Welcome!

The Underwood (Teens and Technology) Lab investigates adolescents’ and young adults’ digital communication, including text messaging and use of social media. We examine how features of digital communication relate to adolescents’ and young adults’ social and psychological health and development. Given the increasing numbers of youth who spend massive amounts of time online and the importance of peer relations for future adjustment, it is critical that we understand how young people use this medium with peers for good or for ill. If we wish to prevent social aggression and to create a climate of belonging and acceptance among youth, we have no choice but to study online communication, to examine how young people use the potentially powerful electronic grapevine. — Marion Underwood, PhD, Principal Investigator

The lab is currently in transition as we recently moved from The University of Texas at Dallas, the lab home for 20 years, to our new home at Purdue University. We are continuing to analyze data from our large, longitudinal study that has been ongoing in various forms since 2003 (see The Blackberry Project on our research page).

Our lab is currently not recruiting new research assistants, graduate students, or post-doctoral researchers.