Quite a bit of variation and it doesn't seem to be generational per se.

I'm a millennial who talks on the phone a lot with both family and friends. However these do tend to be pre-arranged either with a text right beforehand or a few days in advance. Dad will text 'u free' and that's an indicator that he is keen for a chat. I will either call him right back or text back if I'm busy, generally indicating when I will call instead. Dad has always been someone who keeps in touch with family/friends via phone calls so I wonder if I have subliminally absorbed this approach? Pretty much every Sunday morning he calls his two closest sisters and he would talk to his other 3 siblings on a regular basis as well.

I don't tend to do much texting/messaging with friends, we either catch-up in person or talk on the phone. I have two close friends who live elsewhere and we tend to talk for an hour plus every 1-2 months but I will even call local friends when we are struggling to co-ordinate an in-person catch-up. It definitely helps me to feel more connected to them as I feel we can delve into how we actually are in more depth than in a message. I feel this is especially important as many of my friends are in the throes of young children and it would be easy to miss the challenges they are navigating plus hearing about all the positives!

I spend a huge amount of my work time on Teams calls, both pre-arranged meetings and spontaneous. Often if someone has sent me a question via a Teams message, I will just call then back. It's generally important for me to have wider context before I can give an answer to their questions and I often stumble into other information via these conversations.

Perhaps I enjoy the phone because calls are a rare event for me. I don't have more than a handful or so per week, both incoming and outgoing. I understand if one is on the phone all day at work, one needs a break. Also, with social media we have windows into each others lives that may have replaced some of the need to catch up and have a conversation...? I do find it comical though to blame someone for calling when we are in the middle of a movie ...when the phone wasn't silenced, and you picked up and then listened to them...or calling us from a car...how dare they?? ...as if those are just the rudest things. In my current life of several people in a small house, the car is one of my only places for a truly private conversation!

My sense is that a phone call itself isn't rude, per se, just an unexpected phone call with the caller's expectation that one will drop everything to take it?

It is very interesting to me how communication patterns have evolved with technology. I almost never call anyone without texting them first, expect my kids and my sister. I almost never answer a call unless I'm expecting it, except for my kids and husband which I always pick up unless I'm already on a call or work Zoom.

If I ever occasionally spontaneously call out, I am more surprised if someone answers than not. I figure, if they pick up they made that choice!

I do love a long, pre-arranged chat, especially with equally busy friends, while we are both walking. Multi-tasking at its best. I also like to talk while I'm driving -more multitasking (yes, hands free!).

What I really dislike are voicemail messages. Send me a text or even a voice text but don't make me have to go into voicemail. With the recent advent of voice texting, I am using this much more often for that spontaneous hello. Don't know why it's such an annoyance to me.

Janet - laughing about the basement steps memory! I did the same thing with our only phone in the house. Amazing that cord didn't get pulled out of its socket over the years. We were only allowed to use the phone for 10 minutes at a time, though, "in case someone was trying to call". Remember busy signals? So annoying! In retrospect it wasn't a bad rule, but I wanted to talk for hours when I was a teenager and I loathed the 10-minute-rule.

Opinions are mixed for sure, but they don't seem to be breaking down by generation. I'm thinking, like most such things, the articles I read were over generalizing. Instead, the ideas seem to fall this way:

• Most people are fans of prearranging.
• Failing that and assuming lack of emergency, most people do the courteous thing of asking if it's a good time to talk, and want others to do the same.
• Is the caller a close friend? Because of course the feelings will vary based on this.
• A lot is personality. Do you like to talk on the phone? Are you talkative in general? Do you like small talk? Is there a match in these areas between you and the caller? Because if there isn't a match, the differences can often be more tolerable in person than they are with the once removed aspect of the phone.

For the last one, I find talking to my friend in person to be significantly more pleasant than on the phone...and of course, like the first thing, in person is prearranged.

It seems like a few people were put on the defensive by this thread and I'm sorry for that. I truly was just curious if the generational thing was true and it doesn't seem to be, at least in this population sample. Basically, you do you.

I hear you Peri, my mom always wanted to talk on the phone but I preferred in person. I just couldn't meet that need for her and was ok with it (of course, there were some more complicated dynamics involved as with all things mother/daughter...).

I firmly believe that sometimes in order to preserve certain friendships we have to have healthy boundaries/coping mechanisms in place. I love my phone friend but have realized I enjoy her company more in certain contexts (one-on-one get togethers vs larger groups, choosing familiar activities and places that we have in common from our shared past rather than introducing new ideas, etc)..

Some related nostalgia: while going through 60 years of my parents' paperwork, some interesting artifacts included itemized phone bills, and letters. I was a huge letter writer to my parents, indivually or to both together, and my Dad often wrote back but my Mom never did. She was a big phone talker, though, especially after 11 pm. So there were calls and calls and calls to me and my sister in college for most of the '80's! It was a convenient time to talk, given that dorms usually only had 1 phone per floor, in the middle of the hallway, shared by at least 24 people. I never competed for an hour on that phone at that time of the night.
It was also interesting that Westinghouse (and, i expect, most companies) itemized and charged back personal phone calls to my Dad.

My Mom also used to talk very late at night to her best friend, while they ironed. Like, till 3 a.m.!

Hmm. I love caller ID so I can ignore anything I don't want to take. Often I will text first and ask if the person can speak. I also have some calls that are scheduled - e.g., my best friend from high school and I speak every Sunday morning at 7:30 am, unless one of her adult children is getting married. I'm kidding but she has had 3 weddings in 2 years.

Inherently rude? No. But I am perhaps in the minority by being 100% capable of ignoring my phone. If they really want to talk, they'll leave a VM and I'll call back.

I agree Peri, I think there is a trend towards a dislike of phone calls rather than it being especially generational. It is more based upon the timing, the interruption and the personality of the receiver.

I don't think it is rude to call without prior notice, nor do I think it is rude if to delay or not take a call if you have something on or are involved with something at the time.

As long as we maintain connections through other means then all is good - or not if you prefer that.

@ Laurie - love your telling of being a letter writer! When I was a kid in boarding school, phone calls weren’t allowed, but I wrote to my mom and dad, grandma and grandpa, and my Aunt Mary (a stylish single woman!) - and they all wrote back!

When DH and I were courting, he had summer jobs that had him living in a tent camp. He would visit the closest small town for groceries every 10-14 days, then return to camp. We would write long letters to each other (I would send them c/o the post office and they would hold them for him!) This pattern of writing to each other persisted for another 3 years after we married - ‘cause field work! We never got into the habit of long telephone calls.

I had girlfriends who had telephone bills that totalled hundreds of dollars from phoning boyfriends - and that was in the early 80’s!

I got rid of the landline at home 4 years ago. I only received sales cold calls and it bordered on harassment. Everything was there: real estate, energy contracts, insurance, telephony... just bullshit!
Now I only have my smartphone. On my voicemail it is not possible to leave a voicemail, I ask people to send me a text
And I only answer phone numbers I know :xD

Runcarla and Laurie, this thread also made me think about those letter writing days and the joy of opening the mailbox to a thick envelope with recognizable handwriting. I'd savor them. Yes, out of state, out of country and even out of area code phone calls were so expensive then. How lucky we are now to have such easy global contact.

Have you seen the film News From Home by Chantal Ackerman? It's footage of NYC streets when she lived there in the 70's with a voiceover of Chantal reading her mother's letters. (there are two versions, one in French and one in English). https://youtu.be/6ai73JORZfI?si=IeDG0Qfni5mrBJ3T The letters are so mundane, yet heartfelt.

Re letters: one summer when I was a dining room server in a resort, I had every afternoon off. I spent it on the beach at the lake, writing letters and reading. My college roommate and I wrote in Morse Code. It wasn’t so our letters would be secret, it was so we would learn the code! It served her well - she ended up having a multi decade career in the Navy. Actually, I doubt she used the code at all - she was a doctor.

ETA: I’m in several group texts. I like these - we send each other pictures, notes, etc., and we can respond if or when we want.

DD30 (so a Millennial) is a caller. That’s how she maintains friendships with now long distance friends. At least with her dad and me she never asks if it is convenient. Maybe I need to train her. She’s the one who almost always initiates; I always worry about intruding so I generally text. I figure that almost always taking her calls even if they’re not 100% convenient is what keeps us (emotionally) close when she’s halfway across the country. We talk maybe 3x/wk. With other folks, mainly Baby Boomers like me, I generally text or email.

DS and DDL hate phone callas and won't answer if it is not convenient. As I get older I appreciate a time to talk.

I don't pick up a call unless I'm willing to talk. And on the rare occasions when I do call someone (generally at their request) I always start with "am I catching you at a bad time?" I have a friend who always texts to ask if it's a good time before he calls.

MsMary, my dad trained me with the phrase "a phone call is only an invitation to talk and you have the option to decline". Of course as a teenager in the 80s and 90s I disagreed but have now come around to his POV! I feel the same about a ringing doorbell (which is almost always just a notification of a drop off delivery, or a solicitor of some kind). My kids are sooooo embarrassed that I will sit in the living room visible from the front porch ignoring people outside.