Raising Teenagers: Sleep Texting

There has been talk this week of our teens getting involved in a new trend referred to as “sleep texting.” There hasn’t been any controlled research on this topic but at least one person who studies teens believe that there has been an increase in this sort of behavior.

Dr. Elizabeth Dowdell, a professor of nursing at Villanova University, reports that she has seen enough anecdotal evidence about “sleep texting” to believe that it really is happening. Apparently, during “sleep texting” the beep of the cell phone lightly and briefly awakens the teen who then responds in a half-asleep manner and then may have no memory of texting in the morning.

I have spoken to many teens about this and yes many say that they charge their cell phones next to their beds and they often text late into the night but the majority of them are not agreeing that they text in their sleep. I will have to stay on top of this and see if things change.

In the event that this is a very real trend I suggest that parents be proactive. Have your teens charge their phones outside of their rooms. I have always been a fan of having teens be apart from their technology during the evening. Listen, they need their sleep and for goodness sake we don’t want them to be sending messages when they are not fully awake. This talk of “sleep-texting” reminds me of “drunk -dialing” something that we warned our friends in college not to do when they had been drinking and felt the urge to call an ex-boyfriend.