The document discusses how new media has influenced teen dating and intimacy. It describes how teens can use digital communication like texting and social media to casually flirt and gauge interest in a non-direct way. It also discusses how dating rituals now include constantly updating relationship status online and expecting immediate responses to messages due to mobile communication. Breaking up involves cleaning up social media profiles and removing signs of the relationship.

1. Intimacy
New Media’s Influence on Teen Dating

2. Frequently Used Digital
Communication

3. Cour=ship & Flir=ing
“Controlled Casualness”
- When a teen is interested in a potential partner, this digital
world allows for more ambiguous communication.
- Instead of being directly “flirty”, using Facebook or text
messages allows the sender to stop and think about the exact
wording.

4. Cour=ship & Flir=ing
Many teens have reported to sending messages that come across a nonchalant
yet with an edge of flirtation. This way they can gauge the interest of the
other by their response.

5. “Going Out”
The Beginning Stages of Dating Include a lot of Updating
Updating Relationship Status

6. “Going Out”
Profile pictures on social media sites must now include a
“couples” photo. This sends the signal to the rest of the world
that you are spoken for.

7. “Going Out”
The New Rules of Mobile Communication
Within a Teen Relationship
Immediate Responses are Expected in
the Mobile World

8. “Going Out”
This new way of dating has also set new standards for
communication expectations.
The immediacy of return texts and messages has become almost
impossible to live up to. People forget that just because the
technology is at their fingertips, their lives still have their
attentions directed elsewhere.
Work, school, driving, eating and face-to-face conversations with
others are usually not taken into consideration when a message
has not been returned in a specific amount of time.

9. Breaking Up
All status updates, This process is
comments and similar to that of
photos must now removing physical
go through a “clean photos of the
up” phase. All must couple from walls
be removed and and wallets, erasing
social media names on
profiles returned to notebooks and
pre-relationship drawings hidden in
format. dresser drawers.

10. Conclusion
Many of the new media and technology has taken the place of
previous “face-to-face” interactions. Some argue that this is too
impersonal for a relationship to be built upon, others believe the
opposite to be true.
Either way, this is the new wave of dating rituals. As technology
increases, the rituals will change. And teens are usually the first
group to adapt and flourish under such transitions.
This new intimacy study has now grown to include people of all ages, with the
use of dating websites and the expansive use of mobile phones. What these
teenagers started as a means of convenience, the rest of us have followed to
create a new norm.