"The actual rate that was reported … was 1.6 percent growth rate, annualized, in the third quarter," says Dr. Walden, a specialist with the North Carolina Cooperative Extension Service. "Now these numbers can always be revised -- probably will.

"But many economists had expected the growth rate for the third quarter to come in slower, primarily due to the adverse effects in the summer of the high gas prices (and) the slowdown of the housing market," he adds.

"Now this does not mean we are in a recession. We are still growing, we’re just growing at a slower rate," Walden says. "Now for the future, right now economists I think are fairly optimistic. They don’t think this 1.6 percent is going to get slower –- that we may actually go into negative territory, which would be a recession. But they are looking for a pickup in economic growth after the turn of the year."