Studies Look at Student Texting Habits and Effects
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last several years, you’ve probably heard the warnings about how dangerous texting while driving can be. These admonitions are not just scare tactics: According to the National Safety Council, at least 200,000 car crashes each year are caused by texting while driving. In fact, drivers who read and send text messages while on the road are 23 times more likely to get into a car accident than those who don’t.
How Texting Affects Students Although not deadly, studies show that when students sent and read text messages during their classes, it can have serious consequences on the grades they receive—and even their general ability to learn course material. Student texting during class is far from uncommon: One study shows that about 80 percent of students read or send text messages at some point during their classes. In addition, students admit that they generally send at least 11 text messages during one class period. It is also not uncommon for young people to feel like they’re invincible—and this belief can cause students to mistakenly think that they can effectively multitask, and therefore texting during lectures will not affect their ability to perform well in their courses. But researchers say that this is just not the case: “College students may believe that they are capable of performing multitasking behaviors during their classroom learning, such as listening to the lecture and texting simultaneously,” said Fang-Yi Flora Wei, an assistant professor of broadcast communications at the University of Pittsburgh at Bradford, in a statement. “But the real concern is not whether students can learn under a multitasking condition, but how well they can learn if they cannot sustain their full attention on classroom instruction.” In a study conducted Wei and her colleges, researchers sought to find a correlation between texting in class and the extent to which students learn their coursework. In order to do this, 200 students were surveyed about their classroom texting habits and their grades for the semester. In addition, students were asked whether or not they got anything out of their courses when they were finished. Researchers looked at students’ level of self-regulation, which they defined as the ability to pay attention and direct the learning process. Not surprisingly, the students who spent more time texting in class also reported that they had a low level of self-regulation, which led them to receive lower grades than the students who did not text during lectures. In addition, these students also felt like they did not get as much out of their courses as they could have. “We know from our past research that college students who are regular text users habitually engage in text messaging during class lectures,” said Wei. “Now we see that in-class texting partially interferes with a student’s ability to pay attention, which prior studies show is necessary for effective cognitive learning.” Texting to Communicate with Students Not all of the texting that involves college students has a negative effect, however. The StarTribune recently reported that schools like Minnesota State University are using text messages to get in touch with students about important issues—like class registration or academic probation—because students are more likely to pay attention to texts than e-mails or voice mails from university staff. “Using texting is just a reflection of society's change in communication,” said Denise Gorsline, the school’s dean. “If we knew this is how students communicated, why weren't we doing this beforehand?” For example, messages from university staff may say something like: “This message is from the MSUM Academic Support Center. We would like to remind you that you have an appointment this week….” Text messages like this are designed to get important information to students quickly, but they aren’t detailed enough to give away any confidential student information. The StarTribune article says that these texts are getting mixed reviews from students. Although some do see getting text messages from the college as a convenient way of receiving the information that they need, others report that this is an invasion of their privacy and personal space. Tell us what you think in the comments below:
