6: Instant and Text Messaging

It has been argued in recent years that people are becoming less literate. In point of fact, as this book maintains, literacy is simply evolving into new forms—ones that are related but often distinctively different from traditional textuality. Writing as a means of personal communication is being transformed as a result of new technologies such as cellular phones and the Internet. Nowhere is this clearer than in the use of instant messaging by adolescents. Instant messaging, or IM, which usually occurs on the computer, is defined as a form of real-time communication between two or more people based on typed text (Instant messaging and messengers, 2008). Text-messaging, which occurs through more portable, hand-held technologies, is real-time communication with text via one’s cell phone or other hand held electronic device.