17/05/2018 2-2 To Text or Not to Text | Smrt English

2-2 To Text or Not to Text

"Your cellphone is a tool, but that doesn’t mean you have to be one when you
use it." Greg Proops

Warm-up
característica
Do you have a cellphone? If not, why not? If yes, which feature do you use the
most?

Do you believe in cellphone etiquette? Are people in your country or Vancouver

usually polite when they use their phones? What rules should people follow
when they use cellphones?

Do you think cellphones have had a positive e ect on human communication

or a negative one?

Article

Read the following article about teenager’s texting habits. Make sure you
understand the highlighted vocabulary.

alienating a key way suburbs

social privilege substantially median lag

http://www.smrtenglish.com/uemisf/lesson/6782# 1/4
 17/05/2018 2-2 To Text or Not to Text | Smrt English

Texting is ultimate social tool for teens, study says

(CNN) -- Mobile devices often get accused of alienating

people from the world around them. But for U.S. teens,
cell phones (especially text messaging) are a key way to
stay connected with friends and other people in their
lives, according to new research from the Pew Internet &
American Life Project.

Pew found that 63% of all teens say they exchange text messages every day with
por pouco
people in their lives, including their parents. Also, nearly half of all teens send and
receive text messages with friends daily.

In contrast, 28% teens say they never text their friends -- but then, 23% of teens don't
have a cell phone at all. For teens, cell phones appear to correlate with social
privilege . Nearly 90% of older teens (aged 14-17) have a cell phone, while just under
60% of 12- to 13-year-olds have a cell phone. White teens are most likely to have a
cell phone (81%), vs. 72% of black teens and 63% of Hispanic teens.
lares
More than 90% of teens from households earning $75,000 or more annually have a
cell phone, compared with 62% of teens from households earning less than $30,000
per year. Also, teens who live in the suburbs or whose parents graduated from
college are most likely to have a cell phone.

Only about one in four U.S. teens currently uses a smartphone, says Pew, in contrast
to about 46% of U.S. adults. Interestingly, Pew found that smartphone-using teens
levemente/ ligeiramente menos provável
are slightly less likely than teens with simpler feature phones to have recently used a
computer to access the Internet. However, teens with smartphones also are
" substantially more likely than other teens to have used a tablet computer to go
online in the last 30 days." 
superando
Teen girls (78%) slightly outnumber teen boys (78%) for cell phone ownership. And
older teen girls tend to send and receive the most texts: a median of 100 per day.
That said, teen boys now send 60% more texts daily than they did in 2009.

Just over one-third of all parents of cell phone-using teens report using parental
controls to help them manage their kids' cell phone use. These controls can include
limits on which websites they can access, which apps they can download and limits

http://www.smrtenglish.com/uemisf/lesson/6782# 2/4
17/05/2018 2-2 To Text or Not to Text | Smrt English

on the amount or hours of texting. If their teens have simpler feature phones (rather
than smartphones), parents are more likely to enable these controls.

What aren't teens doing with their cell phones? E-mail and instant messaging, which
atraso
lag in popularity behind texting.

"Increasingly, teens do not have the capability or the interest in exchanging instant
messages or exchanging e-mail," Pew notes. "Nearly two in ve teens say they never
or cannot exchange instant messaging, and another 39% of teens say they never
exchange e-mail."

Comprehension
What di erent types of teenagers did the survey look at? What were the main
di erences between them?

Why do you think text messages are so popular among teens? Why are email
and instant messaging less popular?

Is there a danger to young people to text so much? What about adults?

Further Discussion
Would be= seria
How would your life be di erent if you didn’t have a cellphone? How would it
be better? How would it be worse?

If we decided that teenagers were using cellphones too much, how could we
reduce their use?
http://www.smrtenglish.com/uemisf/lesson/6782# 3/4
17/05/2018 2-2 To Text or Not to Text | Smrt English

What do you think is the next step in mobile communications? Is it moving in a

positive or negative direction?

http://www.smrtenglish.com/uemisf/lesson/6782# 4/4