Why Do Teens and Adults Use Texting?

Have you ever wondered WHY do teens and adults use texting? WHY is texting more popular than the old email or phone call methods of communication?

Texting has become increasingly popular because it is an easy way to casually communicate and convey information. It has been replacing some more traditional methods of communication because of its convenience and reliability. It can also be a lot of fun.

Many people believe it is less of an imposition to receive a text than a regular phone call. When one receives a text, he can look at it when he gets around to it. He feels much less social pressure to respond right away, or even at all.

If a person only has a small bit of specific information to communicate, texting might just be the most effective tool. Phone numbers, names and addresses, and directions can be sent quickly and accurately.The sender can be confident that the message arrived exactly how it was sent. Over the phone, numbers can be heard or written down incorrectly, or forgotten completely. A text is there in a tangible form long after it was sent..

Texts have many things in common with e-mail, but the recipient isn't always around to get it. E-mails can go for days and weeks without being read, or even caught by spam filters and never seen at all. A SMS message will be sent directly to the person the sender is trying to reach.

Computers can also be used to utilize text messaging in ways that they have a hard time doing over the phone. Computers can automate the sending of various content like emergency alerts, news, pictures, songs, directions and other information.

Computers can also receive text messages in a format they can easily process. This allows people to send messages to automated services and instantly update web sites, get information about bank accounts, make purchases, pay bills, get information services, and more.

There is a social aspect to texting, too. Text messages have their own slang, jargon, and ways of getting the message across. When a person use these tools effectively, she announces that she is part of the texting class. Most people haven't stopped to think about it, but there is a very real drive in all of us to broadcast this information.

Texting is often an excuse to pull out one's latest toy and let one's friends and co-workers gawk and envy them. It's easy to strike up a conversation about one's phone when somebody comments on it. And chances are, a new phone will be one of a person's favorite subjects.

Texting can also be used to send jokes, pictures and videos to one's friends. Texts often manage to make their way through an entire social circle one person at a time. People have a lot of fun doing this, and it brings "viral" qualities to the SMS format.

There is no one reason why everyone is sending texts these days. It's a matter of convenience, efficiency, social considerations, and sometimes just plain fun. Regular phone conversations and e-mail won't be going anywhere any time soon, but texting is definitely here to stay. It may soon become more common than either, having advantages over both.

Sent from my iPad