This past weekend, I paid more attention to how my friends and I were communicating with people to see what types of media channels we chose to use in different situations.
For instance, on Friday night, my mom asked me to call her after dinner. By the time my friends and I had finished dinner, we were already starting to get ready to go out. I didn’t want to have the 15-20 minute minimum phone conversation – I just wanted to get dressed and get ready with my friends. I saw my mom was online, so instead of calling her, I IMed her and was able to speak and get ready at the same time. I did not have to focus on the one conversation but was able to accomplish different things at once.
A second example of media selection was between my friend and her boyfriend. My friend got upset over text messages that her boyfriend sent her Sunday morning and didn’t understand the purpose or reasoning behind them. Later that day, he texted her and the message refuted what he had texted earlier that day. She texted him that she was upset and didn’t understand what he meant and wanted to actually speak to him. Over the phone, he heard how upset he was and offered to come over. They then spoke face-to-face and were able to talk about what happened and resolved the issue.
I think that my first example relates to The Media Richness Theory. Rather than calling my mom, I IMed her and I chose this media because of its efficiency. I didn’t want or need to have a lengthy conversation. It was fast and easy to IM her and saved me time because I was able to get ready to go out while talking to her. This example can also fit with Sullivan’s model - I was able to IM my mom rather than call her because I was just calling to talk – we did not have anything important to discuss. The locus was about me and it was positive so a mediated channel worked. I could get my message across just as easily through IM rather than the phone since there was no ambiguity or anything that needed clarification. Overall, with this example, efficiency was definitely my first priority, but I also see how I chose my media in terms of Sullivan’s model.
The second example definitely fits better with Sullivan’s model. My friend’s boyfriend used a lean channel (text) for a self locus and negative valence message. He used text messaging to buffer what he was saying. Then, my friend got upset because of the ambiguity of the message and chose a richer channel (the telephone) to try to understand what was going on. Hearing how upset my friend was on the phone, her boyfriend finally decided to make things clear and resolve the issue by choosing FTF communication. They were able to see each other, understand each other’s reactions, and have an open and honest discussion. In this case, in addition to efficiency, ambiguity and clarity played a major role in their choosing a media channel.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
I think that you made both excellent observations of interesting media choices and related them very well to the theories we discussed. Because of the desire to keep the contact with your mother efficient and not entirely occupying, your choice of using IM was a good one. While it is a leaner media than the telephone, it still allowed you to have an actual conversation with your mother rather than just a one-sided form of contact such as email. You were able to please both your desire to focus on going out and your mother's desire to talk to you. In the case of your friend and her boyfriend, I wonder if maybe it would have been possible to avoid the bad situation entirely by never using the leaner form of media (texting) in the first place. In an attempt to be efficient with his contact to his girlfriend, the individual actually caused a situation that was the opposite of efficient. This situation certainly exemplifies how the ambiguity associated with certain electronic forms of media can often cause more harm than it does provide convenience.
Post a Comment