A new study just published suggests that the more expertise one has with instant messaging (IMing), the worse one’s test scores. And, not surprising and consistent with prior research, the new study (Fox, 2008) found that IMing increases the time it takes to complete a task.
The study looked at 69 undergraduates who were randomly assigned to one of four different groups: reading a simple text passage and answering some questions about it, with one group doing it while not IMing, and another while actively IMing; reading a difficult text passage and answering some questions about it, with one group doing it while not IMing, and another while actively IMing. The researchers then examined the differences in response times and their reading comprehension scores based upon the accuracy of their responses to the questions.
The researchers found that those who instant messaged did worse on total reading comprehension scores (but did okay when the questions were only multiple choice), and took significantly longer to complete the difficult text passage than the easier text passage.
The study also found that the more time participants reported spending on IM in their everyday lives, the significantly lower their comprehension scores and their Grade Point Average (GPA).
The upshot? People who IM more than others may not do as well on a test of a person’s knowledge, especially if that test has fill-in-the-blank or essay questions (as opposed to multiple choice). You’ll also likely take longer to complete the test, not surprisingly, if you’re IMing at the same time. And students who IM more have lower GPAs than those who IM less.
Since I don’t know of too many students who would IM during an actual test, one could generalize these results to suggest that trying to read some text — an article or research paper online or offline, for instance — one is less likely to actually do as well a job comprehending what one is reading if one is also IMing at the same time. The study also suggests that too much IMing can have a detrimental effect on one’s grades. If IMing is seen for what it is — a form of socializing via technology — then this result is consistent with our expectations. College life is a balance between socializing, studying, and other extracurricular activities and if you tip that balance to any one activity, academic life usually suffers.
The study was only done on college students, however, so the results should be taken with a grain of salt. And the participants in the study were all pretty highly experienced and frequent users of IM, with an average of over 5 years of experience IMing and nearly 2 hours a day spent IMing. (However, since IMing is rarely the sole activity done while online, it’s unlikely students spent the entire 2 hours — 1.76 to be exact — just instant messaging one another.)
What the study suggests, broadly, is that IMing may interfere with our ability to do as good and timely a job with comprehending something than if we didn’t. Which perhaps is another reason to shut IM and texting down when you really need to concentrate on learning something new.
Reference:
Fox, A.B., Rosen, J., & Crawford, M. (2008). Distractions, distractions: Does instant messaging affect college students’ performance on a concurrent reading comprehension task? CyberPsychology & Behavior, Nov. 2008, ahead of print.
11 comments
I use IM as part of my communications tools for everyday business. I find the IMing saves me time compared to a face to face meeting (less chit chat) and it also avails me a printed transcript of exactly what was said during the IM.
Used responsibly IM can be a great tool in the workplace.
Hi Randy,
I totally agree it can be very useful. Although the statistics in this post are quite alarming.
Does something need to happen in order for students to focus on the proper written and spoken language or is communication evolving?
Thank you.
Regards
Dawn Pugh
http://www.dawnpugh.com
John, did the study say anything about the spelling and punctuation skills of teens/YAs who IM a lot? It seems to me that the 15 to 25 crowd or so is woefully lacking in those areas now that “textspeak” has evolved (LOLZ, OMG u r 2 kewl! — that sort of thing).
I think that would be worth investigating!
@Dawn… These were quite experienced IM users, so I’m not sure what else can be done except to encourage folks not to IM when they need to learn something new — like a new skill, topic, whatever. Perhaps in another 5 or 10 years, our multitasking skills will evolve just as we (and the technology) has.
@CB… No, the study did not look at the actual IM communications at all. It was only looking at the effects IMing has on reading comprehension (and indirectly, the relationship between more IMing and self-reported GPA).
I’m curious if it would make a difference if students were IMing with people who were doing the same or similar task, so the communications isn’t purely “social” but also work-oriented and “collaborative”.
I suspect that replacing IMing in the study with any purely “social” activity – taking a phone call, having an office chat, going to a movie – would show the same results…
Thank you for your post regarding the recent study about instant messaging acting as a distraction for comprehending an online passage. It was inarguably foreseeable that this online communication would increase the time taken to complete an assignment because multitasking stretches attention in many directions. This interference could have been anything though, so the following statement might also apply to television, video games, and the like: “The study also found that the more time participants reported spending on IM in their everyday lives, the significantly lower their comprehension scores and their Grade Point Average (GPA).” If students are spending mass amounts of time doing activities other than studying, it seems bound to affect their academics negatively. By contrast, if student GPAs are actually lower due to instant messaging, I question whether it is a result of their active communication, or because of the way they use the internet. Internet surfers tend to skim and are accustomed to constant visual stimulation. Do you think students who use the web more frequently are at a disadvantage in school because it is more difficult for them to immerse themselves in a traditional novel? It seems likely that their online habits would translate into their daily lives away from the computer. Even if it proves false and internet practices do not carry on outside, do you believe that because participants took this test on the web, they did not comprehend the reading well because they do not usually read deeply for content on this medium? But going beyond comprehension, I am curious about the affects of instant messaging abbreviations on students. You say that “People who IM more than others may not do as well on a test of a person’s knowledge, especially if that test has fill-in-the-blank or essay questions (as opposed to multiple choice).” It seems as though students who are used to writing very informally online may struggle when asked to complete essay-type questions, especially while online because one’s personal chatting may become confused with the task at hand, seeing as they both originate from the same screen.
@Emily — Lots of good observations and questions there. I think you hit a good point on its head, that if we’re busy doing X instead of studying, it makes sense that our studies may suffer. The fact that X may be a social activity, enjoyable, and allows you to keep in touch with important people in your life could be argued to be irrelevant to such an analysis.
But your second point, that new generations of people are growing up with distraction almost being the norm (rather than the exception) does make one wonder whether their long-term attention, retention and ability to immerse themselves in complex material will be negative affected. Time will tell on that one.
As a clarification, the researchers administered the reading material in hard copy, not online or on the computer. So the person who was IMing was going back and forth between the computer screen and a piece of paper.
I think the lack of ability to complete fill-in-the-blank questions was a simple memory-related recall issue. If you’re not storing information in short-term memory in a way that your brain can readily access it, then it won’t be able to recall it later on. This study suggests that when we’re distracted, we may not be storing information in quite the same manner as when we’re not. Note that the information is there in our brains (because even the IM group could access it when they saw the answer in the multiple choice questions), but not for free-recall. We need a memory cue in order to get it out.
IMO this study is right. because im a college graduage (wuz a college student)… uh nvm.
This study has it right. As a college graduate and thus a former college student during the continuing “IM era” (I earned my bachelor’s degree in 2004), I found that my productivity (and unfortunately GPA) went downhill with increased use of IM.
As a psychotherapist of mine once said and still says, IM is essentially, as it’s still referred to, a “chat” situation, much like talking to a friend (or multiple friends at once). It’s like calling on the phone, only worse. On the upside, although I have taken harshly to being physically separated from my college buddies the past 4 years, IM has helped me “stay connected” with them as if I were having regular face-to-face conversation, and my psychotherapist agrees that IM is almost as effective as face-to-face meetings and just as effective as phone calls, and supports my chronic habit of IMming.
I try to use vaguely proper grammar when I’m IMing, so I’m hoping it hasn’t hurt my writing skills too badly…
it would help if they included in the study a group which did something else while reading, and see how they do. It takes a lot to communicate how ever you do it, this will take away your attention from anything else you do.
As for iming during tests, I go to Hunter in NYC and the amount of iming during tests is huge, they are cheating. It is wide spread and organised.
I can’t help but wonder if the problem was at least partly that students were IMing instead of doing their homework! 😉
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