Tech Talk: An Empathy Report on College Communication Trends from Resident's Perspectives

In the digital world we live in, it is evident that face-to-face communication is becoming less frequent. At my institution this is a serious problem. The past three years that I have been a Residence Hall Manager, I have noticed that the residents in my building struggle with face-to-face conversations with their roommates, their peers, and their professors- especially confrontational conversation. Digital communication is becoming more relevant, but why is face-to-face lacking?

I decided instead of assuming, or trying to just solve the problem on my own, that I needed to get a different perspective. I decided to have two conversations with residents in my building and get their points of view on communication and how it has affected them personally and academically. I think a lot of people just assume how students feel or why they do things the way they do. I asked them each 13 questions and the answers were very different between the two students.

My Conversation Questions

It was great to get perspective on all these questions, but I’m going to highlight those I found the most interesting or unexpected in this report. As background knowledge, Student A didn’t have many commitments outside of school and Student B had several jobs; this could be important and affect practice of communication or opportunities for face-to-face communication but that’s something I’m wanting to look into further.

• How do you define effective face-to-face communication?

A: Non-stressful, laid back, not high pressure.

B: We don’t have a lot of face to face communication. Having questions prepped and getting them answered right away rather than ‘I’ll email the answers to you later.”

Convenience is something I have seen come up a lot. I was interested in convenience, as many times that is seen as a perk of digital communication. I was surprised to find it was not seen as the case with Student B as they found in person communication more convenient. 

• In what ways do you think face-to-face communication differs from online or digital communication, especially in academic or professional contexts?

A: I feel like you can get more information face-to-face and it’s more professional in general face-to-face. Virtual can be less stressful, as can think about what you’re saying but feel like face-to-face is better.

B: I feel like it's easier to understand tone or sarcasm f2f and also math - trying to get math answers is so hard over virtual email. I need to have someone there to explain the answer. Also feel like people can misunderstand your question virtually, and you’ll have to ask more questions to get the right answer.

• Do you think technology has impacted face-to-face communication among college students, and if so what are the potential positives or negatives of that?

A: Yes. Both. Negatives would be not knowing how to talk to people in real life, not having professionalism or care of what you’re saying, online it’s normal to say whatever you’re thinking. Positive, would be because you can reach people more online than in person, and less confrontation.

B: I definitely think it has affected it. I’ve never been in college when there haven't been computers. Nobody really talks to each other in classes. We all walk in and get computers out. I don't really know people in my classes. I think it's good because people are more willing to ask questions through email, but don’t really talk to each other.

Talking with these students gave me a few more perspectives on this subject than I had before. Pressure and convenience were the two themes of these conversations. Students want to have face-to-face conversations but they are just not as frequent. I am excited to continue this conversation, and come to a solution that can help students achieve what they want in terms of successful communication.