Social Media Influenced Lexicons: A Child’s Vocabulary Production in Talk-In Interactions

Abstract

Social media has become a prominent medium of communication and has been used by all generations, including the youngest members of society. It has emerged as a powerful communication medium that makes interactions rapid, simple, and sensible. Youngsters also use social media to have fun, form and maintain connections, share and discover hobbies, explore identities, and grow familial ties; it is a continuation of their in-person and offline encounters. There is an assumption that with their exposure to modern gadgets, internet connectivity, and various online networking sites, children's daily talk-in interactions are influenced by social media languages. Utilizing a qualitative-descriptive research design, conversation analysis, Vygotsky's theory of language development and an interactionism approach, the purpose of the study is to provide an elaborated academic account of a child’s vocabulary production in casual conversations and list down the emerging social-media-influenced lexicons generated from a child, which were classified according to six-word categories: slang, colloquialism, alphabetism, neologism, loan words, and pseudowords. Findings show that the trends in digital exchanges on social media platforms have prevalent occurrences in a child’s everyday language, where some words and phrases possess critical meanings, as the child’s denotations and social-media connotations have a contrastive nature. As children develop their productive lexical skills using social media, the study highlights Vygotsky’s assertion on the importance of a child’s "more knowledgeable other" in language acquisition, production, and development.