In the digital age where conversations often happen over a screen, texting seems simple — but every punctuation mark, emoji and delay in response time carries weight. For college students, perfecting their texting skills requires more than connection. It’s about clear, thoughtful messaging that is understood as intended.
A 2021 study conducted by Hidden Hearing found that a third of adults have fallen out with someone after misinterpreting text messages. With so much room for misunderstanding, some college students put a lot of thought into what they text.
Lisé Badeaux, a junior majoring in communication studies and public relations, said she puts a lot of thought into texting, especially when communicating with her peers, and that tone can be hard to convey through text.
“It’s immediately harder because you don’t have people’s facial expressions, you don’t have their body language, you don’t have all of these different things that make face-to-face conversations what they are,” Badeaux said.
Kat Stanek, an accelerated master’s student studying advertising and public relations, said she drafts serious messages in her notes app before sending them to ensure they are worded properly.
“A lot of times there will be miscommunication because someone reads something differently than someone else. There are so many ways things can be misinterpreted; it could be the tone, the word or the grammar side of it,” Stanek said.
Miscommunication can happen even when you know someone well, Stanek said. She noted that because she and her boyfriend are both sarcastic, she sometimes sends a follow-up message clarifying that she is being sincere.
According to a study published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology, using text abbreviations and shorter responses can make texts seem less sincere and receive fewer replies, as people perceive it as a shortcut or lack of effort.
Badeaux said when she gets a one-word response, she sometimes worries people aren’t engaged in conversation with her.
“When my grandmother texts ‘K.’, I don’t hold that against her. But, when anyone else says that I’m like, ‘Oh gosh, that is the worst text possible,’” Badeaux said.
The two students noted several ways they adapted to the disadvantages of texting to make their messages clearer.
Badeaux has lived in six states and said she notices regional differences in texting habits. She said that when she was living in California, texting in all caps was common, but when she moved to Tennessee, people read it as yelling.
“Everybody’s got their own unique thing, and that’s why I change my communication style. I feel like if you’re communicating with someone in their preferred style of communication, they’re going to be more receptive to you over text,” Badeaux said.
Emojis can also be helpful in conveying tone. Stanek said she uses emojis to make messages seem less serious or to show what facial expression she’d be using if the conversation were happening face-to-face.
They can be a great way for students to clarify the meaning of their messages. Created to paint a clearer picture of the emotion or tone the messenger meant to convey, they’ve since taken on more nuance and creativity. The laughing crying emoji isn’t used as commonly anymore, with young people opting for the full crying emoji or the skull emoji.
“I think it shows we’re progressing as a society,” Badeaux said. “There’s a culture around emojis, which I think is unique and specific to something we as a generation started because we’re the first to grow up with emojis.”
Texting also has its own unspoken rules, from double-texting do’s and don’ts to the certain amounts of time to wait before responding to messages, but not everyone follows them. Badeaux said she doesn’t find a problem with double-texting and doesn’t think there’s a time you need to wait to respond.
“Sometimes when I’m talking to my friends, they’ll say, ‘I have to wait at least three hours before I respond to him.’ And I’m like, where did you get that number? Where did you decide you had to wait?” Badeaux said.
To Stanek, however, there is a reason for some people to delay responses, especially in the dating scene, as people might not want to seem “too available.”
Though texting has come a long way, both Stanek and Badeaux agree that they prefer phone calls, FaceTime and in-person conversations.
“If I’m overthinking text messages, I know other people are as well,” Badeaux said. “I’m much more of a face-to-face person.”
