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'Text arguing' a bad way to break up, expert says
Sharon Kirkey
Canwest News Service
Monday, August 11, 2008
U hurt my feelings.
what are U talkin about??
Forget it. It's over btwn us.
U mean that?
Yep.
Riddance jrk
Xcellent. U r an idiot.
In the era of instant communication comes the latest relationship pitfall: text arguing.
Clinical psychologist Jefferson Singer says texting strips away what makes a person fully human and relationships are being mediated via "telegraphic paragraphs that can fit on cellphone screens."
In Psychology Today, Singer describes how a couple he was seeing in therapy broke up before they could really start to do any work together. They haven't seen or telephoned one another since. The only communication they do is through texting.
While it's an efficient way of deciding what to do with the dog, Singer says in his Psychology Today blog, "what happens to their memories of each other?"
Furiously texting or "Berrying" on a keypad takes away the "physical cues and tangible presence of the other person," says the professor of psychology at Connecticut College in New London, Conn.
"It takes away the human dimension from each of the individuals, so you're dealing with the words on a cellphone screen but not doing the same kind of connecting to the full person, which is important in weighing whether to stay or go in a relationship," Singer said.
Texting is brief, often with abbreviations and jargon and, because it's brief, it is less nuanced than talking face to face or on the phone, Singer says. People are invariably more blunt and, the more blunt, the more brutal and less careful they can be.
Even a physical letter is better, he says, because it helps conjure more memories and images of the writer -- "images of their face, their sense of smell, the sound of their voice."
And it slows things down. Not only does it need to be more carefully constructed than a text message, "you have to do the physical work of putting it in an envelope, addressing it and carrying it to the post box."
Texting is a valuable form of instant communication, Singer says -- "if someone needs to pick up milk on the way home. And it's great for even quick little communications of terms of endearment -- I can't wait to see you. But I don't think it's a way people should use to negotiate relationships.
"They require time. Texting is a time saver. Relationships, I believe, should be time-intensive. We shouldn't short cut our relationships."
At the very minimum, he says people should wait 24 hours before sending a message that carries any kind of emotional weight.
"You may want to say it very differently 24 hours later."
© The Calgary Herald 2008
Sharon Kirkey
Canwest News Service
Monday, August 11, 2008
U hurt my feelings.
what are U talkin about??
Forget it. It's over btwn us.
U mean that?
Yep.
Riddance jrk
Xcellent. U r an idiot.
In the era of instant communication comes the latest relationship pitfall: text arguing.
Clinical psychologist Jefferson Singer says texting strips away what makes a person fully human and relationships are being mediated via "telegraphic paragraphs that can fit on cellphone screens."
In Psychology Today, Singer describes how a couple he was seeing in therapy broke up before they could really start to do any work together. They haven't seen or telephoned one another since. The only communication they do is through texting.
While it's an efficient way of deciding what to do with the dog, Singer says in his Psychology Today blog, "what happens to their memories of each other?"
Furiously texting or "Berrying" on a keypad takes away the "physical cues and tangible presence of the other person," says the professor of psychology at Connecticut College in New London, Conn.
"It takes away the human dimension from each of the individuals, so you're dealing with the words on a cellphone screen but not doing the same kind of connecting to the full person, which is important in weighing whether to stay or go in a relationship," Singer said.
Texting is brief, often with abbreviations and jargon and, because it's brief, it is less nuanced than talking face to face or on the phone, Singer says. People are invariably more blunt and, the more blunt, the more brutal and less careful they can be.
Even a physical letter is better, he says, because it helps conjure more memories and images of the writer -- "images of their face, their sense of smell, the sound of their voice."
And it slows things down. Not only does it need to be more carefully constructed than a text message, "you have to do the physical work of putting it in an envelope, addressing it and carrying it to the post box."
Texting is a valuable form of instant communication, Singer says -- "if someone needs to pick up milk on the way home. And it's great for even quick little communications of terms of endearment -- I can't wait to see you. But I don't think it's a way people should use to negotiate relationships.
"They require time. Texting is a time saver. Relationships, I believe, should be time-intensive. We shouldn't short cut our relationships."
At the very minimum, he says people should wait 24 hours before sending a message that carries any kind of emotional weight.
"You may want to say it very differently 24 hours later."
© The Calgary Herald 2008
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