-kmzfj8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4167%2C4167&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">You just got another – yes, another – political text message.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/illustration/hand-holding-smartphone-with-alert-message-royalty-free-illustration/1255978050">goodvector/iStock via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Text messages and emails from political campaigns are pouring into Americans’ phones and inboxes right now. It’s happening to political junkies, to people who gave their phone numbers to campaigns, and even to people who try to keep their contact information off mass mailing lists.</p>
<p>I study political campaigns, including how they use social media and mobile phones to build support. In my book “<a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/presidential-campaigning-in-the-internet-age-9780190694043">Presidential Campaigning in the Internet Age</a>,” I document the history of how campaigns have used the web, social media and phones in efforts to attract independents and urge supporters to take action. </p>
<p>As part of my research for the 2020 election, I subscribed to get text messages from Democratic nominee Joe Biden and Republican nominee Donald Trump. I also used my personal email account – the same one I’ve been using since 1995 – to receive email updates and alerts from both campaigns. I try to look like a supporter. I engage with the emails or text messages periodically, by clicking the links, and I even contribute a tiny amount of my own money to both campaigns so that I really look like a supporter. </p>
<p>Compared to prior election campaigns, as I document in my book, this election is not any more or less active on email. It is not unusual for campaigns to send up to a dozen emails a day from different people on the campaign and the party. What is unusual is the volume of text messages. While both Republican and Democratic campaigns sent texts in 2016, the volume of Trump’s texting this election cycle is unprecedented. </p>
<p>I’ve been inundated, particularly with requests to donate money.</p>
<h2>Floods of requests</h2>
<p>During the two conventions, the sheer volume of messages from the campaigns was astounding, but especially from the Trump campaign. For every one message I received from the Democrats, I received three to five messages from the Republicans, and that was true over both conventions.</p>
<p>On Aug. 7, the night Donald Trump received the nomination, I received five text messages, all from different numbers, some claiming to be from other Republicans, like House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy. I received 16 emails from senders claiming to be Trump, his children, his wife and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley.</p>
<p>Campaigns bombard people with dozens of messages daily because it works. They use email and text messaging because the people who sign up for those communications are, typically, supporters. They already back the campaign and campaigns need money.</p>
<p>In July, Trump raised <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/05/us/elections/trump-vs-biden.html">more than US$165 million</a>, a record-breaking sum – no campaign had ever raised that much money in a single month – while Biden brought in $141 million. </p>
<p>Both campaigns have recently made huge advertising purchases, including Trump’s campaign <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/15/us/politics/trump-campaign-ads-dnc.html">spending $10 million to run TV ads against Biden</a> during the Democratic National Convention. Biden’s campaign has announced a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/05/us/politics/biden-ads.html">$280 million television ad buy</a> across two months and 15 battleground states.</p>
<p>They’ll need to spend – and raise – even more before Election Day arrives. </p>
<h2>More messages are better – for campaigns</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/358863/original/file-20200918-24-zcvmei.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A graphic showing text notifications." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/358863/original/file-20200918-24-zcvmei.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/358863/original/file-20200918-24-zcvmei.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=574&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/358863/original/file-20200918-24-zcvmei.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=574&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/358863/original/file-20200918-24-zcvmei.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=574&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/358863/original/file-20200918-24-zcvmei.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=721&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/358863/original/file-20200918-24-zcvmei.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=721&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/358863/original/file-20200918-24-zcvmei.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=721&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Campaigns send lots of texts.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/illustration/texts-doodle-royalty-free-illustration/1219463155">Jake Olimb/DigitalVision Vectors via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When I interview campaign operatives, they tell me that email is the single most effective way to raise money. Email is intimate, it lands in your inbox, and you can easily click a link to go to a website to provide your credit card number in exchange for a thank you and a sticker or a hat – and that feeling that you’re helping your candidate win. </p>
<p>While it might be easier to get large checks from small numbers of big donors, campaigns need high numbers of low-level contributors to demonstrate that they have the support of the masses. These texts and emails help get campaigns those small donations. </p>
<p>Texting is even more intimate, as the messages pop up in your notifications the way your friends’ texts do. Their punchy, personalized messages draw you in to click on the hyperlink: “Jenny, we’re sending the final list 8X-Match donors to Pres. Trump in 3 HOURS. Make sure your name is at the top.” Or “Jennifer, it’s Joe, and I have to ask one last time before tonight’s FEC deadline: Will you help me and Kamala reach our goal before midnight? We’re still short.”</p>
<p>Campaign operatives believe that the more messages they send, the greater the odds that you will act. One a day is not enough – though they do vary the timing and style of messages throughout the day. They’re betting that one of those messages will hit you in just the right way, at just the right time, to shift you from inaction to action and open your wallet. </p>
<p>[<em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>.]</p>
<p>Opting out is difficult – the messages appear in your most personal inboxes, so your instinct is not to ignore them. And they often come from different senders – I get texts from several numbers for each campaign – so it’s hard to block all the messages at once.</p>
<p>In addition, campaigns get more than just your money. Each time you act on one of those texts or emails – even if you just follow the link but don’t give money – the campaign gets insight on what types of messages seem to work with you. They’ll <a href="https://theconversation.com/amid-pandemic-campaigning-turns-to-the-internet-137745">learn from your responses</a>, and send you more messages like the ones that are successful, in the hopes you’ll stay involved.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/138755/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jennifer Stromer-Galley does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Mobile phones across the country are buzzing nonstop with text notifications from both presidential campaigns. A scholar of campaign communications explains why.Jennifer Stromer-Galley, Professor of Information Studies, Syracuse UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1125822019-03-29T11:27:09Z2019-03-29T11:27:09ZThe dying art of conversation – has technology killed our ability to talk face-to-face?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/266167/original/file-20190327-139349-13qj93w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>What with Facetime, <a href="https://theconversation.com/skype-hospital-appointments-are-coming-but-dont-hold-your-breath-109842">Skype</a>, Whatsapp and Snapchat, for many people, face-to-face conversation is used less and less often. </p>
<p>These apps allow us to converse with each other quickly and easily – overcoming distances, time zones and countries. We can even talk to virtual assistants such as Alexa, Cortana or Siri – commanding them to play our favourite songs, films, or tell us the weather forecast.</p>
<p>Often these ways of communicating reduce the need to speak to another human being. This has led to some of the conversational snippets of our daily lives now taking place mainly via <a href="https://theconversation.com/we-dont-want-ai-that-can-understand-us-wed-only-end-up-arguing-82338">technological devices</a>. So no longer do we need to talk with shop assistants, receptionists, bus drivers or even coworkers, we simply engage with a screen to communicate whatever it is we want to say.</p>
<p>In fact, in these scenarios, we tend to only speak to other people when the digital technology does not operate successfully. For instance, human contact occurs when we call for an assistant to help us when an item is not recognised at the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-shoplifters-justify-theft-at-supermarket-self-service-checkouts-97029">self-service checkout</a>.</p>
<p>And when we have the ability to connect so quickly and easily with others using technological devices and software applications it is easy to start to overlook the value of face-to-face conversation. It seems easier to text someone rather than meet with them. </p>
<h2>Bodily cues</h2>
<p>My research into digital technologies indicates that phrases such as “word of mouth” or “keeping in touch” point to the <a href="https://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/M/bo3637992.html">importance of face-to-face conversation</a>. Indeed, face-to-face conversation can strengthen social ties: with our neighbours, friends, work colleagues and other people we encounter during our day.</p>
<p>It acknowledges their existence, their humanness, in ways that instant messaging and texting do not. Face-to-face conversation is a rich experience that involves drawing on memories, making connections, making mental images, associations and choosing a response. Face-to-face conversation is also multisensory: it’s not just about sending or receiving pre-programmed trinkets such as likes, cartoon love hearts and grinning yellow emojis. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/266168/original/file-20190327-139374-fmlpic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/266168/original/file-20190327-139374-fmlpic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266168/original/file-20190327-139374-fmlpic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266168/original/file-20190327-139374-fmlpic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266168/original/file-20190327-139374-fmlpic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266168/original/file-20190327-139374-fmlpic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266168/original/file-20190327-139374-fmlpic.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Quicker and easier, but are we losing the human touch?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When having a conversation using video you mainly see another person’s face only as a flat image on a screen. But when we have a face-to-face conversation in real life, we can look into someone’s eyes, reach out and touch them. We can also observe the other person’s body posture and <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/37688404_Hand_and_Mind_What_Gestures_Reveal_About_Thought">the gestures they use when speaking</a> – and interpret these accordingly. All these factors, contribute to the sensory intensity and depth of the face-to-face conversations we have in daily life.</p>
<h2>Speaking to machines</h2>
<p><a href="https://sherryturkle.com/">Sherry Turkle</a>, professor of social studies of science and technology, warns that when we first “speak through machines, [we] forget how essential face-to-face conversation is to our relationships, our creativity, and our capacity for empathy”. But then “we take a further step and speak not just through machines but to machines”. </p>
<p>In many ways, our everyday lives now involve a blend of face-to-face and technologically mediated forms of communication. But in my teaching and research I explain how digital forms of communication can supplement, rather than replace face-to-face conversation.</p>
<p>At the same time though, it is also important to acknowledge that some people value online communication because they can express themselves in ways they might find difficult through face-to-face conversation.</p>
<h2>Look up from your phone</h2>
<p><a href="http://garyturk.com/portfolio-item/lookup/">Gary Turk</a>, is a spoken word poet whose poem Look Up illustrates what is at stake by becoming entranced by technological ways of communicating at the expense of connecting with others face-to-face. </p>
<p>Turk’s poem draws attention to the rich, sensory aspects of face-to-face communication, valuing bodily presence in relation to friendship, companionship and intimacy. The central idea running through Turk’s evocative poem is that screen-based devices consume our attention while distancing us from the bodily sense of being with others. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Z7dLU6fk9QY?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Ultimately the sound, touch, smell and observation of bodily cues we experience when having a face-to-face conversation cannot be fully replaced by our technological devices. Communicating and connecting with others through face-to-face discussion is valuable because it is not something that can be edited, paused or replayed. </p>
<p>So next time you’re deciding between human or machine at the supermarket checkout or whether to get up from your desk and walk to another office to talk to a colleague – rather than sending them an email – it might be worth following Turk’s advice and engaging with the human rather than the screen.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/112582/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Melanie Chan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>No longer do we need to talk with shop assistants, receptionists, bus drivers or even coworkers, we simply engage with a screen to communicate whatever it is we want to say.Melanie Chan, Senior Lecturer, Media, Communication and Culture, Leeds Beckett UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1070202018-11-15T10:37:40Z2018-11-15T10:37:40ZPutting the X in text: warm wishes or a kiss-off?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245728/original/file-20181115-194506-1bqqjfv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">lanych via Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Do you sign off texts and emails with an x? Have you ever thought what that x – shorthand for a kiss – means to you or the person who has sent it to you? It’s said that the liberal use of x in electronic correspondence, whether personal or professional, is <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/12/the-xo-factor/309174/">feminising the workplace</a> – and Labour MP Jess Phillips was told off for being unprofessional by a judge a couple of years ago for signing off <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/commentisfree/2016/apr/05/kisses-professional-work-emails-mp-jess-phillips-email-etiquette">an email to a constituent</a> with an x. So how did we arrive at a situation where everybody gets one at the end of nearly every sentence we type?</p>
<p>Part of our answer is really simple – the x in correspondence conveys a special kind of empathy for the recipient. In a world where uppercase letters read like SHOUTING and where emojis are ambiguous, every element of a text message is easily misunderstood. The x serves as a catch-all device, telling your reader that all is well in your relationship.</p>
<p>The ubiquitous x can be applied to friendship, romantic, or even professional relationships when messaging. It is so versatile, revealing interest, affection and a general kind of togetherness which, if face to face, would be equivalent to some kind of non-verbal body language – a head tilt, or a sympathetic nod to show agreement and understanding. The x shows that you are in this together and that you seek to continue the conversation in a spirit of mutual and even jovial appreciation.</p>
<p>However, this still doesn’t fully explain why it is an x that has come to wield such power, or why it feels so essential to include one. After all, it could be – and sometimes is – a different symbol: an emoji perhaps, or a simple smiley face like this: :). Nor does it tell us about the journey taken by the x in becoming this multifaceted symbol.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245729/original/file-20181115-194488-1o1cjbm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245729/original/file-20181115-194488-1o1cjbm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245729/original/file-20181115-194488-1o1cjbm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245729/original/file-20181115-194488-1o1cjbm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245729/original/file-20181115-194488-1o1cjbm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245729/original/file-20181115-194488-1o1cjbm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245729/original/file-20181115-194488-1o1cjbm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Are you free with your emojis?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mego studio via Shutterstock</span></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Making your mark</h2>
<p>History tells us that the x has a long pedigree. In the middle ages, handwritten letters would end with an + to signify the Christian symbol of Christ. With most people being illiterate, a cross <a href="https://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/%22X%22+as+a+Signature">was deemed</a> to be sufficiently accessible to verify identity. What’s more, there is <a href="https://mashable.com/2015/02/11/kiss-symbol-x/?europe=true#srmg.9zSasqJ">evidence</a> of such rituals of signing documentation to be accompanied by a physical kiss being given to the paper, as one might kiss a cross if of certain religious persuasions.</p>
<p>But, this still leaves a big gap between then and now. What happened at the beginnings of the digital revolution that explains this progressive encroachment into all of our correspondence, turning every message into its own letter? Equally, why did the x remain, while other elements of letter writing disappeared, such as writing: “Dear [name]”, or “from [name]” at the start and end of correspondence. We nearly never do this now when sending texts, because messaging has become an endless letter, a conversation that is always left open, to be picked up again at a later stage. It isn’t difficult to imagine that the cross at the end of letters evolved into the x just as words like “goodbye”, <a href="https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/goodbye">evolved</a> out of “God be with you”.</p>
<h2>Kissing culture</h2>
<p>Yet, for today’s generation, the connection behind the x is likely to be completely lost – it is simply some kind of kiss and, just like a cross, using it could land you in big trouble. After all, the kiss is remarkably culturally specific and an x can mean something very different – or nothing at all in a different language. For instance, in Spanish, x is short for “por”, meaning “for”. Equally, a kiss in one culture means something different in another and, in some cultures, <a href="https://scienceline.org/2006/10/ask-fiore-kiss/">there is no kissing at all</a>. There is also a gendered politics to a kiss, which can make it a highly risky undertaking to send, especially in professional settings.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245732/original/file-20181115-194506-19roxcm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245732/original/file-20181115-194506-19roxcm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245732/original/file-20181115-194506-19roxcm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245732/original/file-20181115-194506-19roxcm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245732/original/file-20181115-194506-19roxcm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245732/original/file-20181115-194506-19roxcm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245732/original/file-20181115-194506-19roxcm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Forgotten your phone?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Monkey Business Images via Shutterstock</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>At the same time, the x can be a way of allowing somebody to express themselves physically without the pressure of actually having to touch somebody. Indeed, this is one of the web’s most amazing features; it can liberate us from the constraints of social conventions and provide a space for relating to others differently – a perspective that <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1057/9781137297792_2">researchers have outlined</a> since its inception.</p>
<p>There may be many people who sign off with an x who would not think of kissing the person when face to face, but feel comfortable expressing such affection through a symbol. At a time when the world wide web’s inventor, Sir Tim Berners Lee, has called for <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-technology-www/father-of-web-says-tech-giants-may-have-to-be-split-up-idUSKCN1N63MV?">more love online</a>, this is surely a good thing.</p>
<p>So, while seemingly one of the most uncomplicated things we do when messaging, the x in texts has far wider implications than perhaps we first thought. A good rule may be to only send an x to people who would be comfortable with you kissing them face to face. Would you actually kiss that person, if they were in front of you? If not, then perhaps drop the x.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/107020/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andy Miah does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>People should be a bit more careful when signing off their emails and text messages. Not everyone wants a kiss.Andy Miah, Chair in Science Communication & Future Media, University of SalfordLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/869802017-12-11T14:49:11Z2017-12-11T14:49:11ZAIM brought instant messaging to the masses, teaching skills for modern communication<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/198023/original/file-20171206-31525-1spjrov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The AOL Instant Messenger icon became so well known it was made into a plush toy.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/kwreinsch/2258062113/">KW Reinsch</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Toward the mid-1990s, America Online (by then going by its nickname, AOL) was the company through which most Americans accessed the internet. <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2010/12/27/aol-discs-90s/">As many as half of the CD-ROMs</a> produced at the time bore the near-ubiquitous AOL logo, offering early computer users the opportunity to surf the internet for a flat fee – at the time, US$19.99 for <a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/3046194/a-brief-history-of-aol">unlimited monthly access</a>. </p>
<p>With <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=JWEJCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA236&lpg=PA236&dq=aol+hosted+half+of+us+internet+traffic&source=bl&ots=8f4-hHK6Jc&sig=TbC_WqI4OaPLLww5-0LCVnqAkjk&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjVjPiVhPTXAhVRUd8KHfsuAncQ6AEIPDAD#v=onepage&q=aol%20hosted%20half%20of%20us%20internet%20traffic&f=false">nearly half of U.S.-based internet traffic flowing through AOL</a>, the stage was set for a social evolution of sorts that shifted our collective relationship with technology and each other. AOL Instant Messenger, or AIM, was <a href="http://mashable.com/2014/04/15/aim-history/">launched in May 1997</a> as a way for AOL users to chat each other in real time, via text.</p>
<p>The service’s <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2017/10/06/aol-instant-messenger-shut-down/">Dec. 15 shutdown</a> was announced, notably, on a new real-time text communication channel, Twitter. That is just one testament to AIM’s lasting effects on how people use technology to connect today.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"916290747850264577"}"></div></p>
<h2>Interaction, in private</h2>
<p>AIM provided a space for discreet real-time interaction, with a layer of privacy not necessarily afforded by the home phone. In 1997, mobile phones were still remarkably expensive (<a href="https://medium.com/people-gadgets/the-gadget-we-miss-the-motorola-startac-9bc12db9eedb">the Nokia 6160 cost about $900 and the Motorola StarTAC cost nearly $1,000</a>) and most could not send text messages. A few savvy tech users used <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/1997/nov/26/news/mn-57816">pager-speak</a> to communicate “143” (“I love you”) to their partners; <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2015.07.036">a few others learned how romantic an email can be</a>. But technology-based interactions were limited; they didn’t allow for real-time connection and required access to a landline (if you were on the road, likely a payphone) and a computer terminal.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196357/original/file-20171125-21816-1p88t1j.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196357/original/file-20171125-21816-1p88t1j.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196357/original/file-20171125-21816-1p88t1j.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=412&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196357/original/file-20171125-21816-1p88t1j.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=412&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196357/original/file-20171125-21816-1p88t1j.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=412&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196357/original/file-20171125-21816-1p88t1j.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=518&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196357/original/file-20171125-21816-1p88t1j.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=518&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196357/original/file-20171125-21816-1p88t1j.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=518&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The login page from AIM.com, indicating the platform’s closure on Dec. 15, 2017 – complete with the author’s screen name, first established in 1997 when he was in high school. As of late November, none of his 150+ contacts was logged in.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Nicholas Bowman/WVU</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>AIM’s debut let friends and family connect in real time through their personal computers. Today, people might debate the proper balance between screentime and facetime in a society in which <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/17-tips-for-parenting-when-screens-are-everywhere_us_559ab04de4b0c706985a4491">screens are seemingly everywhere</a>. Yet communication research shows that <a href="http://doi.org/10.1177/1461444813495159">screentime can complement</a> rather than take away from facetime. For instance, scholars such as sociologist danah boyd argue that these venues were (and are still) critical for teenagers, who used AIM as a private space to <a href="https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300199000/its-complicated">engage each other and explore their own identities</a>. For boyd, communication technologies have provided teens with ways to socialize with each other away from structured adult supervision – <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2013/03/22/living/let-children-play-outside/index.html">something that today’s children find increasingly difficult</a>.</p>
<h2>Screen names and social interaction</h2>
<p>While certainly <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-its-important-to-understand-social-medias-dark-history-77230">not the first form of social interaction online</a>, AIM established for many people one of the most critical elements of online identity: the screen name. In a text-only environment, screen names provide some of the only identifying cues for users and <a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/basics-of-communication-a-relational-perspective/oclc/775279573">become the user’s embodied identity</a>. Through these screen names, the AIM space felt like a social one, populated with real people and personalities rather than cold screens and text. In fact, <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/were-all-still-secretly-using-our-1990s-aol-screen-names-why">many people still use their AIM screen name</a> for other social media services, and many more became skilled at <a href="http://doi.org/10.1525/si.2005.28.3.387">creating and maintaining more than one screen name</a>. </p>
<p>Unlike face-to-face conversations, technologies such as AIM also allowed conversations to persist on-screen, both in the short term (during the chat) and in the long term (as an archived chat). This can affect <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15213269.2016.1247718?journalCode=hmep20">how people see themselves</a>, as well as their friends – as users revisit ongoing conversations, they can adapt their language (and even their self-presentation) accordingly.</p>
<h2>Communication, sans cues</h2>
<p>When it became popular, the text-only nature of AIM seemed anathema to social interaction – after all, how could people communicate emotions and feelings via text, stripped of the nonverbal cues (such as facial expressions and touch) that are so <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF02173410">critical to human communication</a>? People didn’t make the connection to the fact that it’s fairly common to have in-person interactions disrupted by nonverbal cues – such as when someone’s <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2016/02/03/health/resting-bitch-face-research-irpt/index.html">facial expressions don’t match</a> the content of the conversation.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196360/original/file-20171125-21858-12jq9dt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/196360/original/file-20171125-21858-12jq9dt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196360/original/file-20171125-21858-12jq9dt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196360/original/file-20171125-21858-12jq9dt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196360/original/file-20171125-21858-12jq9dt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196360/original/file-20171125-21858-12jq9dt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/196360/original/file-20171125-21858-12jq9dt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Early consensus about communication technology assumed that because the technologies didn’t have nonverbal communication cues, they would be less effective for communication.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Media_Richness_Theory_Diagram_PNG.png">Tntdj</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Communication scholar Joseph Walther theorized that a reason communication technologies such as AIM were capable of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/009365096023001001">fostering meaningful social interaction</a> is that users are able to overcome the lack of nonverbals. In fact, he says, systems like AIM made it easier to form relationships online, because people might be less critical or judgmental of each other, knowing that some social cues were missing – and focus more on the words of the conversation itself. </p>
<p>AIM is also where many people first saw and used emojis (then still called <a href="https://github.com/Crissov/unicode-proposals/issues/257">emoticons</a>) to convey emotional context around ambiguous texts – adding a smiley or a frown-face to clarify what’s meant by a message such as “waiting for you to arrive.”</p>
<p>The platform also proved fertile for the development of <a href="http://aimlingo.aimawaymessages.com/">text-speak</a> abbreviations to save keystrokes – the sorts of “LOL” and “BRB” notes now ubiquitous in smartphone texting. While some feared that <a href="http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1083-6101.2006.00031.x">teenagers’ use of techno-gibberish would damage their language development</a>, today’s <a href="http://www.pewinternet.org/2014/09/10/younger-americans-and-public-libraries/">millennials are reading more than any other generation</a>. This use of language suggests they may have more – not less – sophisticated communications skills. </p>
<h2>AIM as a legacy technology</h2>
<p>As AIM shuts down at the end of 2017, the program can fairly call itself a success. It provided the earliest widespread platform for real-time text-based chat, honing users’ skills for the eventual adoption of smartphone-based texting and microblogs like Twitter. Indeed, as AOL’s own statement about the shutdown says, “<a href="https://aimemories.tumblr.com/">The way in which we communicate with each other has profoundly changed</a>” – in large part because of AIM.</p>
<p>Of course, for technology buffs still looking toward bygone technologies, another cue-lean, relational technology introduced in 1997 is making a comeback: The Tamagotchi digital pocket pets were <a href="http://www.rollingstone.com/glixel/news/tamagotchi-pocket-pals-return-for-20th-anniversary-w507970">re-released in November</a>. Otherwise, those looking to revisit AIM after its closure might consider the video game “<a href="http://store.steampowered.com/app/417860/Emily_is_Away/">Emily is Away</a>” to play through an interactive scenario with their high school bestie.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/86980/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nicholas Bowman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As it closes down 20 years after launching, a look back at the key role AOL Instant Messenger played in preparing people for today’s digital messaging methods.Nicholas Bowman, Associate Professor of Communication Studies, West Virginia UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/799082017-06-23T00:37:20Z2017-06-23T00:37:20ZCould long-distance bullies in Australia face up to 20 years in jail for encouraging suicide?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175309/original/file-20170623-27922-1fegql5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wkyxXeOC0k">Fox10 NewsNow</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In a rare decision, a young woman who encouraged another teenager to kill himself has been <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/16/us/suicide-texting-trial-michelle-carter-conrad-roy.html">found guilty of manslaughter</a>. A Massachusetts judge found that Michelle Carter’s text messages to her boyfriend, Conrad Roy III, contributed to Roy’s suicide by carbon monoxide poisoning.</p>
<p>The case marks a controversial development in the criminal law. The question of whether Carter’s conduct would constitute manslaughter in most states and territories in Australia boils down to whether long-distance bullies can be held responsible for another’s suicide.</p>
<h2>The facts of the case</h2>
<p>Roy had a history of depression and had previously attempted suicide. When he started expressing a desire to take his life, Carter originally discouraged him from doing so. However, she later started encouraging Roy. In a series of text messages, she repeatedly told him:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>You just need to do it.</p>
<p>Tonight is the night. It’s now or never.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Carter even provided information about how long it would take him to die from carbon monoxide poisoning:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Just park your car and sit there and it will take, like, 20 minutes … It’s not a big deal.</p>
<p>If you do it right … it will 100% work. It’s not that hard to mess up.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>At one point, as his car was filling with noxious fumes, Roy became sick and scared. He got out of the car and contacted Carter. She told him to:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Get back in.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>It was this final comment that sealed Carter’s fate. The judge said that when Roy exited his car, he broke the “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wkyxXeOC0k">chain of self-causation</a>” – and Carter’s exhortation to him to “get back in” established her responsibility for his death.</p>
<p>The case, although controversial, is not unprecedented. Two previous cases in the US have found defendants liable for manslaughter for encouraging someone else to commit suicide. One involved a game of <a href="http://law.justia.com/cases/massachusetts/supreme-court/1963/345-mass-627-2.html">Russian roulette</a>. Another involved the defendant <a href="http://masscases.com/cases/sjc/343/343mass19.html">loading a gun</a>, giving it to his wife, and encouraging her to use it to kill herself.</p>
<p>What was novel about the Carter case is that the accused was found guilty of homicide on the basis of <a href="https://theconversation.com/will-guilty-verdict-in-teen-texting-suicide-case-lead-to-new-laws-on-end-of-life-issues-79712">words alone</a>, and that she was miles away from Roy at the time of his death.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/1wkyxXeOC0k?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Watch the verdict from US juvenile court Judge Lawrence Moniz in Bristol County, Massachusetts.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Would this be a crime in Australia?</h2>
<p>Carter’s conduct could easily be captured by several laws in Australia. For one thing, it is already a crime to incite another person to <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/vic/consol_act/ca195882/s6b.html">commit suicide</a>.</p>
<p>In addition, laws introduced in Victoria after Brodie Panlock took her life in <a href="http://www.justice.vic.gov.au/home/safer+communities/crime+prevention/bullying+-+brodies+law">2006</a> make it a crime to send an email or text message to another person with the intention of causing them to harm themselves.</p>
<p>But those crimes can only be punished with five or ten years in prison. The maximum penalty for manslaughter, on the other hand, is 20 years. </p>
<p>From the viewpoint of the criminal law, the most difficult task for the prosecution would be to establish causation. </p>
<p>Can Carter be said to have caused Roy’s death, or would his act of suicide be considered an independent act, an exercise of free will, for which he was solely responsible? The trial judge in Carter’s case found that her act of encouraging Roy to “get back in” his car started the clock on her responsibility for what happened afterwards.</p>
<p>Whether a judge in Australia would reach a similar conclusion is yet to be seen, but here’s what we do know. </p>
<p>To prove that a person’s act, such as sending an SMS or making comments during a phone call, caused a particular result (such as someone else committing suicide) the act must have “substantively contributed” to the suicide, or suicide must have been a “reasonably foreseeable” consequence. It is certainly arguable that Carter’s repeated messages substantively contributed to Roy’s death and that his death was a reasonably foreseeable consequence of her encouragement.</p>
<p>In <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/sa/consol_act/clca1935262/s13a.html">South Australia</a>, Carter’s conduct might have constituted murder, an even more severe charge than Carter faced in the US, as a person in that state who uses “<a href="https://www.legislation.sa.gov.au/LZ/C/A/CRIMINAL%20LAW%20CONSOLIDATION%20ACT%201935/CURRENT/1935.2252.UN.PDF">undue influence</a>” to induce another person to commit suicide may be liable for murder.</p>
<h2>Can texting really make you liable for manslaughter or murder?</h2>
<p>The fact that Carter was miles away when Roy got back into the car and killed himself may be expected to cause problems in making her responsible for his death. Many people argue that this factor alone means she should not have been found criminally liable. </p>
<p>But given these two young people primarily conducted their close relationship through text messages and phone calls, and that Carter was on the phone telling Roy to get back into his car immediately before he died, is the fact that she was not physically present when Roy killed himself really significant?</p>
<p>It might be that recognising culpability for messages conveyed by telephone, SMS and online is simply bringing the law into the 21st century.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>If you or someone you know need someone to talk to, for any reason, call Lifeline on 13 11 14 – 24 hours a day.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/79908/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Whether such a verdict would be handed down in Australia remains to be seen, but there are a few things we do know about cases like this one.Marilyn McMahon, Associate Professor in Law, Deakin UniversityDr Paul McGorrery, PhD Candidate (Criminal Law), Deakin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/617922016-07-19T10:07:40Z2016-07-19T10:07:40ZWhy does using a period in a text message make you sound insincere or angry?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130955/original/image-20160718-2144-8y8nnc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">And you thought it just indicated the end of a sentence...</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-371447425/stock-vector-vector-dot-pattern-geometric-color-background.html?src=YjwAyc-vZWeGAtn1yqyIcw-1-89">"Dots" via www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When it comes to texting, the period, full stop, point – whatever you call it – has been getting a lot of attention. </p>
<p>People have begun noticing slight changes to the way our smallest punctuation mark is deployed, from declarations that it’s <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/10/world/europe/period-full-stop-point-whatever-its-called-millennials-arent-using-it.html?_r=1">going out of style</a> to claims that it’s <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/115726/period-our-simplest-punctuation-mark-has-become-sign-anger">becoming angry</a>. </p>
<p>What they’re actually noticing is written language becoming more flexible, with texting possessing its own set of stylistic norms (sometimes informally called “textspeak” or “textese”). </p>
<p>The period is merely one example of this shift, a change that has opened up new possibilities for communicating with written language. Just as we have different styles of speaking in different situations, so do we have context-dependent styles of writing. </p>
<h2>Reading between the periods</h2>
<p>Though periods can still signal the end of a sentence in a text message, many users will omit them (especially if the message is only one sentence long). This tendency now subtly influences how we interpret them. </p>
<p>Because text messaging is a conversation that involves a lot of back-and-forth, people add fillers as a way to mimic spoken language. We see this with the <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/life/the_good_word/2013/07/ellipses_why_so_common_what_are_they_really_for.html">increased use of ellipses</a>, which can invite the recipient to continue the conversation. The period is the opposite of that – a definitive stop that signals, as linguistics professor Mark Liberman <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/115726/period-our-simplest-punctuation-mark-has-become-sign-anger">has explained</a>, “This is final, this is the end of the discussion.” </p>
<p>For some, this can appear angry or standoffish.</p>
<p>Earlier this year, psychologist Danielle Gunraj <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0747563215302181">tested</a> how people perceived one-sentence text messages that used a period at the end of the sentence. Participants thought these text messages were more insincere than those that didn’t have a period. But when the researchers then tested the same messages in handwritten notes, they found that the use of a period didn’t influence how the messages were perceived.</p>
<p>In <a href="http://www.american.edu/cas/lfs/faculty-docs/upload/text-messaging-and-im.pdf">a 2007 study</a> by linguists Naomi Baron and Rich Ling, multi-sentence text messages often had punctuation to indicate where the sentences stopped, but only 29 percent of these texts had punctuation at the very end of the message. The reason, Baron and Ling explain, is that “the act of sending a message coincides with sentence-final punctuation.” </p>
<h2>Situational switches</h2>
<p>But of all the things to feel when seeing a period at the end of a text message – why <em>insincerity</em>?</p>
<p>The answer could have something to do with a term used by linguist John J. Gumperz: “<a href="https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=aUJNgHWl_koC&oi=fnd&pg=PR7&dq=gumperz+1982+situational+codeswitching&ots=jBD__PL91f&sig=txN5bW8diZlhQblV7-_z5A6IMm0#v=onepage&q=situational%20codeswitching&f=false">situational code-switching</a>,” which is when we change how we talk depending on where we are, who we’re talking to or how we’re communicating. </p>
<p>A common example is the way we talk in a job interview versus at a bar with friends. Typically, a speaker will use much more formal language in an interview than when hanging out with peers. If you talked to your friends the same way you talked during a job interview, it would probably give a stilted, distant feeling to the conversation.</p>
<p>Scholars originally investigated situational code-switching in <em>spoken</em> language because spoken language was used in both casual and formal settings. In the past, written language was almost always tinged with a level of formality because it was associated with permanence in books and written documents.</p>
<p>However, now that text messaging and social media have given their users an outlet for casual written language, differences between writing styles can be seen. </p>
<p>The use of the period is one example of situational code-switching: When using one in a text message, it’s perceived as overly formal. So when you end your text with a period, it can come across as insincere or awkward, just like using formal spoken language in a casual setting like a bar.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130956/original/image-20160718-1906-1gb1ab4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130956/original/image-20160718-1906-1gb1ab4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=379&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130956/original/image-20160718-1906-1gb1ab4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=379&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130956/original/image-20160718-1906-1gb1ab4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=379&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130956/original/image-20160718-1906-1gb1ab4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=476&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130956/original/image-20160718-1906-1gb1ab4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=476&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130956/original/image-20160718-1906-1gb1ab4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=476&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Social norms dictated by code-switching could explain why using proper grammar in a text might make you look insincere.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-267024407/stock-vector-ditsy-vector-polka-dot-pattern-with-scattered-hand-drawn-small-circles-in-bright-gold-pink-blue.html?src=YjwAyc-vZWeGAtn1yqyIcw-1-58">'Paint Dots' via www.shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A different form of sincerity</h2>
<p>Another example of language change in casual written forms is the repetition of letters. Communication scholar Erika Darics <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211695813000330">has observed</a> that the repetition of letters or punctuation marks adds intensity to messages (“stopppp!!!”). She writes that this creates “a display of informality through using a relaxed writing style.” </p>
<p>Linguist Deborah Tannen <a href="http://press.georgetown.edu/book/languages/discourse-20">described a similar phenomenon</a>, noting that repeated exclamation points in a message can convey a sincere tone, like in the following text message:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>JACKIE I AM SO SO SO SORRY! I thought you were behind us in the cab and then I saw you weren’t!!!!! I feel soooooooo bad! Catch another cab and ill pay for it for youuuuu </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Note that this message does not contain a message-final period, since that may convey insincerity that would contradict the apology being presented. Instead, the sender uses the non-standard long vowels in “soooooooo” and “youuuuu” as well as five exclamation points at the end of one sentence. </p>
<p>Compare this to a standardized version of the text message:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Jackie, I am so sorry. I thought you were behind us in the cab and then I saw you weren’t. I feel so bad! Catch another cab and I’ll pay for it for you. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>This more formal version, according to the arguments made by Tannen and Darics, reads more like a work email sent to a colleague than one to a friend sincerely and fervently apologizing for a transportation mishap. </p>
<p>It’s a bit counterintuitive, but using formal language may undermine the sincerity of the apology; in order to convey the “right” message, it’s important to know the proper protocols. This may explain why some people’s text messages seem stilted or awkward: they’re used to writing with a formal style that doesn’t translate to the casual medium. </p>
<h2>Will texting erode our writing skills?</h2>
<p>In the media, there’s been a fair amount of debate about whether texting – or using overly casual language – can “ruin” someone’s writing ability. (Examples include the <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2012/aug/02/business/la-fi-tn-texting-ruining-kids-grammar-skills-20120801">LA Times</a>, <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/talking_point/2815461.stm">the BBC</a> and <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2241980/How-texting-history-ruined-language--plenty-marriages.html">The Daily Mail</a>, to name a few.) </p>
<p>However, past research into situational code-switching in spoken language has shown that a person’s ability to code-switch <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15235882.2004.10162613">can signal social competency</a>, can <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01434632.1992.9994487">affirm one’s sense of identity or membership in a community</a> and <a href="http://jeg.sagepub.com/content/30/1/7.full.pdf+html">may be an indicator of high intellectual ability in children</a>. </p>
<p>Studies like <a href="http://psycnet.apa.org/psycinfo/2016-09370-001/">the recent work of psychologists Gene Ouellette and Melissa Michaud</a> have shown that the use of text messaging and “textese” has little relationship to how someone will score on spelling, reading and vocabulary tests. Meanwhile, <a href="http://crx.sagepub.com/content/37/3/420">a study out of California State University</a> found little use of “textisms” in formal letter writing assignments completed by students. This observation supports work like <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1741-4369.2008.00489.x/full">a study by psychologist Beverly Plester and colleagues</a>, who found that an increased use of textese was correlated with higher scores on verbal reasoning ability tests. They suggested that the preteens in their study were able to “slip between one register of language and another, as they deem it appropriate.”</p>
<p>This shows that frequent and fluent users of casual written language can often readily code-switch: they know to put that period at the end of every sentence in a formal writing assignment. Some educators are even beginning to incorporate <a href="http://www.readwritethink.org/resources/resource-print.html?id=31158">lessons about formal and informal writing into their classrooms</a>, which can help students identify those situations that require the use of different styles. </p>
<p>Instead of ignoring or deriding the variation in written language, embracing the change in language – and the ability of speakers and writers to code-switch – can lead to better communication skills in all contexts.</p>
<p>Knowing when a period might indicate insincerity is just one of them.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/61792/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lauren B. Collister does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>For centuries, written communication was tinged with formality and finality. But since the emergence of casual forms like texting, using proper grammar can be fraught with misinterpretation.Lauren B. Collister, Scholarly Communications Librarian, University of PittsburghLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/588552016-05-05T05:36:11Z2016-05-05T05:36:11ZWhy is Brazil trying to block WhatsApp?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/121299/original/image-20160505-19860-phum5n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">It's not the first time attempts have been made to block WhatsApp in Brazil.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/gallery-3878147p1.html?cr=00&pl=edit-00">Chonlachai Panprommas/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The debate about online privacy versus the battle against crime was given new life this week with an attempt in Brazil to ban the popular messaging application <a href="https://www.whatsapp.com/">WhatsApp</a>.</p>
<p>A well-known and strict judge in a regional area of Brazil issued a court order <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-05-03/whatsapp-blocked-by-brazilian-court-for-72-hours/7378490">banning WhatsApp</a> for 72 hours in the whole country on Monday, because of problems he was having getting information from the company that owns the app. </p>
<p>That company is Facebook, which bought the app for US$19 billion in 2014, and <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-02/facebook-s-whatsapp-blocked-again-in-brazil-over-data-dispute">it was allegedly not cooperating</a> by handing over data from customers in a drug-running case that the judge was presiding over.</p>
<h2>One billion users</h2>
<p>The app has become very popular with smartphone users in many parts of the developing world since it provides a free messaging service that rivals SMS.</p>
<p>In February this year, the company said the app was used by <a href="https://blog.whatsapp.com/616/One-billion">one billion people</a>, nearly one in seven people on the planet. The number of users in Brazil is said to be about 100 million people.</p>
<p>But the issue with WhatsApp and other similar apps, including <a href="https://www.wickr.com/">Wickr</a>, is that they guarantee <a href="https://blog.whatsapp.com/10000618/end-to-end-encryption">end-to-end encrypted</a> communications. It’s this feature that is very popular with those who value personal privacy.</p>
<p>For criminals, it provides a secure channel for avoiding surveillance of any kind. The only way their planning and operations can be accessed by law enforcement agencies, if they are communicated via WhatsApp, is with the cooperation of the company holding the data.</p>
<p>But Facebook says it has no power to access the user data anyway. This case appears to echo the same sentiments as those displayed in the recent Apple versus FBI mobile phone incident.</p>
<p>WhatsApp’s co-founder and CEO Jan Koum <a href="https://www.facebook.com/jan.koum/posts/10154106409995011">issued a statement via Facebook</a> explaining why it did not have the data the court was requesting:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Yet again millions of innocent Brazilians are being punished because a court wants WhatsApp to turn over information we repeatedly said we don’t have. Not only do we encrypt messages end-to-end on WhatsApp to keep people’s information safe and secure, we also don’t keep your chat history on our servers. When you send an end-to-end encrypted message, no one else can read it – not even us.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Different cultures</h2>
<p>The case is another instance of the lack of clarity between large US-based telecoms and social media companies over collaboration and cooperation with international governments.</p>
<p>The issue of access to and use of data collected from social media is again happening in a framework of different cultures, varying unexplored attitudes to privacy and within authoritarian legislative systems. </p>
<p>This case had a short term (and potentially longer term) and successful conclusion. The <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2016/05/02/world/whatsapp-suspended-brazil/">WhatsApp suspension was lifted</a> after 24 hours by another judge.</p>
<p>But this is not the first time the WhatsApp service has been banned in Brazil. In December 2015, it was <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-12-17/brazil-judge-blocks-usage-of-facebook-s-whatsapp-for-48-hours">banned for 48 hours</a>. This was also lifted after about 12 hours.</p>
<p>Then, in March, the same Brazilian judge who ordered this week’s ban ordered the vice president of Facebook in Latin America, Diego Dzodan, to <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-35700733">be detained by authorities</a> regarding lack of access to WhatsApp data. He was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/mar/05/facebook-brazil-diego-dzodan-arrest-sao-paulo">released after 24 hours</a>. </p>
<p>In all cases, the aim of the judges has been to obtain information about alleged criminal activities such as drug trafficking. The approach may seem heavy-handed, but that could be about to change.</p>
<p>Brazil is looking at changes to its legislation governing the use of the internet that could see an end to any attempts to shut down any app across the whole country.</p>
<p>One reform, proposed by lower house deputy Esperidião Amin, would allow the blocking of specific individuals or IP addresses suspected of illicit activity.</p>
<p>“It’s less dramatic than withdrawing the service from the whole of the Brazilian population,” <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-brazil-whatsapp-unblock-idUSKCN0XU1YY">he told Reuters</a>.</p>
<h2>Across borders</h2>
<p>But this latest case highlights several issues. First, there is an ongoing debate about the nature of the internet and social media. Liberal democracies have an expectation of a right to privacy, but within them, there is an equal demand for efficient law enforcement, solutions to major crime and provision of national security and protection from terrorism.</p>
<p>Second, companies such as Facebook need to walk carefully and work across different cultures and legal systems to achieve the balance between the demands for security and privacy. It’s often hard to see how these can be achieved.</p>
<p>Third, cybersecurity and privacy legislation is still in its infancy in many under-developed economies and advanced applications are being accessed in economies where the legal boundaries are not clear.</p>
<p>Thankfully, it is very hard to envisage a situation such as this occurring in a country such as Australia, where there has been a more engaged debate over the tension between technology, legislation and privacy.</p>
<p>In more developed economies, the problems that arise from the tension between privacy and national security have had much more debate, but have not necessarily been resolved for all citizens.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/58855/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jill Slay does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>It’s a battle of online privacy versus a crackdown on crime, but is a total ban on the popular app, WhatsApp, the right way to go?Jill Slay, Director, Australian Centre for Cyber Security, UNSW SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/577042016-04-18T14:35:01Z2016-04-18T14:35:01ZHow to start nudging people to drink less alcohol<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/118907/original/image-20160415-11182-1h02sfc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">I drank how much more than my peers?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/dl2_lim.mhtml?src=K_f__S7rlY4_Yf1Aim9PvQ-1-91&clicksrc=download_btn_inline&id=330353657&size=medium_jpg&submit_jpg=">www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Millions of pounds are spent each year to bombard us with information on the risks of alcohol. But do such campaigns work? <a href="http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/hea/34/12/1200/">Our research</a> shows that some simple tweaks to how the message is delivered – by applying findings from behavioural science – could help government campaigns have a far bigger impact. And cost savings might even go some way to filling the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/mar/15/nhs-22bn-funding-black-hole-report-public-accounts-committee">£22 billion funding black hole</a> the NHS finds itself in.</p>
<p>Excessive drinking is a big problem. Although between 2010 and 2013 household spending on alcoholic drinks in the UK <a href="https://www.drinkaware.co.uk/about-us/research-and-impact/databank/data-and-facts-on-alcohol-consumption-and-the-consequences/consumption">fell by 5.7%</a>, liver disease in those under 30 <a href="http://www.alcoholconcern.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/APPG_Manifesto.pdf">has more than doubled</a> over the past 20 years with Alcohol Concern estimating that <a href="http://www.alcoholconcern.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/APPG_Manifesto.pdf">1.2m people a year</a> are admitted to hospital for alcohol-related problems.</p>
<p>The recent fall in spending on alcohol has been attributed to a rise in drinks taxes and the economic downturn, but that <a href="http://www.bmj.com/content/353/bmj.i1860">could be reversed</a> with the recovery and the duty on drinks being dropped in 2014.</p>
<h2>Using a new tactic</h2>
<p>The health sector needs a new tactic to change people’s behaviour and this is where behavioural science, or “nudging”, can help. Behavioural science has worked in other areas. The Cabinet Office’s <a href="http://www.behaviouralinsights.co.uk/">Behavioural Insights Team</a> or Nudge Unit, as it is popularly known, experimented with income tax reminder letters and how they were framed. They found that the repayments rate <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-16943729">increased by 15%</a> when people were told most people living in their town or area had already paid. At a cost of very little, an extra <a href="http://www.behaviouralinsights.co.uk/tax/behavioural-insights-tax-trials-win-civil-service-award/">£210m of tax revenue</a> was brought into HMRC.</p>
<p>We looked at how framing the message could affect how excessive drinkers responded using theories from behavioural economics. There is a large body of work that has shown that people are influenced by how they rank relative to others, rather than by their perception of how they <a href="http://bit.ly/1MCPxpO">differ from the average</a>. </p>
<p>We applied this knowledge to the problem of excessive drinking and found that people were much more likely to seek advice when ranked against their peers than when their drinking was compared with the official guidelines or the group average. </p>
<p>We sent a group of 101 students, who drank excessively, four text messages over four weeks. One ranked how much they drank in a week compared with others (the rank comparison) – for example: “You are in the top 10% of heaviest drinkers.” A second message compared their drinking with the official alcohol guidelines (absolute comparison), while a third showed their consumption compared with the average of the group being tested (mean comparison). And the final text detailed the official alcohol consumption guidelines (absolute framed).</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/118909/original/image-20160415-11188-uovfza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/118909/original/image-20160415-11188-uovfza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118909/original/image-20160415-11188-uovfza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118909/original/image-20160415-11188-uovfza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118909/original/image-20160415-11188-uovfza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118909/original/image-20160415-11188-uovfza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/118909/original/image-20160415-11188-uovfza.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Alcohol consumption may go up as the economy improves.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/dl2_lim.mhtml?src=XMMl9HCuyAh9ibu9XLcKUA-1-32&clicksrc=download_btn_inline&id=127896002&size=medium_jpg&submit_jpg=">www.shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The rank comparison text that showed how much they drank compared to others led to half the excessive drinkers asking for expert recommendations on alcohol consumption, and nearly 45% requested links to alcohol education websites.</p>
<p>The absolute comparison text that compared their drinking with the official alcohol guidelines saw just 5% do this. This figure rose to just over 11% when drinkers were sent the average comparison text, comparing their drinking to the mean average.</p>
<p>The absolute framed message, detailing the official alcohol consumption guidelines did better, with 20% wanting links to helpful websites and around 15% seeking experts’ help.</p>
<p>In addition, 25% who saw the rank comparison text requested details for services for people worried about their alcohol intake. The other texts saw just 5% ask for this, with nobody asking for any details after the absolute comparison text.</p>
<h2>Reframing the message</h2>
<p>Our findings suggest that future interventions might benefit from focusing on telling people how their behaviour ranks among others. It shows more consideration should be given as to how messages can be improved through presenting information in ways in which it is naturally processed.</p>
<p>It is important, however, to emphasise this intervention did not lead to a reduction in participants’ alcohol consumption; this is likely to be because reducing alcohol use is a complex change needing lots of different interventions.</p>
<p>But we found that a minor “reframing” of the message greatly increased its effectiveness at persuading people to seek help. Excessive drinkers typically <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277953615003494">underestimate their consumption</a> relative to that of others, but if we rank them, citing, for example, that they are in the top 10% of heavy drinkers for their age group then it is more likely to give them the impetus to find out more to both educate them on what alcohol does to their bodies and to seek advice on how to reduce their drinking.</p>
<p>Although the sample size was small, this is the first test of whether rank framing is a superior method of presenting information rather than comparing people to the average.</p>
<p>Most public health information compares people to the average, but our study shows that ranking people will be far more effective. This is how people naturally process information, by comparing themselves with others, and could lead to a reduction in drinking in the long run.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/57704/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ivo Vlaev does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Excessive drinkers are more likely to seek help when their drinking habits are compared with their peers than when they are simply given the guidelines.Ivo Vlaev, Professor of behavioural science, Warwick Business School, University of WarwickLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/544002016-03-22T19:38:50Z2016-03-22T19:38:50ZText message medication reminders can save the lives of those with chronic illness<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114802/original/image-20160311-11267-1qqyv65.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">People with a chronic illness find it challenging to keep to their medication regime.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">from shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>If you are diagnosed with a chronic disease, chances are you’ll have to manage it for the rest of your life. This means changing your lifestyle and taking medications as directed.</p>
<p>Many find this challenging. In fact, within a year of being diagnosed with a chronic condition, <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19528344">only 50% of patients</a> still take their medications correctly. </p>
<p>Some have stopped altogether. These patients can unwittingly put themselves at greater risk of heart attack, stroke or premature death. So how can we ensure this doesn’t happen?</p>
<h2>Why you should take your medication</h2>
<p>Chronic conditions such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancers, arthritis and high blood pressure <a href="http://aihw.gov.au/chronic-diseases/">are on the rise</a> all over the world.</p>
<p>They are the leading cause of illness, disability and death in this country, <a href="http://aihw.gov.au/chronic-diseases/about/">estimated to cost</a> A$27 billion each year. Currently <a href="http://aihw.gov.au/media-release-detail/?id=60129552034">about half of all</a> Australians have a chronic illness.</p>
<p>As a cardiovascular specialist, I see patients living with heart disease every day. They may have survived their first heart attack but are now at greater risk of having a second.</p>
<p>We do everything we can to prevent that second, often fatal, attack by encouraging people to change their lifestyle and, just as importantly, to take their medications as directed.</p>
<p>This is because poor adherence to a medication routine – when patients don’t take their medications consistently or just stop taking them altogether – is naturally associated with worse health outcomes.</p>
<p>One <a href="http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=205042">study showed survivors</a> of a heart attack who adhered poorly to cholesterol-lowering drugs (statins) had a 25% higher risk of a fatal heart attack one year on. </p>
<h2>Why don’t people take their medication?</h2>
<p>Many people with a chronic illnesses <a href="http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMra050100">don’t always feel sick</a>. Medications are intended to prevent their condition from worsening rather than to make them feel better in the short run. Because they don’t feel immediate benefits, it’s easy to think the medications are not working, which can lead to patients stopping them altogether.</p>
<p>For some, it’s the cost factor. Studies <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16961440">looking at cholesterol-lowering statins</a> have shown higher prices are associated with lower adherence.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114804/original/image-20160311-11282-zgevuy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/114804/original/image-20160311-11282-zgevuy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114804/original/image-20160311-11282-zgevuy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114804/original/image-20160311-11282-zgevuy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114804/original/image-20160311-11282-zgevuy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114804/original/image-20160311-11282-zgevuy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/114804/original/image-20160311-11282-zgevuy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">We found text messaging doubled the odds of patients with chronic diseases sticking to their medication program.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">from shutterstock.com</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Those with chronic diseases are often on multiple medications. Some of these they have to take once a day, some twice a day, others with meals, some before meals – all of this makes for a complex routine that can be confusing to follow.</p>
<p>Not having convenient access to a pharmacy can also be a barrier to medication adherence. This is usually a problem for the more vulnerable, such as those on a pension, those from a lower socioeconomic background, shift workers, those dependent on others for transport and those who have mobility problems.</p>
<p>And finally, there are people who are wary of drugs and perceived side effects. </p>
<p>A 2010 study in <a href="http://www.internationaljournalofcardiology.com/article/S0167-5273(16)30032-8/abstract">adults with high blood pressure</a> in Spain found reasons for patients not adhering to their medication regime included having to take several medications at once, having a mental illness, living in a rural area and being younger.</p>
<h2>How we can improve medication adherence</h2>
<p>Patients need support and encouragement to take their medications and SMS messaging is a simple, cheap and seemingly effective way to keep them on track.</p>
<p>A 2015 <a href="http://www.nature.com/bjc/journal/v112/n6/abs/bjc201536a.html">study in the United Kingdom</a> showed a 20% increase in women attending breast cancer appointments after receiving text reminders.</p>
<p>Asthma patients in a Danish trial are <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1550628/">keeping SMS diaries</a> to help them monitor and manage their condition. </p>
<p>And <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25565587">another study last September</a> found patients with chronic pain had a significant reduction in pain when they received supportive daily text messages.</p>
<p>We <a href="http://archinte.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=2484905">reviewed 16 randomised clinical trials</a> around the world evaluating mobile text messaging to promote medication adherence in adults with chronic disease.</p>
<p>The way the text message alerts worked in the studies were varied. In one, patients were sent a text when they failed to open a medication dispenser; others were sent personalised texts at predetermined times about specific medications and dosages. Some were sent daily, others weekly. </p>
<p>Regardless of the method, we found text messaging doubled the odds of patients with chronic diseases sticking to their medication program.</p>
<p>But the studies we surveyed were held over an average of twelve weeks. We’re currently running a text messaging trial to be sure it works over longer periods.</p>
<p>Our <a href="https://www.anzctr.org.au/Trial/Registration/TrialReview.aspx?id=364448">TEXTMEDS study</a> is taking place at twenty urban and rural hospitals across Australia, involving 1,400 patients with cardiovascular disease. We hope to show these innovative and cost-effective strategies can help large numbers of people over the long term.</p>
<p>Global governments and policymakers should look closely at the research for an effective and inexpensive method of text message reminders that can help get patients with chronic diseases to take life saving medications.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/54400/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Clara Chow receives funding from the NHMRC and the Heart Foundation. She is affiliated with CSANZ (Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand). </span></em></p>Patients with chronic illness need support and encouragement to take their medications. SMS messaging is a simple, cheap and seemingly effective way to keep them on track.Clara Chow, Director of Cardiovascular Division, George Institute for Global HealthLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/557982016-03-08T10:26:01Z2016-03-08T10:26:01ZEverything you ever wanted to know about nuisance phone calls<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/113887/original/image-20160304-17726-trviyo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">How not to deal with sales calls</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">wavebreakmedia/Shuuterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>We’ve all experienced it. Your phone rings, you pick it up, say hello and it’s someone you don’t know trying to sell you something – or a recorded message. Nuisance calls can be irritating, time-wasting and for some people, highly distressing. But can anything be done about them?</p>
<p>In July 2013, the <a href="https://ico.org.uk/">Information Commissioners Office</a> (ICO) and telecommunications regulator, <a href="http://www.ofcom.org.uk/">Ofcom</a>, announced they were <a href="http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/consultations/silent-calls/joint-action-plan/">joining forces</a> to tackle nuisance calls. Then, from last April, the <a href="https://ico.org.uk/action-weve-taken/nuisance-calls-and-messages/">ICO was given new powers to crack down</a> on nuisance calls through an amendment to the <a href="https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-pecr/">Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations</a>. The results of which are now starting to be seen. </p>
<p>Only last month the ICO issued its <a href="https://ico.org.uk/about-the-ico/news-and-events/news-and-blogs/2016/02/record-fine-for-company-behind-staggering-46-million-nuisance-calls/">largest ever fine of £350,000 to Prodial</a>, a company that had made more than 46m nuisance calls. </p>
<p>Manchester based <a href="http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/business/business-news/marketing-cold-calls-firm-fined-10904916">MyIML</a>, a telemarking company selling solar panels was also recently fined £80,000 by the ICO for contacting people who had opted out of receiving marketing calls. </p>
<h2>Why are nuisance calls such an issue?</h2>
<p>One of the main reasons nuisance calls are such a big problem these days is that it has never been so easy or cheap to setup a call centre. Today’s telephone network is one large computer and with business connection charges falling, all a telesales company needs is their own computer loaded with software – which is <a href="https://www.google.co.uk/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=call%20centre%20software">readily available from the web</a>. </p>
<p>With <a href="http://www.voipfone.co.uk/What_Is_Voip.php">modern Voice over IP systems</a>, call centres don’t even need their own direct link to the telephone network, so long as they are connected to the internet. The telesales organisation’s computer can then automatically dial telephone numbers, connecting those that answer through to telesales operators or a recorded message. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/113889/original/image-20160304-17714-gy9gyt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/113889/original/image-20160304-17714-gy9gyt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/113889/original/image-20160304-17714-gy9gyt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/113889/original/image-20160304-17714-gy9gyt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/113889/original/image-20160304-17714-gy9gyt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/113889/original/image-20160304-17714-gy9gyt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/113889/original/image-20160304-17714-gy9gyt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Don’t call us, we’ll call you!</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Tyler Olson/shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There is generally considered to be <a href="http://consumers.ofcom.org.uk/phone/tackling-nuisance-calls-and-messages/?a=0">three types</a> of nuisance call. <a href="http://consumers.ofcom.org.uk/phone/tackling-nuisance-calls-and-messages/live-marketing-calls/">Live calls</a> are unwanted calls from a real person, normally from a telesales company. <a href="http://consumers.ofcom.org.uk/phone/tackling-nuisance-calls-and-messages/recorded-message-marketing-calls/">Automated calls</a> result in you hearing a pre-recorded marketing message when you answer the phone. And <a href="http://consumers.ofcom.org.uk/phone/tackling-nuisance-calls-and-messages/abandoned-and-silent-calls/">silent or abandoned calls</a> are just that – when you answer the phone no-one’s there. Then there’s also the issue of unwanted <a href="http://consumers.ofcom.org.uk/phone/tackling-nuisance-calls-and-messages/marketing-texts/">SMS text messages</a>. </p>
<p>In January 2016, <a href="https://ico.org.uk/action-weve-taken/nuisance-calls-and-messages/">the ICO received 9,633</a> reports of nuisance calls to be investigated: 45% of these related to automated calls, 42.5% live calls and 12.5% SMS text messages. </p>
<h2>How can you stop nuisance calls?</h2>
<p>With nuisance calls becoming such a, well, nuisance, the telephone providers are now moving to tackle the problem at source. <a href="http://help2.talktalk.co.uk/how-do-i-manage-nuisance-calls">Talk Talk</a> has expanded their HomeSafe system to monitor the frequency of calls and to automatically block those that exceed a threshold from even reaching a customer’s phone. And in February this year, <a href="http://home.bt.com/news/bt-life/bt-offers-breakthrough-service-to-divert-huge-numbers-of-nuisance-calls-11364039280071">BT announced a similar service</a> is to be rolled out across their network. </p>
<p>But on top of this, there is also a lot you can do yourself to help reduce the number of calls. First off, you should always report nuisance calls to either the ICO or Ofcom – so they can be investigated. It’s all too easy to get annoyed and slam the phone down, but if you take a minute to gather as much information as possible and pass it on to the relevant organisation, at least then you might be saving someone else from the nuisance of nuisance calls in the future.</p>
<p>You should also register with the <a href="http://www.tpsonline.org.uk/tps/index.html">Telephone Preference Service</a>. While this alone won’t stop nuisance calls, because it relies on the compliance of organisations, it does act as a deterrent, and is well worth doing if you haven’t done so already. </p>
<p>Another way of managing nuisance calls, is by using <a href="https://www.nfon.com/gb/solutions/resources/glossary/clip/">caller line identification</a> – which allows you to see the number of the person calling you. If you don’t recognise it, you simply have the option of not answering. You can also use call blocking either on your phone or through your telephone provider to stop calls from specific numbers. </p>
<p>Another tip, don’t immediately speak but listen when answering the phone because if it remains silent, there’s a good chance it’s a telesales call. </p>
<p>And of course, you’ve probably heard if before, but do be very careful of the small print on any paper or online form you complete, as you may inadvertently be allowing that organisation to contact you for marketing purposes - effectively saying yes to cold calling. </p>
<h2>Will they ever go away?</h2>
<p>Over the years, telecommunications firms have benefited from connecting companies to their networks and through the sale of services such as call blocking, so it is good to see some of that now being re-invested into tackling nuisance calls. </p>
<p>However, the next challenges are already emerging with a growing number of nuisance calls now being directed towards mobile phones. “<a href="http://consumers.ofcom.org.uk/phone/tackling-nuisance-calls-and-messages/phone-spoof-scam/">Spoofing</a>” has also become a big issue, with telesales companies now able to deceive us, and the network providers, by faking their own telephone number to get you to take the call. </p>
<p>So while it is good to see the regulators have begun the fightback with a renewed determination, sadly, so long as it remains profitable for telesales companies to operate, nuisance calls will continue to plague us. Even if overall volumes are reduced, each one we receive is still a nuisance.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/55798/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nigel Linge is a Fellow of the IET, ITP and BCS Professional Institutions.
He has also received funding for research projects from the EPSRC and EU.</span></em></p>Is hanging-up the only way of getting rid of cold callers?Nigel Linge, Professor, Computer Networking and Telecommunications, University of SalfordLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/451502015-09-29T08:41:06Z2015-09-29T08:41:06ZIs cyberbullying all that goes ‘over the line’ when kids are online?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/95403/original/image-20150918-17676-qgwhv9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Digitally stressed?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?lang=en&language=en&ref_site=photo&search_source=search_form&version=llv1&anyorall=all&safesearch=1&use_local_boost=1&autocomplete_id=&search_tracking_id=l4WZdeI4rFxUMGJa1JmtbQ&searchterm=online%20bullying&show_color_wheel=1&orient=&commercial_ok=&media_type=images&search_cat=&searchtermx=&photographer_name=&people_gender=&people_age=&people_ethnicity=&people_number=&color=&page=1&inline=111830402">Girl Image via www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In a TED talk this past spring, watched by over six million viewers, Monica Lewinsky called herself <a href="http://time.com/3751535/monica-lewinsky-ted-talk-i-was-patient-zero-of-internet-shaming/">“Patient Zero”</a> of cyber-fueled bullying and shaming.</p>
<p>When this “scandal” unfolded, the concept of internet-enabled public shaming was relatively unprecedented. And Lewinsky’s case certainly brought the epidemic threat of digital social networks into public consciousness.</p>
<p>Today, those born in 1998, the year that the world learned of Lewinsky and Bill Clinton’s affair, are in their teen years. And for them, the concept of internet-induced shaming is <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/15/magazine/how-one-stupid-tweet-ruined-justine-saccos-life.html">hardly new</a>.</p>
<p>Today’s kids are connected to, through and within the digital world as never before – <a href="http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/04/09/teens-social-media-technology-2015/">88% of American teens aged 13-17</a> have access to a mobile phone and 73% have access to smartphones. About 92% are on the internet every <a href="http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/04/09/teens-social-media-technology-2015/**">day</a>. This means that adolescents have unprecedented opportunities to create, connect and investigate digital social media. </p>
<p>As researchers at Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE), we study teens’ experiences with technology and social media. In a recent project, we studied the digital stresses that teenagers are facing today. <a href="http://nms.sagepub.com/content/early/2014/07/21/1461444814543989.abstract">Recently</a> we looked at stories that had been posted by adolescents to MTV’s online forum, “Over the Line?” between 2010 and 2013.</p>
<p>And as our own research also shows, kids today face a variety of digital stressors – from negotiating how much communication to have with close friends to managing challenges like public shaming.</p>
<h2>The new digital stressors</h2>
<p><a href="http://www.athinline.org/overtheline">Over the Line?</a> is an online forum for youth that was launched in 2010. It was designed to exchange experiences and advice regarding digital abuse. According to users’ self-reports, a “typical” poster on the site is 15 years old and female. </p>
<p>By 2013 – the time when we began the project – the <a href="http://www.athinline.org/overtheline">site</a> contained over 7,000 stories. Of these, we selected a systematic random sample of 2,000 stories to analyze for our study.</p>
<p>Researchers studying youths’ personal experiences often face several barriers. These include finding young people who are willing and able to openly share personal experiences. We were fortunate to discover (and to be given access to) the authentic repository of stories posted to “Over the Line?”</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/95404/original/image-20150918-17701-1l52xjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/95404/original/image-20150918-17701-1l52xjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=336&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95404/original/image-20150918-17701-1l52xjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=336&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95404/original/image-20150918-17701-1l52xjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=336&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95404/original/image-20150918-17701-1l52xjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=422&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95404/original/image-20150918-17701-1l52xjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=422&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95404/original/image-20150918-17701-1l52xjy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=422&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Online bullying can come in many forms.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/fixersuk/11947831296/in/photolist-jcMKZj-5r5nTR-c7CuL7-8dEdj3-dtFfo2-dtLMZ9-dtLMMG-dtLMSj-6JMMkb-6SBrdW-77qY7o-77qY7q-6KVNsM-7QDAVM-dt6DKp-7RBJx3-77qY7w-ncZb7k-9RJ9zf-9chSab-7Ywrih-7Ywrid-8yN4wZ-nQaxoG-c6tDGQ-6os4Si-nQ59XN-nxK8iz-nS1DG8-nPW4wT-nxJqXL-nQe5Nv-nQatLm-nQax5f-nQe72x-nQe85e-nQe7UV-nxJE6w-nNbvSY-nNbx6j-nxJrqv-nQauXQ-nQavYs-bn4ktJ-5U4C4H-eakQqr-6TeQEB-86nwxv-bzYcZ8-5U4Cj6">The home of Fixers on Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This material was particularly valuable since teens wrote about their experiences as they actively dealt with the issues.</p>
<p>Through teens’ stories, we identified six distinct digital stress experiences.</p>
<p>Teens describe receiving mean and harassing personal attacks, which come directly to them through texts or direct digital messages. They also describe public shaming and humiliation; in contrast to direct messages, public shaming happens in front of a digitally enabled audience. </p>
<p>Public shaming can take the form of gossip or text-based messages that someone posts about another person, or may involve mass distribution of embarrassing pictures (think everything from unflattering images to revealing “nudies”).</p>
<p>That’s not all. We found a collection of accounts of impersonation – that is, someone else posting hurtful, embarrassing or slanderous information while pretending to be that person. This was described in teens’ stories as either through accessing and sending messages from his or her personal account or by creating a new, fake account.</p>
<p>These three stressors – personal attacks, public shaming, and impersonation – all represent issues generally fueled by varying degrees of hostile intentions. At times, they are akin to <a href="https://cyber.law.harvard.edu/publications/2012/kbw_bulling_in_a_networked_era">cyberbullying</a>; at times they more closely resemble heightened cases of <a href="http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm%3Fabstract_id=1926349">“digital drama</a>.”</p>
<p>All of these issues are related to some kind of relational conflict or hostility. Some have a clear victim, while others reflect more “mundane” conflict; some may not even show a clear distinction between victims and perpetrator; and some could just be cases of “serious meanness” versus “just kidding.”</p>
<h2>Another set of issues</h2>
<p>Other than these, teens’ stories also described digital stressors of a different kind: challenges that arise while navigating close relationships in today’s digital ecology.</p>
<p>For instance, when it is the sheer quantity of messages facilitated by digital communication that becomes burdensome – rather than the content – teens indicate feeling smothered by digital communication.</p>
<p>There is also another kind of issue that emerges from crossing boundaries and violating norms. </p>
<p>Giving in to curiosity to read or access private traces of digital communication with others leads to a breach of trust. And that frequently produces information that poses issues for both the “spy” and the “spied upon.” </p>
<p>For example, a teen may be tempted to glance through a friend’s text messages when the friend’s phone is left out on a table. How does she respond when she finds that her friend has been texting unfavorably about her with a boy on whom she has a crush?</p>
<p>Also, teens share accounts of feeling a pressure to comply with requests for access to sensitive content such as nude photographs. The pressure is particularly acute when the requests come from the target of a teen’s affection. Sending nude pictures seems to offer a powerful currency, often a strong signal of trust and attraction.</p>
<p>These latter three stressors – feeling smothered, breaking and entering, and pressure to comply – in many ways align with and echo broader public debates about the boundaries, norms and nature of <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/reference/index-privacy.html">digital privacy</a>.</p>
<h2>Forming a community of support</h2>
<p>We were also interested in understanding the (anonymous) advice these young personal account posters were receiving on how to deal with digital stressors. </p>
<p>So approximately one year after we began our original analysis of teens’ posts to “Over the Line?,” we conducted a <a href="http://jar.sagepub.com/content/early/2015/06/18/0743558415587326.full.pdf+html">second analysis</a> of teens’ posts.</p>
<p>This time we focused on the specific comments and advice anonymously offered by peers in response to personal accounts of digital stress. We culled a sample of 628 comments posted in response to 180 stories of digital stress (30 stories for each of the original six digital <a href="http://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/uk/15/07/digital-drama">stressors</a>.</p>
<p>We found several recommendations came up regularly: get help from others (especially adults in positions of authority); communicate directly with the person involved in the situation; cut ties (ie, end the friendship or, if it is a significant other, break up); try to ignore or avoid the situation; and utilize digital solutions, such as block, un-friend or alter privacy settings.</p>
<p>Seeking outside help, particularly from adults and authority figures, was one of the most common recommendations when it came to issues of public shaming as well as for impersonation and mean personal attacks.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/95406/original/image-20150918-17701-16ve2ci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/95406/original/image-20150918-17701-16ve2ci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95406/original/image-20150918-17701-16ve2ci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95406/original/image-20150918-17701-16ve2ci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95406/original/image-20150918-17701-16ve2ci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95406/original/image-20150918-17701-16ve2ci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95406/original/image-20150918-17701-16ve2ci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">How are kids coping with digital stressors?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/usagvicenza/8190565300/in/photolist-dtLMH7-7AVGYZ-sth7r7-tjNQZ5-nsdYdu-d589fm-i5pJh2-jcMKZj-5r5nTR-c7CuL7-8dEdj3-dtFfo2-dtLMZ9-dtLMMG-dtLMSj-6JMMkb-6SBrdW-77qY7o-77qY7q-6KVNsM-7QDAVM-dt6DKp-7RBJx3-77qY7w-ncZb7k-9RJ9zf-9chSab-7Ywrih-7Ywrid-8yN4wZ-nQaxoG-c6tDGQ-6os4Si-nQ59XN-nxK8iz-nS1DG8-nPW4wT-nxJqXL-nQe5Nv-nQatLm-nQax5f-nQe72x-nQe85e-nQe7UV-nxJE6w-nNbvSY-nNbx6j-nxJrqv-nQauXQ-nQavYs">USAG Vicenza</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>However, in cases of impersonation, “utilizing digital solutions” was also considered a practical response. This might entail, for example, reporting the account as fake so that it could be taken down or blocking the account.</p>
<p>For mean personal attacks, the most popular advice – other than to get help – was to simply try to ignore or avoid it.</p>
<p>However, getting help was the least common recommendation for digital stressors regarding the conflicts endemic to intimate relationships. Teens most often recommended that their peers deal with this genre of issues by simply cutting ties and breaking off the friendship or relationship.</p>
<p>These descriptive findings raised several questions for us about the efficacy of the recommended strategies.</p>
<p>For a teen coping with public shaming, it’s likely a good thing that their peers recommend help from adults, assuming the adults know how to help.</p>
<p>At the same time, imagine turning to a friend to complain about receiving too many messages from a significant other and receiving the advice to simply ditch him or her. And “ignore it” is easy advice to give but may be quite difficult to apply toward someone who cares about you.</p>
<h2>Making sense of their stories</h2>
<p>We set out to study teens’ stories because we wanted to understand what social challenges they face in their digital lives. In the process, we were reminded that it is not just researchers who are trying to make sense of teens’ experiences. </p>
<p>Teens, too, are actively defining their own norms, drawing their own “lines,” and doing their best to navigate all from the best and to the hardest aspects of their social relationships in a digitally connected context.</p>
<p>The outpouring of queries and of generally well-intentioned (if not always effective) advice reminds us that teens crave various forums, safe places, where they can talk with one another about their experiences and offer support.</p>
<p>So, are social media good or bad for teens? Is “digital stress” a reason for hand-wringing? </p>
<p>We think these questions are beside the point. We know that a tool can be a weapon, and a weapon can be a tool. We need to continue to figure out how we can amplify teens’ good intentions and desires as they tweet, post, “like,” comment, text, and share. </p>
<p>And, if we pay attention to the ways new media at times complicate or generate “digital stress” – not for the purpose of imposing restrictions, but in order to offer meaningful support – we can continue to help teens wield their tools adeptly.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/45150/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Emily C Weinstein is affiliated with Common Sense Education.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robert L Selman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Kids today face a variety of digital stressors –from negotiating how much communication to have with close friends to digital abuse.Emily C Weinstein, Doctoral Student, Harvard UniversityRobert L Selman, Professor of Human Development and Education and Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry, Harvard UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/384082015-04-06T10:15:40Z2015-04-06T10:15:40ZEmoticons and symbols aren’t ruining language – they’re revolutionizing it<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77057/original/image-20150403-9335-mgdy22.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Does this represent the degeneration of language? Not quite.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?searchterm=Modern%20mobile%20instant%20messenger%20chat%20poster%20with%20hands%20and%20smartphones%20illustration&language=en&lang=en&search_source=&safesearch=1&version=llv1&media_type=&media_type2=images&search_cat=&searchtermx=&photographer_name=&people_gender=&people_age=&people_ethnicity=&people_number=&color=&page=1&inline=190917395">from www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>txt msgs r running language</p>
<p>*ruining </p>
<p><sup>lol,</sup> jk!! :) </p>
<p>In many casual discussions of language and the internet, it’s not uncommon to hear about how such “textspeak ruins language” – how technology has made everybody lazy with their speech and writing. Major media outlets such as the <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2012/aug/02/business/la-fi-tn-texting-ruining-kids-grammar-skills-20120801">LA Times</a>, the <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/talking_point/2815461.stm">BBC</a> and <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2241980/How-texting-history-ruined-language--plenty-marriages.html">The Daily Mail</a> have all bemoaned the ways in which people communicate through technology.</p>
<p>Of course, language does change when it’s used to text or write messages on the internet. It’s even become the focus of the field of linguistics known as Computer-Mediated Communication (CMC). Although it specifies computers in its name, CMC refers to the study of interaction facilitated by technology like computers, mobile phones and tablets. </p>
<p>And contrary to the idea that these innovations are corrupting language, they actually demonstrate a creative repurposing of symbols and marks to a new age of technology. These evolutions of language are swift, clever and context-specific, illustrating the flexibility of the language to communicate nonverbal meaning in a nuanced, efficient manner.</p>
<h2>Change doesn’t mean decay</h2>
<p>It turns out that people have been complaining about language being “ruined” for as long as they’ve been writing and speaking. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/john_mcwhorter_txtng_is_killing_language_jk/transcript?language=en#t-576632">In a TED Talk</a>, linguist John McWhorter shared stories of people complaining about language change through the ages. For example, in 63 AD a Roman scholar groused that students of Latin were writing in an “artificial language” – a language that would become French!</p>
<p>And a 1871 <a href="http://books.google.com/books/about/Report_of_the_President_of_Harvard_Colle.html?id=VxFOAAAAMAAJ">quote</a> from Charles Eliot, the President of Harvard University, might sound familiar:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Bad spelling, incorrectness, as well as inelegance of expression in writing, ignorance of the simplest rules of punctuation… are far from rare among young men otherwise well prepared for college studies.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77035/original/image-20150403-9351-n34rsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77035/original/image-20150403-9351-n34rsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=774&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77035/original/image-20150403-9351-n34rsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=774&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77035/original/image-20150403-9351-n34rsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=774&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77035/original/image-20150403-9351-n34rsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=972&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77035/original/image-20150403-9351-n34rsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=972&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77035/original/image-20150403-9351-n34rsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=972&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Former Harvard president Charles Eliot spouted a ‘kids these days…’ refrain that’s been repeated throughout history.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9a/Charles_William_Eliot.jpg">Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Young Theodore Roosevelt – a student at Harvard in the 1870s – was possibly among those young men being described. As historian Kathleen Dalton observed in <a href="http://smile.amazon.com/Theodore-Roosevelt-A-Strenuous-Life/dp/0679767339?sa-no-redirect=1">her biography of Roosevelt</a>, the future president would eventually support <a href="http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9D00E3DB173EE733A25756C2A96E9C946797D6CF">the revision of American English spelling rules</a>, many of which we still use today, like changing -re endings to -er in words like <em>center</em> and changing -our to -or in words like <em>color</em>. </p>
<h2>The emoticon: more than a face</h2>
<p>Today, people are able to communicate rapidly through a range of mediums – and perhaps no linguistic development better indicates changes in the ways we communicate than the ubiquitous emoticon. </p>
<p>The emoticon :) – a colon followed by a parenthesis – is a visual representation of a smiley face turned sideways. Although an emoticon may <em>look</em> like a smile, a frown <a href="https://support.skype.com/en/faq/FA12330/what-is-the-full-list-of-emoticons?">or any number of facial expressions</a>, it doesn’t represent a face, as many internet users assume. It’s actually intended to convey a feeling (“I’m happy,” or “just joking”). </p>
<p>This meaning is evident even in the first emoticon, <a href="http://mashable.com/2011/09/20/emoticon-history/">credited</a> to Scott Fahlman at Carnegie Mellon University. In a 1982 <a href="http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/mbj/smiley/smiley.html">e-mail</a>, Fahlman suggested :-) as a “joke marker” to indicate wisecracks or sarcasm in text communication. In this legendary e-mail, he also used the first instance of the frown emoticon :-(. </p>
<p>Words that represent these feelings are what linguists call <em>discourse particles</em>, or little pieces of language that convey information about the tone of the statement. Folklorist Lee-Ellen Marvin <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/enhanced/doi/10.1111/j.1083-6101.1995.tb00324.x/">called them</a> the “paralanguage of the internet, the winks which signal the playfulness of a statement over the seriousness it might denote.” </p>
<p>In a study of instant messaging, scholar <a href="http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/cpb.2007.0132">Shao-Kang Lo</a> describes emoticons as “quasi-nonverbal cues” – something that looks like a word, but performs the functions of a nonverbal cue, like a hand gesture or nod. </p>
<p>In fact, the variations in how you construct this emoticon can imply something about your identity, just like whether you use a soda, pop or Coke can <a href="http://popvssoda.com">suggest</a> what part of the United States you come from. For example, as linguist and data scientist Tyler Schnoebelen <a href="http://repository.upenn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1242&context=pwpl">pointed out</a> in a 2012 study, people who put a “nose” in their emoticons tend to be older than non-nose emoticon users.</p>
<p>Though emoticons have been the subject of <a href="http://patricklowenthal.com/publications/preprint--A_literature_review_on_the_use_of_emoticons_to_support_online_learning.pdf">numerous</a> <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.5539/ass.v9n4p201">studies</a>, individual symbols – which serve a different purpose than emoticons – can add meaning to a message or express meaning all on their own.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77037/original/image-20150403-9351-asormn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77037/original/image-20150403-9351-asormn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=438&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77037/original/image-20150403-9351-asormn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=438&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77037/original/image-20150403-9351-asormn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=438&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77037/original/image-20150403-9351-asormn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77037/original/image-20150403-9351-asormn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77037/original/image-20150403-9351-asormn.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In a precursor to the modern emoticon, 19th century typographers took a stab at conveying emotion through symbols,</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ee/Emoticons_Puck_1881_with_Text.png">Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Fluid conversation and clarified meaning</h2>
<p>Have you ever seen someone fix a typo in a message with an asteriks?
(*asterisk) </p>
<p>The asterisk <a href="http://d-scholarship.pitt.edu/20621/">signals a repair of an error in language</a>. Conversational repair, or the act of correcting ourselves or others in spoken language, has been <a href="http://www.cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/languages-linguistics/semantics-and-pragmatics/conversational-repair-and-human-understanding">discussed for decades</a> by conversation analysts in spoken language. Saying “sorry, I meant to say” or “er, I mean” can be awkward and interrupt the dynamics of a spoken conversation. </p>
<p>This conversational move has made its way into online written language, where that awkwardness is reduced to a single symbol. Instead of saying “oops, I mispelled ‘asterisk’ in my previous sentence,” people can avoid a conversational detour by simply typing an asterisk before the word: *asterisk.</p>
<p>That’s not the only use of the asterisk. A pair of them around a word or phrase <a href="http://www.davidcrystal.com/?id=4420">can indicate</a> emphasis. This style has gradually given way to words in all caps and repeated letters to show intensity and emphasis, as linguist Deborah Tannen and communication scholar Erika Darics <a href="http://press.georgetown.edu/book/languages/discourse-20">have</a> <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211695813000330">noted</a>. Tannen provides an example of a text message that uses multiple styles to convey an intensely apologetic, sincere tone:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>JACKIE I AM SO SO SO SORRY! I thought you were behind us in the cab
and then I saw you weren’t!!!!! I feel soooooooo bad! Catch another cab and ill
pay for it for youuuuu </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Meanwhile, punctuation marks like hyphens and periods suggest a change in voice and tempo. One example is the ubiquitous ellipses. Traditionally, this mark has been used in text to denote deleted text. Now, it can also indicate a tone of voice that’s trailing off or hesitating, such as the following example from a conversation in the popular online role playing game World of Warcraft:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>So… since we live in the same city, do you wanna like… meet up sometime…? </p>
</blockquote>
<p>This use of the ellipses adds that extra meaning to the text and it can also do the work of denoting someone else’s turn in the conversation. </p>
<p>It’s even been incorporated into user interfaces. In instant messaging and chat programs like Skype, an ellipsis is used to show that the other party is typing.</p>
<h2>A single symbol conveys a complex message</h2>
<p>A single symbol can also be an entire message on its own. In her contribution to the book <a href="http://press.georgetown.edu/book/languages/discourse-20">Discourse 2.0: Language and New Media</a>, Susan Herring describes how a single question mark can be an entire message that indicates that the user is “confused or does not know what to say.” </p>
<p>In other words, a question mark does the job of asking for clarification in a single keystroke. Similarly, a single exclamation point as a message can illustrate surprise and excitement. You can repeat either of these symbols for as a superlative to show a greater level of surprise. Consider this exchange in which B uses nothing but symbols to express reactions to A’s statements:</p>
<p><strong>A:</strong> So I have some good news.</p>
<p><strong>B:</strong> ?</p>
<p><strong>A:</strong> I got a raise today</p>
<p><strong>B:</strong> !</p>
<p><strong>A:</strong> And it came with a promotion</p>
<p><strong>B:</strong> !!!</p>
<p>These two aren’t the only punctuation that can stand on their own as a message. In my <a href="http://d-scholarship.pitt.edu/17348/">2012 study</a> of World of Warcraft players, I found that in this community, and others, the carat (<sup>)</sup> can stand alone as an entire message that indicates agreement with another person. Meanwhile, an arrow-shaped symbol (<–) signaled volunteering for a task, like raising a hand in the classroom. </p>
<p>Here’s a hypothetical interaction:</p>
<p><strong>A:</strong> I am so ready for vacation.</p>
<p><strong>B:</strong> ^</p>
<p><strong>A:</strong> Who wants to go to Florida with me?</p>
<p><strong>B:</strong> <–</p>
<p>Far from crippling language, these examples indicate how people can now communicate complex feelings in a streamlined manner – perfect for our modern, fast-paced world.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/38408/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lauren Collister is a member of the Linguistics Society of America.</span></em></p>Don’t listen to the naysayers. New ways of communicating have created a wealth of new opportunities to harness – and study – language.Lauren B. Collister, Electronics Publications Associate, University of PittsburghLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/222442014-01-22T23:14:47Z2014-01-22T23:14:47ZHow texting turns you into a walking disaster<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39609/original/9r83bgfk-1390352004.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">It's easy to see how 'wexting' accidents can happen.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Flickr/Jonathan Adami</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>For most of us, walking in a straight line at reasonable speed is a simple task. But watch someone texting or reading on their mobile phone and you’d be forgiven for thinking that walking is not as easy as it looks.</p>
<p>People who text and walk (“wexting”) are not only a source of irritation to those of us stuck behind a slow, weaving wexter. Wexting may also put you at risk of injury and – according to our <a href="http://dx.plos.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0084312">study</a> published today in <a href="http://www.plosone.org/">PLOS ONE</a> – even changes your style of walking. </p>
<h2>Wexting? Mind that fountain … or train …</h2>
<p>The dangers of texting while driving are <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/sap/2012/09/18/it-is-time-for-a-parental-control-no-texting-while-driving-phone/">well known</a>, but the impact of texting on walking is only beginning to gain attention. </p>
<p>Much of this interest has been generated by media reports of wexters who wander into fountains, onto <a href="http://mashable.com/2012/07/31/texting-while-walking-2/">train tracks</a>, or recently in St Kilda, <a href="http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/woman-glued-to-phone-walks-off-st-kilda-pier/story-e6frg6nf-1226785479518">off a pier</a> (and although the woman in question couldn’t swim, she did manage to hold onto her phone until rescued). </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/mg11glsBW4Y?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Mind that fountain!</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In addition, the number of pedestrians killed or injured in traffic is rising and texting while walking is bearing the <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2388351/Texting-walking-blamed-nationwide-increase-pedestrian-deaths.html">brunt of the blame</a>.</p>
<p>But, despite speculation that using a mobile phone while walking might be hazardous, few studies have examined the impact of mobile phone use on walking.</p>
<h2>Walk like a robot</h2>
<p>Our study used a 3D movement analysis system to examine how people walk while texting or reading on a mobile phone. We asked 26 healthy individuals (with an average age of 30 years), who used their mobile phone to text on a daily basis, to walk in a straight line in one of the following ways:</p>
<ul>
<li>without their mobile phone </li>
<li>while reading a news article on their mobile phone </li>
<li>while texting on a mobile phone.</li>
</ul>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39618/original/phkr47hh-1390353862.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39618/original/phkr47hh-1390353862.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39618/original/phkr47hh-1390353862.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39618/original/phkr47hh-1390353862.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39618/original/phkr47hh-1390353862.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39618/original/phkr47hh-1390353862.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39618/original/phkr47hh-1390353862.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Are we all just robots walking the streets?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Flickr/Ben Garvey</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Participants used their natural texting style (one or two hands, portrait or landscape orientation, use of autocorrect or not) and eight cameras captured the speed, direction and movement of their bodies when walking under each condition.</p>
<p>We found texting and (to a lesser extent) reading on a mobile phone causes people to walk slower, deviate from a straight path and “lock” their head, trunk and arms together, so they move as a unit (in order to keep the phone steady in front of their eyes). </p>
<p>The net effect? Slow, swerving, robot-style walking that prioritises texting over balance and stability.</p>
<h2>The problem with the robot-like walk</h2>
<p>Research has shown that people who walk <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16320147">slower</a>, who <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12127181">dual-task</a>, and who walk with a more “<a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16320147">locked</a>” (robot-style) posture are at greater risk of collisions or falls. </p>
<p>In addition, people who deviate from a straight path while walking in a pedestrian environment are more likely to wander into traffic or onto train tracks, leaving them at greater risk of serious injury or death. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22269509">Previous studies</a> have shown that individuals who text while crossing the street in a virtual pedestrian environment look away from the street more often – and are hit more often by motor vehicles – than those who are not using their mobile phone.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39659/original/78rmz7vx-1390370578.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39659/original/78rmz7vx-1390370578.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39659/original/78rmz7vx-1390370578.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39659/original/78rmz7vx-1390370578.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39659/original/78rmz7vx-1390370578.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39659/original/78rmz7vx-1390370578.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/39659/original/78rmz7vx-1390370578.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Flickr/pborenstein</span></span>
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<p>Surprisingly, 35% of our young, healthy participants reported a previous accident while texting on their mobile phone including falls, trips and collisions with obstacles or other people. It seems accidents while walking and texting are not uncommon – even among a generation that is highly skilled with mobile phones and believes itself to be adept at dual-tasking.</p>
<p>Ours is not the first study to show reduced speed and deviation from a straight line while texting and walking – the only other <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22226937">study</a> in this area asked participants to wear a hood while walking that excluded their vision of the floor and destination. </p>
<p>But ours is the first to show changes in posture and walking when people text under natural circumstances with normal vision and the first to compare differences between typing and reading text.</p>
<h2>Pedestrian safety</h2>
<p>Breaking our addiction to mobile phone technology, particularly that of texting, seems like a battle lost. </p>
<p>Perhaps by ensuring people are educated about how using a mobile phone to text (and, to a lesser extent, read) affects their ability to walk safely – particularly in high-risk environments such as near traffic, train tracks, water or even bears (see video below) – we can reduce wexting related accidents.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">An extreme wexting accident (almost).</span></figcaption>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Siobhan Schabrun has received funding from The National Health and Medical Research Council, The International Association for the Study of Pain, Parkinson's QLD Inc and Arthritis Australia.</span></em></p>For most of us, walking in a straight line at reasonable speed is a simple task. But watch someone texting or reading on their mobile phone and you’d be forgiven for thinking that walking is not as easy…Siobhan Schabrun, Research Fellow in Brain Plasticity and Rehabilitation, Western Sydney UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/220642014-01-15T14:40:25Z2014-01-15T14:40:25ZTexting is bound to decline but it won’t die out just yet<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/39139/original/4pvhb3hd-1389793478.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">How come you never text me no more? </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jan Persiel</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/c-u-l8r-sms-text-messages-decline-in-the-uk-for-the-first-time-as-whatsapp-and-snapchat-rise-9055870.html">Reports</a> this week reveal the number of text messages sent between mobile phones has fallen into decline for the first time since the service was introduced. According to figures from Deloitte, the number of messages sent worldwide fell from 152 billion in 2012 to 145bn in 2013. </p>
<p>The numbers confirmed what many have suspected for some time – mobile users are abandoning the built-in phone service and using <a href="http://www.techradar.com/news/phone-and-communications/mobile-phones/best-messaging-apps-for-android-1187003">internet-based apps</a> to communicate. It’s true that services such as WhatsApp are playing an increasingly central role in our communications but it’s not the end for the text.</p>
<h2>The growth of text</h2>
<p>The first text message was sent from Vodafone’s headquarters in Newbury, England, on 3 December 1992, by engineer <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2012/dec/01/text-messaging-20-years">Neil Papworth</a>. It was quickly adopted by the dominant carriers in telecommunications, who have, until only very recently, been in complete control of the market. They have placed strict constraints on the amount we can message and how much it will cost us when we do.</p>
<p>This was acceptable when they were the only providers of such technology, but with the availability of internet-based instant messaging, the method of “pay-as-you-go” is equivalent to putting money in a pot every time you open your mouth and having your mouth clamped shut after you’ve said 500 words. It’s archaic. </p>
<p>Instant messaging frees us from these chains. It removes the previous oligopoly of carriers and allows us to choose from a range of communication methods. This type of competition is healthy, and pushes technology to evolve in new and exciting ways. I am not using a particular instant messaging app because its the only one I can afford, I am using it because it allows me to communicate with people in new and exciting ways. </p>
<h2>More than a message</h2>
<p>The essence of a message is about so much more than its content. The ability to decorate the content with emojis, to provide additional media to support the content, and even the medium through which the content is sent, all have a relevant bearing on how the message is interpreted by its intended audience.</p>
<p>SMS was an early way of sending text messages by phone at a time when providers didn’t really need to think about this symbiotic relationship. But modern app developers are now designing innovative ways to communicate.</p>
<p>If I send something via email it might be because I want it to look more formal than the same thing sent via text or WhatsApp. I might only email my boss, text message my mum, but WhatsApp all my friends. In one sense, this is about ubiquity. Older generations are probably less likely to adopt new services such as WhatsApp.</p>
<p>But it might also be that I don’t want to communicate with my boss and my mum through a medium I consider to be very informal, the same medium I use to send Harlem shake videos to my friends. It just feels wrong and sends a certain message about the content to the recipient.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.snapchat.com/">Snapchat</a> is an excellent example of this trend. It is a service designed just for fun and is therefore used for fun content. Messages are sent in the form of pictures and disappear up to 10 seconds after they’ve been opened. It isn’t designed for serious content that needs to be considered for longer and is therefore used to communicate just the fun stuff.</p>
<p>Even in an age in which we email job applications to potential employers, many people still choose to attach their cover letter in the form of a word document rather than send it in the body of the email. We remain attached to the symbolism of the letter as a way of conveying the gravity of our intent.</p>
<p>These new ways of communicating offer us cheaper services, more options to send different types of message and allow us to communicate with more than one person at a time, but by their very nature, they don’t necessarily spell doom for the slightly more formal medium of text, just as email hasn’t quite done for the letter.</p>
<h2>One medium to bind them</h2>
<p>SMS may cling on to its place in our communications for some time for another important reason. Short of taking the trouble to call someone (and who does that these days?) it remains the only sure-fire way to contact people through your mobile.</p>
<p>If your contact has a mobile phone, then they almost definitely have SMS. This is not the case for the new services on offer and may never be. While we have sought to break free from the SMS oligopoly, we now have a system that offers us almost too many options.</p>
<p>I might prefer WhatsApp but my friends might use Skype or Kik, and their friends might use something different. We might be willing to download another app to stay in touch but what if every person I know has a different go-to service? I’d need to download a hundred different apps and don’t have the time to be constantly moving between them. While many large networks and communities will favour a particular messaging service, it is likely that SMS will remain the most ubiquitous service for a while to come.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/22064/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Matthew Higgs receives funding from the EPSRC.</span></em></p>Reports this week reveal the number of text messages sent between mobile phones has fallen into decline for the first time since the service was introduced. According to figures from Deloitte, the number…Matthew Higgs, Postdoctoral Research Associate, UCLLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.