Instant Messaging Addiction in Teenagers - IELTS Listening Answers & Explanations

TUTOR: I'm very glad that the two of you decided to pursue this research topic because I think it's not only much needed but very relevant to current psychological concerns about addiction issues in young people. Now, tell me, how did you get started?

LEE: Well, we looked around for problems, or perceived problems, that teenagers in general might encounter and we came up with the extremely popular phenomenon of instant messaging and the implications that the use, or overuse, of this form of communication might have on teen behaviour.

KIM: Then we decided to propose the concept of instant messaging addiction. By the way, do you mind if we abbreviate "instant messaging" to IM in our discussion?

TUTOR: Not at all. But before you go any further, tell me something about the demographic sample you used.

LEE: We chose a random sample of teenagers from Jiangsu Province, from a typical public middle school, and we considered this group to be representative of teenagers in urban China. We distributed 500 questionnaires and 450 were returned. The sample group was on average aged between 14 and 15 years.

TUTOR: Internet addiction, or technological addiction as it's sometimes called, has been studied many times before. What makes your research different?

LEE: Well, previous studies indicated that Internet-dependent students are more likely to use instant communication, but we wanted to find out primarily whether IM addiction actually exists...and if so, what the symptoms are.

KIM: And secondly, we wanted to know whether IM addiction could be predicted, and finally, whether addiction has an impact on academic performance.

TUTOR: Quite a large undertaking. Tell me, what IM addiction symptoms did you identify among teenagers in your sample?

KIM: We found four major IM addiction symptoms, which are remarkably similar to the symptoms used to identify substance dependence, although here we're looking at behavioural addiction, not chemical addiction to drugs, alcohol or the like.

LEE: Yes, loss of control was a significant factor which indicates that the addicts had less self-discipline; they could not control the amount of time they spent on IM; and they neglected their schoolwork, as well as other responsibilities or obligations they might have. Obviously academic performance was adversely affected.

TUTOR: I'm sure that led to a lot of complaints from family and friends not to mention teachers.

KIM: Yes, of course. Another symptom was, as you would expect, a preoccupation with instant messaging—they would be annoyed if interrupted when chatting online and they would feel depressed and moody when they couldn't; they would go without sleep in order to chat; and when they were offline they would still be thinking about online chatting. As in chemical addiction, they would need to increase the dose, in this case, of IM time, to get satisfaction.

TUTOR: That sounds quite disturbing.

LEE: Yes, and as you can imagine, loss of relationships due to overuse of IM was a factor too. The addicted teenagers would rather chat online than go out with friends or spend time with family, which jeopardised their social relationships and their educational opportunities.

KIM: The fourth addictive factor we found was escape. These teenagers used IM as a form of escape from reality and responsibilities.

TUTOR: And can IM addiction be predicted?

KIM: Well, we found a definite correlation between shyness and IM addiction.

LEE: Not only shyness, but also a feeling of alienation was a predictor too: alienation from family, peers, and school.

TUTOR: So the more alienated they feel, the more they look for affection, friendship and social support through IM.

KIM: Exactly. But, interestingly, what we found was that alienation was a predictor for addiction but not necessarily related to a high level of IM use.

TUTOR: How do you explain that?

KIM: One possible explanation we considered was that those who were not alienated would communicate frequently with their friends through IM but addicts, on the other hand, are probably looking for friendship through online chatting with strangers.

TUTOR: Look, we're just about out of time—I'm really looking forward to reading your paper when you've finished it—but, before I go, can you quickly sum up your conclusions.

LEE: By looking at behavioural patterns and psychological characteristics, we were able to establish that there is a difference between high level of IM use and IM addiction as such.

KIM: And that there are certain positive predictors for addiction.

LEE: And our findings showed that teenagers' level of use of IM affected their academic performance.

TUTOR: So, you're saying that IM addiction detracts from the students' academic performance.

LEE: That's what we set out to prove—and there's absolutely no doubt: addicted students perform badly at school—but what we also found is that there is a correlation between the level of IM use and schoolwork.

TUTOR: So, not just the addicts suffer low scores.

LEE: Precisely. Our results show that the higher the level of IM use, regardless of whether addiction is involved, the more negative impact there is on academic performance.

TUTOR: Your research shows, then, that not only should teachers and parents be on the lookout for those teenagers who might be vulnerable to IM addiction but that parents should pay close attention and provide proper guidance and monitor their teenagers' level of use of instant messaging.

LEE: Yes, that's it in a nutshell.