Text-Speak processing

Abstract

There has been a steady shift from more traditional means of communication (e.g., hand written letters) to more electronically based (e.g., text messaging) (Crystal, 2008). This shift in communication style has influenced both civilian and military occupations (Turkoski, 2009;Finomore, et al., 2010). The current study investigated whether text-speak (method for shortening words or phrases) provides semantic value. A text-speak proficiency scale was also created in order to determine if the extent of text-speak use correlates with behavioral performance. Eighty-seven university students completed a masked priming experiment coupled with an 8-item text-speak scale. The masked priming experiment yielded significant priming indicating that text-speak primes are semantically meaningful, because they facilitate responding to their word counterpart even when the prime is processed unconsciously. The 8-item scale yielded a correlation between willingness to use text speak and magnitude of priming. These findings suggest that the 8-item scale may be useful in assessing text-speak behavior and aid in a better understanding of the role of textspeak proficiency and performance.

Right Hemisphere Prefrontal Cortical Involvement in Text-Speak Processing

“…Text-speak questionnaire. The text-speak questionnaire (Head et al, 2011) is an 8-item self-report questionnaire that consists of three factors: willingness to use text-speak, preference to use text messaging, and text messaging experience. This questionnaire has been used in previous studies and has correlated with behavioral measurements (Head, et al, 2012;Head et al, 2011).…”

“…To explore text-speak proficiency with performance we correlated the three factors from the Text-speak questionnaire (Head et al, 2011): Willingness to use text-speak, Preference to use text messaging, and Text messaging experience with the behavioural performance of participants (correct responses and response time) and physiological measurements (rSO 2 ). RH activity was significantly correlated with Factor 1 (r = .248, p = .04).…”

“…Text-speak is often word-like and has lexical representation (Head, Helton, Neumann, Russell, & Shears, 2011;Ganushchak, Krott, & Meyer, 2012); however, reading text-speak can be cognitively demanding. Indeed, for those who are literate, word activation is generally automatic and captures attention (Stroop, 1935); conversely, text-speak is not as automatically activated and requires more cognitive effort to process (Ganushchak, Krott, & Meyer, 2010;Head, Russell, Dorahy, Neumann, & Helton, 2011;Perea, Acha, & Carreiras, 2009).…”