September 23, 2009

Is Texting Making Us Bad Spellers?

A recent study finds SMS texting is not impacting young people's ability to spell. Christie Nicholson reports

SUBSCRIBE TO 60-Second Mind

Join Our Community of Science Lovers!

On supporting science journalism

If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.

[Below is the original script. But a few changes may have been made during the recording of this audio podcast.]

OMG, roflol, ttyl, brb, l8r, lmao, tmlae (the most ludicrous abbreviation ever)...these cryptic creations, as many of you know, are examples of Short Message Service Language, perhaps one of the fastest growing dialects in the world right now.AKA: SMS, textese, chatspeak is the slang that shortens English into phonetic bits—sometimes images made from punctuation—so that we can send meaningful messages via mobile phones.In 2008 people sent 2.3 trillion messages, a 150 percent increase since 2000, according to Newsweek. Punctuation, capitalization, grammar and vowels are tossed aside for creations that are often unrecognizable abbreviations of real words. Numbers often replace letters.Critics say SMS leads to sloppiness, masks dyslexia, and essentially signals the death of the English language.But research does not support the critics.A study released yesterday in the journal Reading and Writingfound no evidence that texting had any impact on spelling ability.Forty subjects from 12 to 17 years old were asked to save all their text messages for one week. Then they took a standardized spelling test. Turns out that if you’re a good speller of the Queen’s English you’re also a good speller in textese. Conversely, if you’re a poor speller academically you make more errors in chatspeak. And those who used more abbreviations when texting tended to be better spellers of standard English.
The researchers suggest that chatspeak is a complex, innovative language. And they added that using and translating any new language requires concentration and creativity—and is a real brain workout. It seems surprising, bt itz 4 real dud.

—Christie Nicholson

Subscribe to Support Independent Journalism

Great science journalism requires human expertise, time, effort and creativity. And it costs money. That’s why I and the journalists here at Scientific American hope you’ll join our community.

When you subscribe, you are supporting staff and freelance journalists who are passionate about telling science stories that are true, important and compelling. Our editors and reporters are often experts in their fields, which means they understand the nuances of big discoveries and can untangle the breakthroughs from the hype. With a subscription, you are also supporting rigorous fact-checking to ensure the words we publish are precise and accurate. And you’re supporting original illustrations, graphics and photos that bring you closer to an advanced laboratory, an ice sheet in Antarctica or a space mission in orbit. You’re helping us craft other types of high-quality journalism as well: Our newsletters are carefully written, edited and curated by staffers you have or will come to know and love. Our Science Quickly podcast is based on original reporting, collaboration with editors and scientists and exacting production.

Subscriptions keep this engine running so we can continue to deliver thoughtful, rigorous and independent science journalism to you. In an era of viral misinformation, this work is crucial. If you value what we do, I hope you’ll consider joining us as a subscriber

Thank you,

Jeanna Bryner, Editor in Chief, Scientific American