R U Able to Meat Me: The Impact of Students’ Overly Casual Email Messages to Instructors

The undocumented rules of emailing a lecturer have a measured price, and lecturers and students disagree about what they are.

Stephens, K. K., Houser, M. L. & Cowan, R. L. (2009). R U Able to Meat Me: The Impact of Students’ Overly Casual Email Messages to Instructors. Communication Education, 58(3), 303–326.

Type

Journal article

Find it

doi.org/10.1080/03634520802582598

Checked

Against the abstract, 15 September 2026

Why it is on the list

Casual versus formal wording explained 48–64% of the variance in how instructors felt about a student, how credible they found them, and their attitude to the message. It also affected whether they agreed to meet. Instructors were more bothered than students, especially by unsigned emails and shortcuts like “RU”. That is the definition of an undocumented expectation, and it is 2009 data from the US, so norms may have drifted since.