After Thursday's lecture, I really began to notice how and why I choose the mediums of communication that I use on a daily basis. For instance, this past weekend I decided to confront a friend about an issue that has been building up between us. After the first few weeks of living in our house together, the excitement settled and the reality of chores finally set in. Before arriving in the fall, I thought our biggest problem would be the five of us girls trying to share one bathroom. Soon enough I realized the importance of everybody doing a portion of the house chores. One girl, let's just call her Molly, seemed to be the one whom everybody cleaned up after. As my frustration built up, I decided to write her a note instead of confronting her face to face. According to O'Sullivan's Impression Management Model, lean channels of communication provide a medium in which one can better manage self-presentation. This goes against the Media Richness Theory which states that people choose a medium in which they can be most efficient. O'Sullivan's model shows that I chose a lean medium because of the expected negative outcome. By communicating with her in an asynchronous way, I was able to avoid a face to face interaction in which I would have to deal with her reaction.
In addition to this instance, I also noticed the significance of my choice of medium when I called my mom last weekend. I called her after my fitness testing to tell her how excited I was that I had passed the running tests. According to the Impression Management Model, people are likely to choose media rich channels, like telephone conversations, when they have something positive to say about themselves. The Media Richness Theory also came into play because in this instance, self-presentation was not as issue. I merely wanted to boast about my accomplishments. I wanted the most efficient medium of communication and a synchronous conversation so I could also quickly hear her excitement as well.
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I think you did a good job accurately identifying examples of O’Sullivan’s Impression Management Model. While the Media Richness Theory is about efficiency, O’Sullivan’s model is about clarity and ambiguity. In order to assess your two situations of media selection you had to determine the valence and locus of each. In the first example, you needed to confront your roommate about the chores she was not participating in around the house. This is clearly a situation with a negative valence and a locus focusing on someone else. Because you were accusing your friend of her lack of house chores, you chose a lean and mediated interaction in order to create a buffer between the two of you. Your second example involved a situation involving positive valence and focus on the self. Once again, the Impression Management Model correctly supported your example because you wanted to use a rich channel to share the optimistic self-promoting story about yourself. It is clear that you have a firm understanding of O’Sullivan’s model and the factors that are important in determining which type of interaction is preferred.
Jenny, I think your post was spot on about the way you classified your communication choices and applied them to O'Sullivan's Impression Management Model. I can't believe you wrote your roomate a note though! I feel like that would make things even more awkward the next time you guys met face to face. It makes it clear that regardless of model (O'Sullivan vs. Media Richness), people can make a very different media choice depending in the exact same situation.
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