A 17-year-old boy, caught sending text messages in class, was recently sent to the vice principal's office at Millwood High School in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
The vice principal, Steve Gallagher, told the boy he needed to focus on the teacher, not his cellphone. The boy listened politely and nodded, and that's when Mr. Gallagher noticed the student's fingers moving on his lap.
He was texting while being reprimanded for texting.
"It was a subconscious act," says Mr. Gallagher, who took the phone away. "Young people today are connected socially from the moment they open their eyes in the morning until they close their eyes at night. It's compulsive."
Because so many people in their teens and early 20s are in this constant whir of socializing—accessible to each other every minute of the day via cellphone, instant messaging and social-networking Web sites—there are a host of new questions that need to be addressed in schools, in the workplace and at home. Chief among them: How much work can "hyper-socializing" students or employees really accomplish if they are holding multiple conversations with friends via text-messaging, or are obsessively checking Facebook?
Some argue they can accomplish a great deal: This generation has a gift for multitasking, and because they've integrated technology into their lives, their ability to remain connected to each other will serve them and their employers well. Others contend that these hyper-socializers are serial time-wasters, that the bonds between them are shallow, and that their face-to-face interpersonal skills are poor.
"The unspoken attitude is, 'I don't need you. I have the Internet,'" says P.M. Forni, the 58-year-old director of the Civility Initiative at Johns Hopkins University, which studies politeness and manners. "The Net provides an opportunity to play hide-and-seek, to say and not say, to be truthful and to pretend. There is a lot of communication going on that is futile and trivial."
That's far too harsh an assessment, says Ben Bajarin, 32, a technology analyst at Creative Strategies, a consulting firm in Campbell, Calif. He argues that because young people are so adept at multimedia socializing, their social skills are actually strengthened. They're good at "managing conversations" and getting to the pithy essence of an issue, he says, which will help them in the workplace.
While their older colleagues waste time holding meetings or engaging in long phone conversations, young people have an ability to sum things up in one-sentence text messages, Mr. Bajarin says. "They know how to optimize and prioritize. They will call or set up a meeting if it's needed. If not, they text." And given their vast network of online acquaintances, they discover people who can become true friends or valued business colleagues—people they wouldn't have been able to find in the pre-Internet era.
It's hard to quantify whether the abbreviated interchanges of text messaging are beneficial in the workplace, but this much is known: Young workers spend more time than older workers socializing via their devices or entertaining themselves online. In a 2008 survey for Salary.com, 53% of those under age 24 said this was their primary "time wasting" activity while at work, compared to just 34% for those between ages 41 and 65.
Online social networking while at work hampers business productivity, according to a new study by Nucleus Research. Almost two-thirds of those with Facebook accounts access them at their workplaces, the study found, which translates to a 1.5% loss of total employee productivity across an organization.
A study this year by psychology students at Covenant College in Lookout Mountain, Ga., found that the more time young people spend on Facebook, the more likely they are to have lower grades and weaker study habits. Heavy Facebook users show signs of being more gregarious, but they are also more likely to be anxious, hostile or depressed. (Doctors, meanwhile, are now blaming addictions to "night texting" for disturbing the sleep patterns of teens.)
Weaned From Facebook
Almost a quarter of today's teens check Facebook more than 10 times a day, according to a 2009 survey by Common Sense Media, a nonprofit group that monitors media's impact on families. Will these young people wean themselves of this habit once they enter the work force, or will employers come to see texting and "social-network checking" as accepted parts of the workday?
Think back. When today's older workers were in their 20s, they might have taken a break on the job to call friends and make after-work plans. In those earlier eras, companies discouraged non-business-related calls, and someone who made personal calls all day risked being fired. It was impossible to envision the constant back-and-forth texting that defines interactions among young people today.
However, now that these older workers are managers, they're being advised by consultants to accept the changed dynamics, so long as young employees are doing good work and meeting deadlines.
Educators are also being asked by parents, students and educational strategists to reconsider their rules. In past generations, students got in trouble for passing notes in class. Now students are adept at texting with their phones still in their pockets, says 40-year-old Mr. Gallagher, the vice principal, "and they're able to communicate with someone one floor down and three rows over. Students are just fundamentally different today. They will take suspensions rather than give up their phones."
It may feel like a strange new world, but Mr. Gallagher's wife, Holly, is among those who say it's time for educators and employers to embrace it. As a human-resources manager, she believes that as the generation now aged 15 to 24 enters the work force, managers must adjust to the new ways they socialize and communicate.
For instance, past generations accepted that corporations were hierarchical. There were supervisors, managers and senior managers, and you communicated your questions to your immediate superior. "Young people today want accessibility," says Ms. Gallagher, 41. "If they have a problem or suggestion, they'll email or text senior managers, or even the CEO. They don't have the old-school notion that there are appropriate communication models. They've grown up in a freedom-of-information era."
Preparing for Work
She thinks the constant text messaging among teens can serve as good preparation for workplace interactions. "In a lot of corporations, if something goes wrong, it's because so-and-so didn't talk to so-and-so," Ms. Gallagher says. "But with young people, simultaneous conversations are always happening. This reduces the chances of not reaching success because the right people didn't connect."
More schools are now allowing students to use their cellphones between classes, or even as a learning tool in the classroom. Some teachers are having students text their friends during classes to share feedback on what's being taught. The mantra among educators who try to be enlightened: It's no longer about attention span. It's about attention scope—being able to concentrate on many things at once.
Steve Gallagher is finding it futile to argue with his students that they should go a seven-hour school day without their texting devices. As he explains: "It's like talking to kids about why they don't need air."
—Email: Jeffrey.Zaslow@ wsj.com
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