Too close to lie to you: investigating availability management on multiple communication tools across different social relationships

Abstract

PurposeIn a world where different communication technologies support social connection, managing unavailability is as important as, if not more important than, managing availability. The need to manage unavailability becomes increasingly critical when users employ several communication tools to interact with various ties. A person's availability information disclosure may depend on different social relationships and the technologies used by the person. The study contributes to the literature by drawing on privacy management theory to investigate how users practice availability management and use its deceptive form, which is sometimes called a butler lie, with various ties across different messaging applications (apps) as part of their online privacy. Relevant factors in mediated communication, including facework, common ground, and interpersonal trust, are included in the developed model.Design/methodology/approachThe authors conducted an online survey (n = 475) to explore the relationship between one's contact with different interactants (significant others, family members, close friends, acquaintances, groups of friends, and groups of acquaintances) and one's practice of availability management and use of butler lies with these interactants at different size levels on various messaging apps.FindingsFactors such as facework, privacy related to technology, and privacy related to social relationships affect the practice of availability management and the use of butler lies. Notably, butler lies are used most frequently with acquaintances and groups of acquaintances and least frequently with significant others. Moreover, the practice of availability management and the use of butler lies are negatively moderated by people's conversational grounding and trust.Originality/valueThe study examined the practice of cross-app availability management with diverse social ties on mobile technologies, which is a socio-informatic practice that is widely adopted in the contemporary digital landscape but on which limited scientific and theoretic research has been conducted. No research has directly investigated users' availability management across multiple apps from a relational perspective. Building on the theoretical framework of privacy management, the paper aims to bridge the gap in the relevant literature. The results of this study can serve as a reference for library professionals to develop information literacy programs according to users' availability management needs. The results also provide insights to system designers for developing messaging tools.

Guest editorial: Contemporary learning behaviors on mobile devices and social media – part II

“…Readers may also be interested in recent research on communities of practice (Leung et al ., 2023; Wang and Xie, 2023; Zhang and Hu, 2024), MOOCs (Cheng, 2022; Cheng et al ., 2023; Wang et al , 2023b), social media information creditability and sharing issues (Khan et al , 2022; Li et al , 2023b; Ye and Ho, 2022; Yuan and Bi, 2023; Zhang et al , 2022, 2023b), and the use of social media for promotion (Liao et al , 2022; Lu et al , 2023; Wójcik, 2022a; Wu and Yang, 2022).…”

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“…Zhang et al (2023b) also examined whether central cognition elaboration cue and peripheral cognition elaboration cue could influence users' health information sharing intention, with a model developed based on Elaboration Likelihood Model, Media Richness Theory, Trust Theory and Regulatory Focus Theory. Yuan and Bi (2023) studied people's availability information disclosure and explored how people interact with others in their social media network and use butler lies. They showed that people would be less likely to use butler lies with their significant others.…”

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“…Their results revealed that e-service quality positively predicts e-trust in the digital economy, e-trust predicts e-loyalty and e-trust mediates the relationship between e-service quality and e-loyalty links. Readers may also be interested in reading further into e-trust issues on social media (Nabi et al ., 2023; Wang et al ., 2021; Wang and Tse, 2022; Ye and Ho, 2023; Yuan and Bi, 2023; Zhang et al ., 2023a, b, c), contact-tracing apps (Ho et al ., 2023a, b) and chatbots (Hsiao and Chen, 2022). Besides, readers may be interested in issues related to library promotion and marketing (Chan et al ., 2020; Cheng et al ., 2020; Fong et al ., 2020; Kwan et al ., 2023; Lam et al ., 2019, 2023; Liu et al ., 2023; Sahli et al ., 2023; Wójcik, 2022; Wu and Yang, 2022).…”