Mixed Emotions

‘Ever worry that sms and email might be ruining your personal relationships?’. That’s how a short article I found on the SMH site a while ago began. No, I thought to myself at the time. I don’t. Today, I’m not so sure I’d give you the same answer. There are many pitfalls involved in relying heavily on these forms of communication and they are really no substitute for what should often be said face to face.

One of the biggest problems with written forms of communication is that you cannot gauge the reaction of the recipient. You may not know if you have committed a grievous error in their eyes and you may loose the chance to explain yourself or make it up. You will have also given them the means by which they can prove and remember what you have said or done which may make it harder still to resolve any issues that might have arisen regardless.

Another major problem inherent with written communication is that it is extremely difficult to emote. When speaking to someone face to face, what is actually said only counts for a small part of the message received by an interlocutor. Body language, tone of voice and social context also provide a great deal of information, which is assimilated along side the actual words used. When sending an email or sms however, these other factors are absent and as Murphy’s Law would suggest, when someone can take something the wrong way, then they probably will.

In an attempt to counteract this problem, we have seen the emergence of emoticons. We can insert a smiley face to indicate that we are happy, a wink to suggest we are joking or a frown to show we are sad. Via email, we also have a large variety of pictorial emoticons to choose from which represent a wider range of emotions such as embarrassment, frustration and anger. These are still somewhat limited however and although widely available, are not used by everyone. The mobile equivalents currently being developed are not widely used either.

Text or sms is perhaps the area where people should be the most careful. Due to the fact that there is a limited number of characters that may be included in each sms, people will often abbreviate both words and sentences to fit their message in. When using predictive text, they will also occasionally include words they have not meant which may also cause problems. Often occurring outside the context of a conversation it is easy for them to be misunderstood and they do require money to reply to.

But on the other hand, these forms of communication can be extremely convenient. So regardless of the fact that I have had bad experiences, I would not choose to cease using them. What I would be wary of and say to anyone else who texts or emails is that one should always think carefully when writing something where strong emotions are involved and that one should consider how something may be interpreted not merely how it is meant.