Why is texting hard?

Piled-up notifications, texts left on seen or delivered, a general sense of guilt — these are all signs and symptoms of a bad texter. Yet it feels like most people run into this problem.  

If everyone is a bad texter, what makes texting so hard?

According to a 2025 study published by Statistics Canada, nearly 9 in every 10 Canadians reported that they used a combination of both virtual and in-person methods to communicate. Despite its common use, many students at Dalhousie University are getting frustrated with texting. 

Aliyah Juliana Cojuangco, a second-year nursing student at Dalhousie,  says texting’s disconnective factors are a deterrent.

“For someone like me, it’s so hard to read tone through text, and sometimes it gets the wrong message across,” says Cojuangco. “There’s a big communication barrier when you’re texting.”

A study of 20 undergraduate students from the University of California, Los Angeles found 100 per cent of participants felt they were better understood through face-to-face communication, with 90 per cent feeling that it was easier to communicate in person rather than through texting. 

Aside from ambiguous tone, the lack of immediacy in the conversation is another relevant factor for Cojuangco.

“It’s so much easier for people to ignore texts,” she says.

Cojuangco is not the only one who finds difficulties with texting.

Johan John, a second-year student at Dal, says he regularly has up to 10 unread messages.

“Sometimes it takes a lot. Sometimes you don’t know what you’re getting into. I don’t really like to look at my messages and try to see what the text is before,” he says.

“It can be a lot.”

Sophie Manuge, a first-year student at Dal, also finds the lack of tone indicators makes texting harder. 

She says the access that texting allows can often overwhelm her. 

“In real life, not a lot of people are trying to talk to you at once. Whereas when you open your phone, you’re having multiple conversations. I get overwhelmed with that.”

Matthew Orr, an assistant professor in the psychology department at Acadia University, links these difficulties back to natural stress responses.

“When you have this overwhelming amount of messages coming at you, you might feel some anxiety about not being able to keep up with it,” he says.

Orr says turning off notifications can reduce stress and anxiety. He also says that turning off notifications and checking them at scheduled times helps to reduce feeling overwhelmed.

“If the people who are waiting for you to respond can’t be respectful of that very small boundary, then that’s their problem.”