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Chanya Kib Goysookho

Mr. Abel Cadias

English 10/1001

June 5, 2019

The Effects of Textese on Grade 10 Students’ Spelling at Mahidol University

International Demonstration School

Texting, or messaging is a form of communication which allows people to

communicate with each other, despite of where they are. Oftentimes, people would use

“textese”, also known as “text language”, which are word shortcuts often based on the

abbreviation(s) of the original word or phrase to increase their typing speed, for example

“IDK” is used instead of “I don’t know”. Textese may also involve taking away some of the

letters from the original word, for example, ‘cnt’ is used instead of ‘can’t’, and ‘tmrw’ is

used instead of ‘tomorrow’. Textese doesn’t only apply to English, in fact other languages

too have textese. According to Stubbs (2018), some people have positive attitudes toward

textese, believing it’s a way of innovation. However, some believe it’s destroying the

language and leads to poor spelling. Does messaging with textese lowers spelling ability?

Textese can make texting faster, but if used too regularly, it may lower one’s ability to spell.

The purpose of this research report is to find out whether messaging with textese

impact Grade 10 Students’ ability to spell words correctly using a survey. The importance of

this research is for students to become aware of whether they should stop using too much

textese. The author uses three academic articles from different sources to relate the results

and interpretation of the survey to other research studies.

The question asked whether messaging with textese lowers spelling ability. The

survey includes a spelling questionnaire, consisting of nine questions, containing both Thai
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and English language, and a choice of how often the students use textese on a scale of one to

five, one being ‘barely’ and five being ‘all the time’. The figure below represents the spelling

scores in comparison to the average use of textese by students who earned that score. The

blue bars represent the scores and the red bars represent the use of textese. The students who

earned the lowest score (two points) use textese almost all the time (4.2), as well as those

who earned seven points (4.17). Furthermore, students who earned a full score use textese

more than students who earned 5 points (2.8 and 1.91). This shows that there is no

correlation between spelling scores and how often textese is used.

Textese may involve altering the original words, but when used, it allows students to

become better aware of the language as it improves student’s metalinguistic awareness (van

Dijk, van Witteloostuijn, Vasić, Avrutin and Blom, 2016). Additionally, a study by Moya

(2015) shows that, despite textese being used most frequently among teenagers, teenagers

were able to recognise their spelling mistakes, including ones that were influenced by

textese. Thus, this shows that textese doesn’t lowers one’s spelling ability, in fact, it can help

enhance students’ care for the language. Moreover, out of the 64 students surveyed, majority

of the students misspelled ‘definitely and pharaoh’. The word ‘definitely’, without a doubt,

is the most misspelled word in English (Archer, 2015). This shows that the mistakes that

were made were mostly due to common mistakes and does not have to do with the use of

textese.

Spelling Scores Use of Use

Textese
Spelling of
Textese
Scores
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Figure 1 Spelling scores vs Use of Textese

The author initially thought that messaging with textese will lowers spelling abilities

as textese involve spelling words incorrectly. However, this research report concludes that

using textese does not lowers one’s spelling abilities and can even make students become

better aware of the language. Most of the students misspelled ‘definitely’ and ‘pharaoh’

which are commonly misspelled words, even without the use of textese. Either way, textese

shouldn’t be used too much as it is still an improper way of spelling.

References

Moya, A. (2015) Whatsapp, Textese, and Moral Panics: Discourse Features and Habits
Across Two Generations. Retrieved from
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877042815013786

Stubbs, J. (2018, January 23) THE EFFECTS OF TEXTESE ON LITERACY. Retrieved

from
http://www.jacobstubbsonline.com/home/the-effects-of-textese-on-literacy

van Dijk CN, van Witteloostuijn M, Vasić N, Avrutin S and Blom E. (2016) The Influence of
Texting Language on Grammar and Executive Functions in Primary School Children.
Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0152409