What this story covers:
How much communication with your romantic partner is too much? In some relationships, the expectations are for immediate responses to texts, calls or social media posts. The need for constant communication is often a warning sign in relationships.
Why it matters:
Constant communication may indicate dependency, insecurity or attention-seeking behavior, and it has led to the end of some relationships. The problem is only getting worse as there are more and more ways to communicate using technology.
By Olivia Balog, Cecily Jackson & Taylor Montford
Needy. Insecure. Anxious. Obsessive. Emotionally dependent. These are the words that young adults use to describe people in romantic relationships who expect constant communication from their partners. You know the type — the one who texts and gets worried if you don’t respond right away. Or wonders why you didn’t pick up the phone. And wants to know why you didn’t like a Facebook message or comment on an Instagram post.
The burden becomes immense. Doing your homework? Put your pencil down and send a reply. Watching a movie? Pause it and send a reply. Eating dinner with family? Hide your phone under the table to send a message. But do people need to hear from each other so often throughout the day? How does the need for constant communication affect relationships? We examine those questions and more in this podcast.
Constant communication may be understandable in the early stages of a relationship, when two people are establishing their connection. But after that? It often becomes a problem.
“In the beginning stages, it’s very nice to be able to talk to somebody for endless amounts of time a day. But as the relationship carries on, it gets a little frustrating because you feel like you have to communicate with each other all day because you have the chance to. But you start losing out on doing other things like being with your friends. And then you don’t really get a chance to miss them if you’re in constant communication all day.”
Jason Hopkins
How much do we communicate with each other? Quite often, according to research.
The need for constant communication is a warning sign in relationships. And it often means that people are addicted to instant gratification and are losing their sense of self.
“We’re not in the here and now,” said Robert Duran, a professor at the University of Hartford. “We’ve lost the sense of autonomy and we’re feeling the stress of constant connectedness and that possibly some of our impersonal skills are eroding because of that just medium.”
In some cases, constant texting and calling can lead to digital dating abuse.
So what are some solutions? One approach, researchers say, is to determine early in a relationships if you are text compatible with your partner.
Another approach, according to Duran and other researchers, is to agree to ground rules for communicating through technology.
