Many people ride an emotional roller coaster when a message isn’t immediately answered, whether a direct text or a social-media DM. It’s driven by the effect of 24/7 ‘digital availability’, a socially ingrained expectation that a recipient is constantly around and should immediately shoot back a reply.
Tensions over reply times may also come down to social norms
New developments in digital technology have outpaced the formulation of mutually agreed new communication paradigms, so when a text is sent, we’re not all responding according to the same rules
- Speedy responses have become a paradigm in the workplace since a delay in writing back to the boss reflects poorly on you
- A nagging feeling
- There’s no universally accepted consensus on how long people can take to reply to a message before it becomes ‘rude’
- Technology has far outpaced our ability to develop norms and expectations
- The emergence of new forms of interaction that swap face-to-face verbal communication with nonverbal written cues which have to be deciphered and contextualized with our own imaginations can add to confusion and anxiety
- These challenges can compound among people with similar disparities in response times
Can we just let it go?
In the end, is there anything you can do? Maybe yes, maybe no..
- If you’re getting angry about a slow reply, it may help to internalize why you’re beginning to work yourself up, remembering you’re projecting your own situation and subsequent anxieties on the recipient.
Social norms that put everyone on the same page about communication remain a moving target
The fact that people are talking more about these feelings could help move that needle
- Norms come from “open discussions”
- Perhaps an honest chat might be in order with a friend whose communication patterns are driving you crazy
