Bonus Blog Assignment: Show Me The Money

As much as technology and social norms change, the theories we have learned will stay pretty much how they are. These same theories and phenomena might be applied differently as the Internet changes and grows, but they’re fundamental ideas and concepts will remain the same. This is because the basics of Internet interaction will never change drastically.

For instance, the CFO perspective, the Hyperpersonal model, and SIDE all deal with impression formation and relationship development. These concepts will always be relevant in their current forms because there will always be Internet users meeting new people. No matter what new technologies arise, or what new uses for the internet develop, people will always be interacting on the web. Thus, such theories will still apply.

Likewise, people will always need social support, there will always be two genders, and there will always be internet users who take their relationships and interactions offline, into reality. Most, if not all, of the theories we learned are broad enough, commenting on the entire Internet or general psychological spaces, that these elements of human nature, and thus the net, will continue to exist and be important.

One aspect of the Internet that will be explored heavily in coming years, and that this class did not cover, is commerce. There are so many people buying, selling, promoting, and researching on the Internet that it would be unwise for communication researchers to ignore this area of the Internet. How do people make financial decisions on the Internet, and is the process different that at physical stores? There is such a variety of commercial activity on the Internet that the opportunities for research and observation are almost limitless. Not only are new companies establishing themselves on the net, but also reputable businesses are expanding to include websites. Some companies use the Internet simply to promote their products and services, while others offer ways to make actual purchases.

Internet promotion takes many forms on the Internet. Vendors send emails to promote sales and new products, film studios release trailers on YouTube and similar sites, and small advertisements cover web pages of almost every kind.
The issue of Internet commerce, whether it differs from traditional purchasing activities, and if so, how, will become increasingly important in the years and decades to come. As the Internet, along with its number of users, grows, more will be possible on the Internet, especially in this area. This Internet space will be the subject of much future research.


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Bonus: Change by New Technology

One of the theories that we learned in class that will always hold is the Media Richness Theory. Daft and Lengel (‘84) state that efficiency of communication will dictate which media people will use. With this fast pace society where productivity and work load have been increasing, efficiency is a huge part of life. Therefore, people will want to get that optimal match between equivocality and communication and will want to be efficient with their time. Furthermore, with new media of communications increasing to pop up in our society, such as the Blackberry and the iPhone, people will be able to even more efficient.

However, with the introduction of new software and technology, we will have to alter some theories as well. Some of these theories that will need to be changed are the CFO perspective, the Hyperpersonal model and the SIP theory. All these theories deal with impression management over CMC and the ambiguousness of the internet. However, with tools such as Facebook, Youtube and video chat/conferencing, where people are able to perceive Ftf cues, many of these theories will need to be changed. The CFO theory which predicts that communication over CMC will lead to poor and negative impressions will be negated with the introduction of new cues into the internet. Furthermore, the slow impression formation over the CMC that the SIP theory states, will also have to changed since all the impressions will form faster due to more cues. Finally, regarding the Hyperpersonal model, the breath of impression formation will increase due to more cues and, therefore, the intensity of the impressions will decrease over CMC.

Technologies that I mentioned above are revolutionizing not only the work place, but also the academic society. Now due to video conferencing, students in Qatar can listen to a Psych 101 lecture held in Bailey Hall. Now due to the blackberries and the iPhones, businessmen can work on deals any time and any where. New graduates just entering the work field are greeted with Blackberries and laptops so that the companies can be more efficient and productive. Issues such as these are very interesting and it would be great to learn how people are dealing with this fast pace environment.

Moreover, with this addition of new technology come issues such as Problematic Internet Use and internet addiction. More and more people are getting addicted to online games and sites such as Second Life. Being a premed major, it would be really interesting to learn new treatments or drugs that are provided for these new types of disabilities.

All in all, this class gave a great insight into the psychology of the internet and how people are getting affected by it. The social theories and guidelines that were taught were fascinating to learn about. It would have been great if we studied more about digital deception and the new threats out there in this field. Furthermore, I would have loved to learn more about how the advancement of new internet technology has affected our behaviors and attitudes online.

12: Predicting the Future

The theories we studied will always be evolving and new theories will be developed as technology affects our interactions. However, impression formation and impression management are a phenomena that will always be studied because it is how we first act when we put ourselves online and how we react to others online. In particular, the Hyperpersonal Model has been applied in the beginning when people were simply chatting online through text to now, as people, along with online chatting, use profiles to interact through social network sites. Although we do not hear much about online social support in the news, its success in helping others has proven that it will probably be around for awhile. The internet’s characteristics, including 24/7 access, anonymity, social distance, and interaction management, allow people to self-disclose more and truly receive the help they cannot get in an FtF environment. Digital deception has been a particularly interesting topic that will also always hold because it deals with human behavior when presented with various media to lie in. Since lying is something we do on a daily bases, the Social Distance Theory and Media Richness Theory will always be applied to these situations.

I think the theories relating to leaving virtuality will change as more relationships incorporate mixed modality in their interaction. Some of the theories do not entirely relate for relationships that went from talking online, to talking on the phone, to talking in person. Predictions were mostly negative for relationships that went strictly from CMC to FtF, but when other media are involved, it helps each party to validate and redistribute their impressions so that the FtF meeting is more “natural”.

New issues regarding privacy and rights will need to be addressed as internet offenses increase. Many of the news articles we heard about in lecture were dealing with whether people should be accounted for the wrongs they perform online and how they should be punished. However, there is also the issue of whether it would be considered as invading privacy because what they do in CMC is their business. Will it be necessary to have some for of online law enforcement to monitor virtuality? I noticed from our blogs about the virtual self that most people were not impressed with Second Life. It would be interesting to study why our generation was indifferent to Second Life; yet, large companies are investing so much in it and its popularity is growing worldwide.

Predictions from the KRYSTAL Ball

Based on the theories and phenomenon we learned about this semester I think that although the technological world has changed so dramatically throughout the years, there are still several theories and phenomenon that will continue to apply in the future based on pure human nature. I do not think that people will stop trying to impress others by shaping how others perceive them, thus the impression management model will always hold. Because of people’s desire to be perceived favorably by others, I also think that people will continue choosing a medium that best matches their intentions and gives them the best opportunity for selective self-presentation (Media Richness Theory). They will also continue to choose an appealing virtual self-identity or avatar online whether or not it actually resembles their true selves. Additionally, I think that people will continue trying to immediately form judgments of others by quickly coming to conclusions and thus holding the Hyperpersonal model, CFO perspective, and SIDE theory constant.

On the other hand, I do think that many theories and phenomenon will change based on society’s push for using technology for nearly everything. I do think that with many organizations going global these days and with the costs associated with flying executives into a central location for meetings, technology use for business transactions will increase. I think that businesses will use technology, such as a live virtual environment, to try and keep business transactions similar to FtF interactions. Thus parts of the Media Richness Theory will change as the amount of rich information processed and the associated costs will determine the medium at which transactions may occur. The richest medium companies may end up using could be a live virtual environment to actually see their employees instead of FtF versus using a lean medium like a program similar to IBM’s Second Life where there are avatars. I assume that there will be a bigger push for virtual classroom technologies in the near future.

Overall, I enjoyed this course. However, I wished that we were able to relate the class theories to having the internet accessible in certain organizations based on how it affects worker productivity. I think it would have been beneficial if we applied the class theories to organizations by discussing options companies could take in restricting or allowing internet use by providing some example case studies. This correlation would have directly related to my ILR major and would have significantly increased my interest in the course. I also enjoyed learning how to blog as this was an online technology that I was very unfamiliar with.

11: Strange But True

Something that happened to a stranger a week or so ago is a good example of online-to-FTF interaction.

I was waiting for the TCAT bus at about 8:00PM last week when a girl approached me and asked if I had any money. I thought this was quite strange, and I asked her why she needed it. She began to tell me about an interaction that occurred between her and a student at Cornell. She told me that she was from Michigan and she met a kid on MySpace, and he sent her a bus ticket to come visit him at school. She went on to say that she met him at his frat, but he kicked her out when she refused to have sex with him. She needed money because now she didn't have a way back to Michigan, but unfortunately I was unable to help her, and directed her to the campus police.

This was a very unfortunate occurrence for the girl, but I think she could have used better judgment than to visit a complete stranger hundreds of miles away. She may have felt she knew him better than she did, and that is what led her to believe she could trust him. This goes along with Ramirez and Wang's view that switching from CMC to FTF can result in negative views and disappointment. The male at Cornell obviously had different expectations, and they were clearly violated. The girl's expectations were also violated, as she didn't expect the relationship to be sexual. Ramirez and Wang's ideas were upheld in this situation.

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11. O ... Crap

This semester I met a guy in one of my classes while trying to form a group for our final project. I had one person in my group already and just needed one more person. I got emails from a couple of dudes who still needed a partner for the project but I chose this one dude in particular because he was senior computer science major and the project was a CS project. I corresponded with him very briefly over the course of two days and then we met as a group to discuss the project. I must admit that I was slightly disappointed when I met him. The determining factor for me choosing him to be in my group was that he said he was a senior CS major. A former CS major myself, I know the rigorous workload that professors demand of their CS students. I figured that our project would be a piece of cake for him, a break from his real CS work. I thought he would be a “super-programmer”, someone we could just throw heavy problems at and who would be able to solve them with no problem. After or initial meeting and following work sessions, I realized that he was no more capable to write code and problem solve than anyone else in the group.

I think my reaction could best be described by SIDE. Even though I had never met him, I associated him with the highly intelligent CS majors I have met in the past. This made me build him up to be some sort of programming genius before I met him. I over attributed him as a overly intelligent guy since the only thing I knew about him was that he belonged to that group of smart CS majors.

This contradicts the long-term vs. short-term factor discussed in the Ramirez & Wang paper. The paper predicted that with a short time in CMC only a few expectations could be made so the corresponding FTF would be about “filling in the blanks”, while a long time in CMC would allow for many expectations to be made the corresponding FTF would be disappointing since many of the expectation would probably not be met. The only characteristic that interested me was his programming skills and when they weren’t above average I was disappointed. The theory did not take into account that in certain contexts only a few characteristics would be of importance and even the few expectations that were made could lead to a negative experience.

11 Take me down to disappointment city

For this assignment I decided to look back on an online relationship I formed before coming to Cornell. Like many students in the Facebook-era, I friended various students a few weeks before leaving for orientation that were coming to Cornell from my area, or who would be living in my dorm, or, as in this case, had very similar interests as myself. After we exchanged a few messages, poked each other, and wrote on walls, we had established somewhat of a relationship. And honestly, I liked him. I was really looking forward to this cool, funny guy that had a pretty good taste in movies. A few weeks after I came to Cornell and got settled in, we decided to meet up at Appel for dinner. I was amazed at how different a person can appear online compared to face-to-face. He wasn’t especially awkward or anything, he just had this quality about him that I absolutely can’t stand – he thought he was really funny when he wasn’t. He laughed at his own jokes, which we were constant, and bad at that. On top of that, the couple of favorite movies that we shared, was pretty much it. He hadn’t even heard of The Office, which is pretty much unforgivable in my book. Overall, I was disappointed with our face-to-face meeting based on our online interactions.

I would say that my experience makes a lot of sense in terms of the hyperpersonal model. During our computer-mediated conversations, visual and sound cues are eliminated; thus, I never had to undergo his excessive laughing at his own jokes. Also, he is able to spend more time choosing his words and could steer the conversation away from topics he didn’t know much about, which again affected my opinion of him. I only saw the best of him, resulting in an exaggerated opinion of him. I’m sure I came off similarly to him, and I don’t know if I was as much of a disappointment, but we haven’t really spoken since besides an awkward hello every now and then.

The timing of our relationship played a definite role in the modality switch. I would classify our relationship online as long-term, especially when compared to the brevity of our face-to-face relationship. This makes sense according to Ramirez and Wang’s research results. This study showed that “[p]articipants evaluated the social information more positively and uncertainty-reducing following short-term on-line associations but more negatively and uncertainty-provoking following long-term ones compared to remaining online.” In other words, I spent so long talking to this boy that I formed grossly positive opinions of him. I was almost bound for disappointment, but don’t worry, I haven’t turned my back on Facebook yet.

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