INSTANT MESSAGING IN STUDENT LIFE

Why are Students Attracted to Instant Messenger?

The Pew Internet Project Report cites that adolescents have adopted instant messaging to their own needs and purposes, and they have embraced it in a manner that adults have not. As we trace the numerous aspects and effects of instant messaging, we will examine the capabilities of instant messaging, the types of usage, insights into adoption, the trends of usage, how usage is characterized and essentially why it occurs, and overall examine the variety of social and serious needs instant messaging fulfills for adolescents. We will then examine the future of instant messaging in education and the workplace, as the individuals who used IM technologies as teenagers begin to implement their once purely social usage of IM elsewhere. Note that the terms student, teenager, and adolescents are used interchangeably throughout the website to generally mean individuals ranging from middle school to college.

The Capabilities of Instant Messaging

Instant messaging offers a variety of unique capabilities inexistent and unavailable in other methods of communication. The studies by Huang and Yen cite three fundamental capabilities. First, instant messaging services provide immediate one-to-one communication very much like a phone conversation, with near-immediate confirmation of exchanged messages. Instant messaging, however, allows for the ability to delay response, so it does not require complete, undivided attention. Second, IM services foster a variety of practical features, such as private chat rooms, integrated image sharing, transfer of documents and files, and live information such as game scores or stock ticker services. Third, instant messaging provides presence awareness that tells other users whether their friends are online or not, and if they are, what they are doing or where they are (if not at the computer), which is valuable in itself even if text communication does not occur.

Discrete and Continuous Connectivity

Instant messaging usage is characterized as either discrete connectivity or continuous connectivity. Generally speaking, discrete connectivity occurs when a user is required to connect to the internet through dial-up Internet access, and is unable to stay online continuously, and similarly, unable to stay on IM continuously. Discrete connectivity is characterized by focused messaging activity. Continuous connectivity often occurs when individuals have an Ethernet (either by cable internet or LAN type server) or DSL connection, and are continuously connected to the internet. This constant connectivity, allows users to be constantly connected to their preferred IM service, and is therefore considerably less focused than discrete connectivity. Users often engage in sporadic conversation, and may leave messaging windows open even while away from their computer.

Three Insights into Teenage IM Adoption

The article entitled “Instant Messaging in Teen Life” by Rebecca E. Grinter and Leysia Palen offers three valuable insights into teenage instant messaging adoption. They are summarized as follows: “Firstly, teenage IM adoption marks a significant entry of collaborative information technologies into the home…Secondly, since most teenagers have little previous experience with technologies that convey presence between remote peers, they must learn what it means to be simultaneously private and public people. Finally, teenagers are the workforce of the future, and communication habits they develop now may indicate what we can expect from them as adults.”

Description and Explanation of General Usage

For most of the users researched in the studies examined, IM peer groups reflected their real relationships. That is, the friends they talked to on instant messenger were they same friends they associated with in real life. College students also used instant messenger as a means of communication with their families and old high school friends. Either way, most IM usage is characterized by communication with personally known others. IM fulfilled the desire of adolescents to conform to and increase socializing opportunities with their peers, at least initially. The studies examined found that IM is an essentially neutral communication tool (with no specific purpose) that allows individuals to reach known others and converse without any specific conversation topic. Instant messaging allows users to socialize with peers outside of traditional constraints, and furthermore, socialize with multiple people all on a one-to-one basis. As the study by Grinter and Palen points out, “Over time, claiming membership in a particular social group rested in part on the ability to participate in IM communications…Participants reported being annoyed by IM non-users and complained of the inconvenience and additional work required to contact them,” IM is becoming more and more a necessary tool for effective socializing, and is having a considerable effect on developing one’s social life and community. Overall, traditional constraints and restricted freedoms, as well as limited financial resources, all coupled with an intense desire to socialize and develop socially fuel extensive instant messaging use in adolescents. Instant messaging allows for increased communication and community development, while occurring within traditional constraints, and without any cost to the user, and therefore it can be understood why IM has so quickly become one of the most popular and widespread communication tools for teenagers.

Aspects of Teenage Instant Messaging

The study entitled “Instant Messaging in Teen Life” defines three fundamental activities which underlie teenage usage: socializing, event planning, and schoolwork collaboration. The study entitled “Usefulness of instant messaging among young users” discusses six factors which discuss the perceived usefulness of instant messaging: friendship development, personalized communication, information volume, information richness, security, and ease of use. While both are important to consider in defining the aspects of instant messaging in order to examine it’s impact on students, we will first discuss the activities described by the first article.

Socializing
Informal conversation is now generally considered as the primary use of instant messaging. Conversation is rarely dominated by a specific topic, and often jumps freely as would a conversation in real life. Similarly, conversation often revolves around the day’s events, gossip, and other chit-chat. The article “Teen Use of Messaging media” by Schiano et al, states, “Interviewees described IM as something to do when ‘bored,’ and a way to connect & ‘hang out,’ chatting about ‘anything; nothing.’” In this manner, instant messaging can be as a method by which friendship development and socialization occurs, although it also begs the question of whether this chit-chat is beneficial or necessary to effective modern social development, or whether it is an unneeded hindrance, which detracts student’s time from more useful activities. College IM socialization is characterized by increased autonomy and therefore events of the day are discussed less in detail and more as highlights from time to time. Considering college students shared less of their everyday lives with their friends and had a greater ability to socialize much more outside of IM, the nature of their conversations changed.

Event Planning
One productive byproduct aspect of instant messaging is event planning. Considering IM’s ability to facilitate both group discussions and numerous individual conversations, IM is highly useful in organizing events with peers. Instant messaging is more efficient then calling each individual time and time again as different constraints and transportation are worked out, and “removed some of the complexity in many-person coordination.” For older individuals, considering less constraints, event planning was much more spontaneous and immediate.

Schoolwork Collaboration
A significant portion of IM users used instant messaging for schoolwork as well as socializing and event planning. This work-related use increases age increases, with younger individuals doing homework while also chatting, and older individuals engaging in more serious forms of collaboration. Overall, there seems to be a general shift from purely social messaging interaction, to one that envelopes an array of different tasks, from chit-chat to serious, as IM facilitates multiple levels of communication. College students were reported by Grinter and Palen to use “IM in ways that resemble the IM practice of office workers.”

Multitasking
Most instant messaging users reported that they in fact multitasked while using instant messenger, and engaged in numerous aspects at the same time, as well as computer activities. Because of the ability to respond at the user’s own pace, individuals can complete many tasks simultaneously without focusing their complete attention to IM. This also allows for IM to be used constantly while in the background, and increases its usage.

Analysis of Perceived Social and Workplace Usefulness

The study by Huang and Yen, entitled, “Usefulness of instant messaging among young users: Social vs. work perspective” which conducted a variety of exact statistical calculations to determine the usefulness of IM in a definitive manner, examines the following six factors in order to determine the perceived usefulness of IM: friendship development, personalized communication, information volume, information richness, security, and ease of use. The study attempted to answer what were the different and sometimes overlapping factors which made IM useful as a social and work-related tool, and which factors are important to increasing the usefulness of IM for work-related tasks. An empirical study was conducted, and data was collected from internet users who used both IM and e-mail. The study involved 560 university students, and 400 responses were used in the analysis. After a variety of statistical analysis, which can be found in the actual study on pp. 69-70 it was determined that the three most significant factors for social usefulness were friendship development, personalized communication, and ease of use. The two significant factors for work-related usefulness were information volume and information richness, which indicated that “…those who felt that IM conveyed more information also felt that it was a more useful tool for work.” The study concluded that, “1. The factors that make IM useful as a socializing tool might not make IM useful for work-related activities. 2. Friendship development and personalized communication are more important for IM as a socializing tool. They are not directly related to work-related usefulness.3. Information richness and information volume are not important for IM as a socializing tool. 4. Information richness and information volume are more important for IM as a useful tool for work-related communication. 5. Ease of use is important for personal use, but not important for work-related use.”

Future of Instant Messaging in Education

According to the study by Cunliffe, “Instant messaging has incredible potential in education. IM encourages active learning and prompt feedback.” The study offers a variety of the possible means by which instant messaging technology could be implemented in education, “...[it] offers possibilities for students to collaborate together on team projects; have discussions about course material, study together and quiz each other in pairs or groups. Tutors could run one-to-many or one-on-one tutorials, virtual (online) office hours, provide computer support and even mentoring.” It is therefore evident that instant messaging has a variety of possible applications not only in the workplace, but also in education. Considering most students already use instant messaging services, educators that integrate IM into their curriculum as a tool of discussion and tutoring would be able to more directly aide and relate to students in a familiar medium. Cunliffe states that, “Im would enable another way for students to have increased timely and remote contact with their lectures, tutors and classmates. The informality of IM provides a potentially unintimidating environment for students to ask for help.” She offers the example of a Texan high school teacher who states, “Being accessible on computer after hours allows me to be a part of their world and provide each student with meaningful, targeted support.”