Mediated Conversation
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Item The Role of Chronemic Agency in the Processing of a Multitude of Mediated Conversation Threads(2018-01-03) Kalman, Yoram; Aguilar, Ana; Ballard, DawnaHundreds of messages and conversations stream daily into our communication media and devices. How do we manage this influx without missing urgent messages? In this study we provide initial evidence that this is achieved by closely monitoring only a small number of media-”those media where users expect time sensitive messages to arrive. We describe this heightened attention to a medium as "assigning the medium high chronemic agency", and characterize chronemic agency through extensive interviews of eighteen American undergraduate students. Our findings reveal how chronemic agency is involved in communication norms associated with urgency. Furthermore, they demonstrate the dynamic nature of chronemic agency, and its role in managing responsiveness and in dealing with communication overload. We conclude with a discussion of the shifting nature of the synchronicity of mediated conversation.Item Is Politeness Catalytic and Contagious? Effects on Participation in Online News Discussions(2018-01-03) Kim, Yeweon; Herring, Susan C.This study investigates how the politeness strategies of readers who comment on online news articles influence the participation and politeness behaviors of subsequent readers. We analyzed comments and replies collected from a South Korean news aggregator using a computer-mediated discourse analysis approach; the gender of commenters was considered as a potential moderating factor. Results show that the politeness of comments did not affect the frequency of replies, and violations of politeness were prevalent in replies to all types of comments and addressees, especially in threads with mostly male participants. However, significant differences were found in responses to polite comments in male-dominant versus female-dominant discussions. Polite comments served as a catalyst for active participation by repliers, but only when men dominated the discussions, and these comments elicited harsh replies. Conversely, only when women participated more did any replies tend to use polite language, and that was only when addressing the original commenter.Item Introduction to the Minitrack on Mediated Conversation(2018-01-03) Rafaeli, Sheizaf; Kalman, Yoram; Kent, Carmel