Amanda Pritchett, St. Louis University senior, wanted to break up with her boyfriend. But every time she met with him to end their relationship, Pritchett ended up making out with him instead. After three rounds of this, she finally decided that enough was enough. So Pritchett did the most logical thing at the time: she whipped out her cell phone and sent him a break-up text.

It turns out breaking up via text message is a growing trend. According to a study conducted by Illinois State University researchers, 9 percent of non-married adults choose to end relationships via “online communications.”

 Omri Gillath, associate professor of psychology, says breaking up via text is an increasingly acceptable short-term solution, but it isn’t advised. “We term these people ‘avoidant’ because they have basic insecurities with self and relationships. They would rather do things in a distant way,” Gillath says.

 Alex Hood confidently admits that he is a break-up texter. “Hells yeah, I did it!” he says. “I tried calling her all day but she wouldn’t pick up her phone. I just texted her and said, ‘It’s over!’” Hood explains that he was angry that his then-girlfriend was ignoring his calls when he did try to break up with her in a more polite way. Fortunately though, Hood does have some remorse. “I wouldn’t do it again because she hates me three years after the fact,” he says. “I would just be patient and wait until the next day to meet up with her.”

 The text-message-break-up phenomena may seem new, but Gillath says it’s the medium for the messy breakup that’s new, not the avoidant behavior that leads to it.

 “It must be hurtful, insulting and messy, but you have to remember the topic of breakup is not new. People were mean about it years ago. It’s the technology that’s changed,” he says. The “meanness” that comes from breaking up via text stems from the impersonal nature of the medium, says Jessica Vascellaro, a technology columnist for The Wall Street Journal. “Communication is becoming so easy that the recipient knows how little time and thought was required by the sender,” Vascellaro writes in her article, “Why E-Mail No Longer Rules ... and What That Means for the Way We Communicate.”

 When sending that break-up text, one must be aware of the implications of such a form of communication. Not only is the sender avoiding the difficulty of a verbal conversation, he or she is also inadvertently telling the significant other that he or she doesn’t care enough to discuss the matter in person.

 Alex Frederickson, Fort Scott senior, thinks the whole business of break-up texting is a bad idea. “It makes people more upset and creates more drama than needed,” he says. Frederickson says he’s noticed that men are more likely to break up via text than women. A couple of his friends have ended their relationships this way and he says the breakups didn’t go well. “I don’t know specifically why,” Frederickson says, “but maybe it was because they were too afraid to go face-to-face.”

 Another issue with a text-message breakup is that the limits of the medium could make it difficult to get your point across. “It’s also about how you interpret a text,” says Caroline Mason, Dallas freshman. “It’s hard to know what a person is really saying.”

 Gillath admits that ending a relationship via text message may be the easiest thing to do. But to truly make a clean break, it’s best to at least try talking over the phone rather than sending that avoidant text. And if at all possible, talk to them face-to-face in a public space. Gillath says these methods are better because you can hear the person’s voice and interact with them, which gives both of you a bit of closure and a stepping stone toward moving on.