Using a Group Editor with Alternative Communication Media in a Co-Authoring Environment

Abstract

The writing efficiency of a type of computer-based groupware called a group editor was evaluated in six environments by factorially combining three communication media (audio only, audio plus video, and face-to-face) each with and without the group editor. Twelve subjects familiar with journalistic writing were pretested and matched into dyads. Subjects were trained with the group editor and wrote news articles based on a standard set of questions about actors and objects shown in short video clips. The quality of the writing task products was consistently high and showed no differences among conditions. Results of a balanced, within-subject analysis of variance design indicated that face-to-face conditions took significantly less time to complete than the other two communication conditions. When the group editor was used, however, all communication media were equal in terms of efficiency to face-to-face communications. Significantly less variance occurred in the audio plus video condition with the group editor than in the audio or the audio plus video conditions which did not have the group editor. Users preferred co-authoring with the group editor and considered writing trials with the group editor to be more productive. The results were discussed in terms of the benefits of using the group editor to increase the overall communication structure, to reduce variability of writing time among dyads, and to increase efficiency when face-to-face communication is not practical. Methodological procedures for matching subjects, using within-subject designs, and structuring a writing task were discussed as means of reducing team variability in writing efficiency when investigating computer-supported, cooperative work configurations.