Interpersonal skills seem to diminish with the overuse of technology among children and teenagers, scientists and school personnel say.
Susan Mordenti, guidance counselor at Logansport High School, said she’s noticed that kids will communicate more frequently and more openly via text messages because it’s not face-to-face communication.
A couple of students, for example, spoke with Mordenti due to concerns about another student who wanted to inflect self-harm. She said the girls were texting him about it, but things changed once all three students met with Mordenti.
One of the girls hid under a table in the office, Mordenti said, and couldn’t look or talk face-to-face with the student who she did communicate with via text.
“They’re free to say whatever they want to, but once you come in face to face, they can’t deal with it,” Mordenti said. “I can’t explain the communication skills these kids have today, or the lack of.”
The Pew Research Center found in a 2010 study that 54 percent of teenagers ages 12-17 use texting daily to contact friends outside of school, and 33 percent communicate face to face.
Lewis Cass Jr.-Sr. High School Guidance Counselor Heather Adams agreed with the number of students not communicating face to face. She said dealing with conflict online or on texts creates more challenges compared to in person.
“Sometimes when we talk it out,” Adams said about working through student-on-student problems, “it kind of takes care of those issues too when they’re more face to face.”
In a more recent study, Pew surveyed 13- to 17-year-olds in 2015 and found that 88 percent own or have access to a cellphone, specifically 73 percent having access to a smartphone.
And 92 percent of teens report going online daily — 24 percent of those teens say they’re on the Internet “almost constantly,” mostly on smartphones. The study also states that a typical teen sends and receives 30 texts a day.
Melissa Ortega, a child psychologist at New York’s Child Mind Institute, told the Huffington Post in December 2011 that teenagers are struggling to handle conflict in face-to-face situations because of the reliance on technology.
“Clinically, I’m seeing it in the office,” Ortega said. “The high school kids who I do see will be checking their phones constantly. They’ll use it as an avoidance strategy. They’ll see if they got a text message in the two minutes they were talking to me.”
People constantly use nonverbal communication in face-to-face situations, such as fidgeting, foot tapping and eye contact, but that can’t happen electronically. Neuroscientist Gary Small told the Huffington Post “that young people are not learning [nonverbal skills] when they’re using these devices.”
“We all know the story of kids breaking up with each other through text message,” Small said. “When you have to fire someone or give them bad news, it’s uncomfortable. In face-to-face conversation, you’ve got to think on your feet. ... You’ve got to respond right away.”
Small said even though research is only beginning about the effect technology has on social skills among children and teenagers, the brain can still adapt.
“It’s not too late,” he said. “You can teach people empathy skills. You can teach them to look each other in the eye.”