Robyn Lee， a 15-year-old teenage girl who studies at York Community High School， US says she has four friends. But she also has 15 to 20 other friends she considers part of her regular social circle.

“It's like a bad thing to have only one， friend ，”explained Robyn. “If you have one friend， it means only one person likes you. That’s not cool，” she said.

For many years， experts studying teen friendships have known that teenagers prefer to travel in groups. In studies conducted in 1963 and in 1995， researchers found teen friendship groups averaged six people. In 2005， when teens were asked about how many friends they kept in touch with regularly， the average answer was 20.

The change to bigger -group friendships has advantages， such as increasing more connections and improving teens' self-pride by giving them a place to belong.

However， the change also has some disadvantages，say psychologists. “The meaning of friendship is becoming much more complicated，” said Bernardo Carducci， a professor of psychology at Indiana University Southeast.

MaryRose Moss， a 17-year-old in Chicago， knows how she could get more friends. She created a Facebook page when she was 14 and within months ， she had her group of 500 friends.

Text messaging has opened the door to many new connections， she says. “I'm friends with some people that I wouldn't be as close to if it weren't for technology，” said Moss. “It's so easy to send a text to somebody even if you don't know him very well. ”

Some psychologists wonder whether social-networking technology is affecting some skills children once got from making friends in the old-fashioned way.

“In the past， you argued， discussed and reached an agreement， but if somebody disagrees with you now， you can ‘defriend’ him with the click of keys，” said Carducci.

Marianne Boe， a social studies teacher in Chicago ， sees signs of changing friendships in the hallways. Ten years ago， she could easily know groups of girls who stayed friends through all four years of high school. “Today， it's harder，” Boe said.

   Nowadays, I acknowledge that a revolution has occurred. That much has been ___ by having hand-held iPads or smart phones that allow us not only to communicate while on the _____ but also to reserve parking spaces, get weather reports, and _____ tell us where, at any given moment, we are standing on the planet Earth.

But I must acknowledge a _____. Conversation used to be surprisingly _____ to start. When I took a seat next to someone on a train, bus, or plane, the first thing I would do was _____ the person. Once the ice had been broken, the following chat _____ erupt naturally.

Time has changed, and the change has been _____. Recently, while I was _____ a long distance bus, I couldn't help but notice everyone was staring at their ______, clicking. I found an empty seat next to a middle-aged man and said "Morning" to him. He threw me a ______ and said "Morning". Then he returned to his ______. So I left him in his world.

I miss the ______ conversations with fellow travelers. One never knows what will be ______, and in fact, sometimes how ______ it will be. I was once on a ______ traveling from Iceland to Denmark. I noticed an old man looking out over the North Sea. "It's beautiful, isn't it?" I said. He turned to me,______, and we were soon chatting away. _____ I told him that I didn't know how I was going to get from the port in Denmark to my destination city. He ______,"Of course you know. I have a car and I'm going to ______ you there. "

   Most people love to lose themselves in a great book, maybe a classic novel, a modern storybook or a great work of history. But many people also live busy lives, and for them finding time to sit quietly and read is difficult, if not impossible. Fortunately, with the coming of the Internet and high-tech tools like the iPod, more and more people are making literature a part of their lives again.

A very special website now makes it possible for people to listen to books that they simply would not have time to read. The site is called Audible Inc., and it’s the best place to download audio (音频的) books. Over the past few years, hundreds of thousands of these books have been recorded. They include nearly every classic, as well as most newly-published ones. Most of these are read by voice actors who really bring the text to life.

Audible Inc. lets you easily and quickly download a book and load it onto your iPod or other MP3 players, or onto CDs so that you can listen in your car. The site is like Amazon, com, but for audio books. It includes thousands of recommendations (推荐) and customer reviews that are extremely helpful. The site lets you listen to a free piece of each book so you can tell ahead what the narrator (讲述者) sounds like. No wonder that most people who listen to an audio book for the first time are immediately attracted.

This is the perfect opportunity to find out what so many people know about audio books. But be careful — you may become attracted to audio books for life.