British Journal of Developmental Psychology · 2008 · 238 citations · 15 references
EducationEarly Childhood EducationLiteracy EducationPhonological AwarenessReading DevelopmentVocabulary DevelopmentEarly Literacy SkillsLanguage ExposureLexical DevelopmentReadingReading AcquisitionWord KnowledgeIndividual Learner DifferencesLearner Individual DifferencesLudic WritingMobile Phone CommunicationMobile Phone MessagingSchool LiteracyShort-term Memory Development
The study discusses how knowledge of text message abbreviations may contribute to children’s word reading attainment through increased print exposure and ludic language use. The study investigates the relationship between 10‑12‑year‑old British children’s knowledge of text message abbreviations and their school literacy attainment. Children composed scenario‑based text messages, which were coded for textisms to compute a textism‑to‑word ratio, and they also completed a mobile‑phone‑use questionnaire. Higher textism‑to‑word ratios were positively linked to word reading, vocabulary, and phonological awareness, and predicted word reading ability even after controlling for age, memory, vocabulary, phonological awareness, and phone ownership.
This paper presents a study of 88 British 10-12-year-old children's knowledge of text message (SMS) abbreviations ('textisms') and how it relates to their school literacy attainment. As a measure of textism knowledge, the children were asked to compose text messages they might write if they were in each of a set of scenarios. Their text messages were coded for types of text abbreviations (textisms) used, and the ratio of textisms to total words was calculated to indicate density of textism use. The children also completed a short questionnaire about their mobile phone use. The ratio of textisms to total words used was positively associated with word reading, vocabulary, and phonological awareness measures. Moreover, the children's textism use predicted word reading ability after controlling for individual differences in age, short-term memory, vocabulary, phonological awareness and how long they had owned a mobile phone. The nature of the contribution that textism knowledge makes to children's word reading attainment is discussed in terms of the notion of increased exposure to print, and Crystal's (2006a) notion of ludic language use.
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