Saturday, July 14, 2018

"The (Sometimes Unintentional) Subtext of Digital Conversations"



"It’s not surprising that professors’ and students’ practices would vary, given the difference in power and age. But even best friends can have very different ideas about appropriate ways to use social media. Noelle Miesfeld and Rachel Jacobson had been close friends since college, and they stayed in close touch after graduation, often having long telephone conversations, catching up. After a number of years, however, they began communicating more through texting. This meant more frequent conversations—often daily or even multiple times a day. So Noelle was surprised when Rachel registered a complaint: She’d been telling Noelle about a problem, and she felt that Noelle’s responses seemed too casual and brief to show real concern. Rachel missed her caring, emotionally supportive friend. They traced the trouble to their contrasting assumptions about texting. To Noelle, comforting closeness resided in the frequency of their exchanges. To Rachel, frequency didn’t substitute for the expression of feeling and detailed discussion of her situation that they’d shared in the past—the kinds of conversations that Noelle didn’t feel could or should take place through texting."



This is probably most useful for that one friend who is always sending unintentionally cold texts. 

FB: For that one friend everyone has who always sounds angry in their texts

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