Active use of social media promotes writing skills
Chatting on Whatsapp or tweeting a lot does not make young people write worse at school. It is precisely the active use of social media, in which students come up with and write messages themselves, that ensures that they make fewer writing mistakes at school. This is evident from the doctoral research of linguist Lieke Verheijen.
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“My research shows that we don't have to be afraid of language use on social media. WhatsApp language is not as useless and arbitrary as people think, ”says Verheijen of Radboud University Nijmegen.
For her PhD research she wanted to know whether the 'chat language' that young people use on Whatsapp, text messages, Twitter and formerly on MSN influences their writing skills at school. “There are many concerns about the deviating language use of young people,” says Verheijen. “There is talk of language degradation, but in the Netherlands there was no good, extensive research. I wanted to see if all the concerns were justified.”
To find out, Verheijen conducted several studies. For example, she researched about 400 authentic social media messages, such as WhatsApp messages from Dutch young people between the ages of 12 and 23. She also examined the social media use and writing skills of young people in the third year of VMBO or VWO and of older young people in MBO and university. In doing so, she conducted a survey of 400 young people who completed questions about how often they are on social media and compared the results with their writing essays at school. Finally, she did an experiment among 500 young people in two groups: one group used WhatsApp for XNUMX minutes before writing a story, the other group did not.
There are many concerns about the deviating language use of young people. There is talk of language degradation, but in the Netherlands a good, extensive study was lacking
Distinguish
“The analysis shows clear confirmation that young people use many words on social media that deviate from the standard Dutch language. They shorten words, write them phonetically, omit capital letters and spaces. More deviations can be found especially in secondary school students. They dare to experiment more with language.” According to the PhD student, young people on public network sites such as Twitter more often adhered to the language rules than on Whatsapp. “This is because it is visible to all of your online followers.” Another conclusion of the linguist is that young adults who are already in further education are already adapting much more to 'Standard Dutch' in their writing on social media. “They are already conforming more. Teenagers want to distinguish themselves.”
The other two studies show, according to the language researcher, that active use of social media does not cause young people to perform worse on writing assignments at school. “Young people who had appped for the writing assignment made slightly less spelling mistakes. This was especially evident in secondary school students, ”says Verheijen. “They may make fewer spelling mistakes because they are already working on language and are actually training. Your brain is already working on it and that also stimulates language assignments at school. ”
Young people who texted for the writing assignment actually made slightly fewer spelling mistakes
A passive use of social media, ie young people who only read messages from others, but do not type much themselves, does not have a good influence on the school texts. “This is a negative relationship and can mainly be seen in less educated young people. You don't train yourself that way. The use of word predictors and auto-correction on the phone also does not help to improve writing skills. Exposure to messages from others with many deviations from the official Dutch spelling and grammar can cause these deviations to become dominant in their own school texts, ”says Verheijen.
Switching
The research, on which Verheijen hopes to obtain his doctorate on 25 January, shows that young people switch well between the language they use with friends on social media and the language in their school texts. It is important that Standard Dutch is always taught very well. “As long as Dutch education pays a lot of attention to this, things should go well. You can then compare the chat language that young people use on social media to a dialect. Teachers must make it clear that there is a distinction between texts at school and on social media, and students learn that they must therefore use different communication styles.”
Read the entire study: Is Textese a Threat to Traditional Literacy?
