Message size constraints on discourse planning in synchronous computer-mediated communication

Abstract

Three groups of 20 dyads planned the MTV Music VideoAwards Show over computers. The groups varied in whether they could send 4-line, lO-line, or I8-line messages, in part to examine whether increased planning efficiency in computer-mediated communication reflects communication strategies associated with constraints on message size. The results demonstrate that increased efficiency is not a function of such design features as the maximum message that may be sent. However, the subjects in the 4-line condition sent shorter messages to one another, were less likely to engage in a strategy of making multiple suggestions that required a single assent, and were more likely to differ in the relative proportion of their contributions to the discourse. The subjects in the lO-line condition had shorter maximum messages (and proportionately more disfluencies) than did those in the I8-line condition, despite the finding that the maximum messages of the latter would have also fit within 10lines. Thus, the results also support a claim that size of the text window may result in different discourse management strategies and may influence an initial discourse-planning stage.

Profiling turns in interaction: discourse structure and function

“…Though we are aware that refined measures of dominance should take into account the function of utterances along with the size [7], the amount of participants' contributions provides a content-free measure for comparative studies. ýech and Condon observe that participants tend to match each others' contribution size in the MTV corpora with average message sizes of partners achieving correlations of .52, .76 and .69 in the 4-, 10-, and 18-line conditions respectively [2]. Yet Figure 4 provides a turn profile in which the asymmetry of contributions is dramatically evident.…”

“…For more details about the communication interfaces in the two studies see [2,6] Participants in the synchronous interactions were allotted two hours to complete the tasks, and most finished within two hours, though a few computer-mediated interactions were longer. Participants in the e-mail conditions, who were permitted to use any email system they preferred, were asked around midterm to finish by the end of the semester.…”