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Middle school students who frequently use "tech-speak"—omitting letters to shorten words and using homophone symbols, such as @ for "at" or 2nite for "tonight"—performed worse on a test of basic grammar, according to a new study in New Media & Society.

Drew P. Cingel, a doctoral candidate in media, technology, and society at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., conducted the experiment when he was an undergraduate with the Media Effects Research Laboratory at Penn State University in University Park, Pa. under director S. Shyam Sundar. The researchers surveyed 228 6th, 7th, and 8th graders in central Pennsylvania on their daily habits, including the number of texts they sent and received, their attitudes about texting, and their other activities during the day, such as watching television or reading for pleasure. The researchers then assessed the students using 22 questions adapted from a 9th-grade grammar test to include only topics taught by 6th grade, including verb/noun agreement, use of correct tense, homophones, possessives, apostrophes, comma usage, punctuation, and capitalization. Mr. Cingel, who published the study while at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, N.C., and Mr. Sundar found that the more often students sent text messages using text-speak (shortened words and homophones), the worse their grammar—a concern as 13- to 17-year-olds send more than twice the number of text messages each month than any other age group.

Digital natives, people born after 1980, have grown up with new technology and are using it every day, multiple times a day. This research will uncover why this new technology, text messaging in particular, is affecting students’ learning. Texting like any form of writing takes time, and on a small keyboard like a cellular device, it can take even longer. Over the years, “texters” have saved time by creating a new form of shorthand often called “chat-speak”. This form of writing uses abbreviations that includes numbers, symbols and, incorrect grammar. Students who text every day have gotten so used to this form of writing that they are starting to use it for school related projects and real world scenarios, such as job applications.