Use Of Computer-mediated Communication Research Articles

Marina Orsini-Jones and Fiona Lee. Intercultural Communicative Competence for Global Citizenship. Identifying cyberpragmatic rules of engagement in telecollaboration. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018. Pp. i-xix, 1-135. ISBN 978-1-137-58102-0 ISBN 978-1-137-58103-7 (eBook)

The book titled Intercultural Communicative Competence for Global Citizenship. Identifying cyberpragmatic rules of engagement in telecollaboration brings novel approaches to Computer Mediated Communication, based on practical outcomes from a small-scale online international learning (OIL) project, i.e., CoCo, carried out during the academic year 2015–2016, between UK and France. It provides useful insights into the contribution of OIL projects to the internationalisation of the Higher Education (HE) curriculum as well as to the development of global citizenship competences, with a focus on intercultural communicative competence (ICC) in the digital era. The authors structured the book into seven chapters, concentrating on essential pragmatics concepts revisited within the cyberspace and describing the project methodology and findings. Chapter 1, Introduction provides an overview of the topics presented in the volume, with clear definitions and eloquent examples, i.e., Online International Learning (OIL), Intercultural communicative competence (ICC), Telecollaboration, Internationalisation of the curriculum (IoC), Threshold concept (TC), Global citizenship, and Cyberpragmatics. Chapter 2, Intercultural Communicative Competence (ICC) Revisited brings forth an account of the historical evolution of the concepts of Communicative Competence (CC) and Intercultural Communicative Competence (ICC), while at the same time examining the impact of the World Wide Web, coupled with the extensive use of Computer Mediated Communication (CMC) on the re-conceptualisation of ICC and its reassessed characteristics. It emphasises the value of integrating telecollaboration into the Higher Education curriculum with a view to creating global citizenship competences for the digital age in Higher Education. Chapter 3, Cyberpragmatics advances a comprehensive definition of cyberpragmatics seen as a professional as well as an academic genre-specific online ‘savoir-être’. It explores the theoretical foundations of the term, coined by Yus (2011), and brings forth examples of cyberpragmatic findings from similar research. Moreover, it gives an overview of the politeness theory (Brown, & Levinson 1987) and politeness principle (Leech 1983, 2014). The authors explain the blurring line between oral and written language that may occur in the case of online communication and how this affects students. The chapter also provides a clear-cut definition of the threshold concept (TC) pedagogy, upholding that Intercultural Cyberpragmatic Communicative Competence (ICCC) may be subsumed to TC. The authors advocate curricular scaffolding in HE in order to assist students with reflecting on and practising ICCC. Last but not least, the chapter presents the research question that this study aims to address. Chapter 4, The ‘CoCo’ Telecollaborative Project: Internationalisation at Home to Foster Global Citizenship Competences presents the CoCo (Coventry Colmar) telecollaborative course, along with the tasks devised and/or adopted for it, e.g., the Cultura Quizzes. It demonstrates the successful integration of CoCo into the curriculum and assessment of the two participating institutions and how students managed to apply critical digital literacies for global citizenship through active learning. The authors make an overview of research instruments and materials, including the frameworks of analysis and their application. Useful figures and tables illustrating the telecollaborative project structure, the politeness frameworks and strategies applied are also included. The fifth chapter, ‘CoCo’ Research Questions and Answers, delves further into the research questions of this study, at the same time offering a rationale for the analysis decisions taken as part of the asynchronous discussion forums with reference to tasks devised for the CoCo telecollaborative project. It tackles the impact of linguistic politeness theory frameworks on how project participants manage to negotiate politeness online. As for the asynchronous interactions in the CoCo forum, politeness strategies and facework employed by the CoCo interactants are interpreted from a cyberpragmatic standpoint through the application of Brown and Levinson’s and Leech’s politeness frameworks of analysis. Chapter 6, Emerging Online Politeness Patterns, brings forth a thorough account of the results obtained from the analysis of interactants’ exchanges carried out on the asynchronous discussion forums, with respect to the tasks devised for the telecollaborative CoCo project. In particular, three online exchanges were used in order to highlight patterns of linguistic behaviour, i.e., type and frequency of politeness strategies or maxims. The final chapter, Conclusion, presents the summary of findings, limitations and further research suggestions as well as pedagogical implications for teachers and students alike. The politeness frameworks of analysis provided by Brown and Levinson (1978) and Leech (1983), applied to cybercommunication are outlined and explained. The results revealed particular problematical areas in the field of cyberpragmatics, underpinning the challenges that students may face in telecollaboration, leading to the conclusion that detailed and structured task scaffolding is necessary in such collaborative activities. All in all, the book is an extremely useful tool for all stakeholders in the tertiary education landscape. It is a must read for language teachers, teacher trainers, trainees and educators from all educational systems across the globe.

An Analysis of the Linguistic Features Used in Selected Social Interactions on Facebook

Facebook (FB) is one of the social networks that allow its users to interact freely by posting short messages, pictures and videos. FB has a forum where people write and post their opinions, pictures and videos to see their friends’ reactions. FB also allows anonymity thus giving users the freedom to use a language of their choice without restrictions. Given the fact that FB is an informal context, users employ certain patterns of language in their interactions. This paper endeavors to examine the manner in which these patterns of language are used on FB with special focus on Kiswahili language. Kiswahili is now an official language in Kenya and there is a paradigm shift concerning patterns of texts that are sent on FB interaction. The objective of the study was to analyze the linguistic features used in selected social interactions on FB (SSIFB). The units of analysis in this study were texts that were sent as reactions to the news and pictures that were posted on the FB forums such as those collected from pages like Citizen TV Kenya, KTN Kenya and Mpasho News. The data of this study was analyzed qualitatively by coding every text based on its content. The study employed the use of Computer Mediated Communication (CMC) as proposed by Hiltz and Turoff (1978) to interpret and give inferences about the texts that were sent. The study revealed that FB users used the language of their choice creatively to communicate. Various linguistic features were used to communicate intended messages.

ARSENAL-GSD: A framework for trust estimation in virtual teams based on sentiment analysis

ContextTechnology advances has enabled the emergence of virtual teams. In these teams, people are in different places and possibly over different time zones, making use of computer mediated communication to interact. At the same time distribution brings benefits, it poses challenges as the difficulty to develop trust, which is essential for team efficiency. ObjectiveIn this paper, we present ARSENAL-GSD, an automatic framework for detecting trust among members of global software development teams based on sentiment analysis. MethodsTo design ARSENAL-GSD we made a literature review to identify trust evidences, especially those that could be captured or inferred from the automatic analysis of data generated by members’ interactions in a versioning system. We applied a survey to validate the framework and evidences found. ResultsOn a scale of 0–9, evidences were evaluated as having importance greater or equal to 5.23, and the extraction techniques used to estimate them were considered as good enough. Regarding differences between subjects profile, no difference was found in responses of participants with theoretical knowledge/none and those with medium/high knowledge in GSD, except for the evidence mimicry, which was considered more important for the group of participants with medium/high knowledge in GSD. ConclusionWe concluded that our framework is valid and trust information provided by it could be used to allocate members to a new team and/or, to monitor them during project development.

Personality Types and Megabytes

This article describes the results of a pilot study to examine the attitudes of university students toward the use of computer mediated communication in their French Conversation and Composition course. Student perceptions are examined in the light of their personality types as determined by the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). Quantitative and qualitative data validate that both I (introvert) and E (extrovert) personality types generally perceive the use of LAN (local area network) as a beneficial experience.

Minority status and the use of computer mediated communication: a test of the Social Diversification Hypothesis

Multicultural societies are characterized by the existence of groups holding different positions in a stratified system (natives, immigrants and disadvantaged minorities). As access to the Internet in Israel is becoming universal, it is important to know how different groups of the Israeli population use the Internet and if motivations for using information and communication technologies (ICT) vary according to their position in society. This study investigates the use of the Internet in a multicultural society (Israel) with particular emphasis on similarities and differences among a disadvantaged minority (Arabs), the native majority. The results provide partial support for the social diversification perspective and indicate that lack of access to social capital motivates minorities to use Internet platforms as compensation.

Blog assisted learning: Experiences in learning Business English vocabularies

Information Technology (IT) is currently seen and felt in almost every aspect of our daily lives. In addition, the shift of the traditional literacies to the current notion of multiliteracies is caused by the rapid evolution and integration of IT in an age of increased cultural diversity and global connectedness. Such changes did not only change the way students’ learn, but it also changed the students’ perception of text. Furthermore, within the last decades, the rise in popularity of the concept of English for Specific Purpose (ESP) language learning has also encouraged dramatic curricular changes in Taiwan. Recently, students are much influence by the prevalent use of computer mediated communication (CMC) in terms of their English language learning. Students tend to use unorthodox text in their day to day CMC, hence, affected their formal language learning. In light of these situations, this study shall attempt to analyze the influence of maintaining and interacting with a blog posting while learning various Business topics. Participants are a group of volunteer students from the Applied Foreign Languages (AFL) department of a technical vocational university in Taiwan. Students gathered every two weeks for three months to meet and discuss pre-selected topics regarding Business English. Each student is then required to give their reactions and insights regarding the meeting topics through the use of blog entries. Students also take turns in taking the role of topic leaders, which are tasked with giving corrections and reactions with regards to the blog entries. Themes where then generated and analyzed from the students interviews, reactions, and insights. Results show that the peer cooperative learning opportunity combined with blog discussions have positively contributed to the enhancement of the students’ Business English vocabulary learning.

Computer mediated communication for social and academic purposes: Profiles of use and University students’ gratifications

The present study approaches the Internet as a social space, where university students make use of computer mediated communication (CMC) applications, i.e. e-mail, instant messaging and social network sites, in order to satisfy social and academic needs. We focus on university students, because they represent one of the most avid groups of CMC users and additionally, because they are expected to carry their perceptions of media with them into the work place and their social life. In order to investigate this issue, we conducted an empirical research using, as a target group, a sample of students from a specific Greek University. Grounded in the ''uses and gratifications'' perspective, we investigated the various profiles of CMC use by students along with (a) the students' perceptions about social and academic usefulness of CMC applications, (b) the extent up to which these perceptions are correlated with students' prior experience with the use of CMC applications, and (c) how both of these factors can predict the frequency of present use of CMC for social or academic purposes respectively. The results reveal that although these three CMC applications constitute ''functional alternatives'' (media that satisfy similar needs) they are different to the degree of their ''functionality'' for the gratification of social and academic needs. Furthermore, the degree of CMC use by students is not correlated with the years of CMC experience, but with the profile of use that students dynamically adopt according to their daily needs and preferences. The results provide evidence for the current CMC use by university students and can be useful for the implementation of further academic policies regarding CMC use in Higher Education settings.

Online Communities of Practice to Support Collaborative Mental Health Practice in Rural Areas

The provision of quality mental health services in rural areas continues to be an ongoing challenge for nurses and the patients they serve. The use of computer mediated communication to construct collaborative learning environments similar to those suggested in Wenger's community of practice framework has the potential to mitigate a number of the difficulties faced by rural health care providers. The author presents a brief discussion of social learning theories, the communities of practice framework, and related concepts. Examples of current online communities of practice used as a means for knowledge construction in various professional disciplines are presented in building the case for the fit between online communities of practice and the needs of nurses in rural mental health. Nurses providing mental health care in rural areas have documented needs for interdisciplinary teamwork, access to a collaborative learning environment, and ongoing contact with expert resources. The construction of online communities of practice could potentially address a multitude of concerns identified by nurses practicing mental health care in rural areas.

Dynamic organizations. How to measure evolution and change in organizations by analyzing email communication networks

Since organizations are dynamic systems, they change over time. Communication within organizations represents these changes. The use of social network analysis is an established (although still not common) approach to better understanding organizational structures. Methods and business applications for dynamic analyses are still a new, though promising field. The increasing use of computer mediated communication, like email, provides particularly relevant data for studying organizations. Focusing exclusively on the changes in the use of email communication over time, two different methodological approaches are used to analyze the email data stream: descriptive network visualizations and a new model using exponential random graph models for event stream data. In a simulation with 97 students, a merger of two different organizations was replicated.

Fear and Competence in Japan and the U.S.: Fear of Negative Evaluation, Affect for Communication Channels, Channel Competence and Use of Computer Mediated Communication

This cross-cultural investigation examines the relationship between fear of negative evaluation, affect for communication channels (i.e., email versus face-to-face), and self-reports of communication competence. Participants from both Japan (N = 296) and the United States (N = 325) responded to three scales: Fear of Negative Evaluation (Leary, M. R. (1983) Understanding social anxiety. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage), Affect for Communication Channels Scale (Kelly, L. & Keaten, J. A. (2007) Development of the Affect for Communication Channels Scale. Journal of Communication, 57, 349–365), and a measure of communication competence. Cross-cultural differences were discovered on reports of fear of negative evaluation, CMC use, and self-reported competence. The factors predicting channel usage in a difficult personal situation (e.g., competence and general email usage), however, were quite similar across Japanese and U.S. participants.

The Use Of Computer Mediated Communication In Consumer Complaining: A Study In Higher Education

The electronic channel for consumer complaining has increased dramatically in recent years and continued growth is expected in the future. The objective of this research was to explore how computer-mediated communication is being used as a channel for complaining in higher education. A study was conducted of the complaint intentions of 222 students at one college in the eastern half of the United States. Four complaining dimensions were studied: Voice, Negative Word-of-Mouth, Third Party, and Exit. The results indicated that the most common behavioral intentions are: Complain to other students face-to-face, complain to the professor in office, and never take another class from the professor. The research findings also indicate the number of students who are likely to use computer-mediated communication to complain. In addition, the results show strong correlations between computer-mediated complaining and other complaining responses.

Using ICQ to enhance teacher-student relationships

<span>This research investigated the use of computer mediated communication (CMC) tools to enhance teacher-student relationships in two secondary schools in Hong Kong. This study showed that ICQ (a most popular CMC tool) could be used to enhance teacher-student relationships in these cases. An ethnographic approach was used where the interviews were conducted with key informants, face to face (n=11) and then through ICQ (n=4). Teachers who used ICQ to communicate with students were also interviewed (n=4). It was found in this study that the school and the parents over-stressed academic achievement, with both teachers and students being required to spend most of their time on academic related matters, and as such the results were that teacher-student communication was found to be rare in the two school environments. The study was able to summarise why students prefer using ICQ to communicate with teachers, how the Confucian heritage culture affects teacher-student communication in Hong Kong schools, and how ICQ can be used to enhance teacher-student communication.</span>

WHO'S AFRAID OF THE VIRTUAL WORLD? Anxiety and Computer-Mediated Communication

This study integrates the literature on computer anxiety and communication apprehension to determine their joint impact upon individual attitudes toward using and use of computer mediated communication (CMC). We introduce the application-specific CMC anxiety, defined as an individual' s level of fear or apprehension associated with actual or anticipated use of information technology to communicate with others. Furthermore, we advance a new nomological structure that positions CMC anxiety as a proximal mediating construct between the more general constructs of computer anxiety, communication apprehension, and CMC familiarity, and the dependent constructs of CMC attitudes and use. We develop and empirically test this nomological structure, finding that computer anxiety, oral communication apprehension, and CMC familiarity contribute to CMC anxiety, while written communication apprehension does not. CMC anxiety fully mediates the relationship between the general constructs and attitude toward using CMC. CMC anxiety explains 34% of the variance in attitudes, while attitudes, coupled with familiarity, explain 14% of the variance in CMC use.

The e‐flow audit: an evaluation of knowledge flow within and outside a high‐tech firm

Use of computer mediated communication, specifically electronic mail (e‐mail), has grown exponentially in recent years reaching as high as 75 percent penetration per household in some countries. The penetration rate is even higher for corporate environments. E‐mail is the communication medium of choice for most businesses and can therefore be construed as a proxy for codified knowledge flow in organizations. This paper advances the knowledge management body of literature by empirically examining several phenomena. Specifically, a comparison is made between inter‐ and intra‐departmental knowledge flows in organizations. Furthermore, knowledge flows within functional departments as well as knowledge flows to and from the external environment are examined. Data were collected from 15,500 e‐mails logged over five random days in a high‐tech organization of 480 employees. These data were then mapped on to the organizational chart and compared with the perceptual responses of a survey administration. Quantitative results were then triangulated with qualitative data gathered during focus groups. The research results yielded two important findings: (1) individuals showed an interesting bias towards over‐estimating their perceived knowledge flow throughout the organization; and (2) the e‐flow audit is an insightful managerial tool which provides a snapshot for knowledge management evaluation.

The Development of Social Climate in Virtual Learning Discussion Groups

<P class=abstract>As the educational use of computer mediated communication (CMC) increases there is growing interest among researchers as to social processes evolving within the varied models of group work using Internet, e.g., special interest groups, topical discussion groups, discussion forums attached to virtual courses, and learning communities. In this paper we present a synthetic summary of five studies that explored social climate issues in synchronous and asynchronous online activities in academic courses, focusing on the following questions: Does a social atmosphere develop in online learning discussion groups? What are the different modes of social interaction are manifest in online learning discussion groups? What is the role of the virtual teacher with regards to the social climate in online learning discussion groups? Discussed are the implications of these five studies' on the design of virtual-learning-discussion-groups, and the results for the characterization of teacher moderation functions.</P>

Computer Mediated Communication and University International Students

The design for this preliminary study was based on the experiences of the international students and faculty members of a small southwest university being surveyed and interviewed. The data collection procedure blends qualitative and quantitative data. A strong consensus was found that supports the study's premise that there is an association between the use of computer mediated communication (CMC) and teaching and learning performance of international students. Both groups believe CMC to be an effective teaching and learning tool by: increasing the frequency and quality of communication between students and instructors; improving language skills through increased writing and communication opportunities; allowing students and instructors to stay current and to compete effectively; providing alternative teaching and learning methods to increase students' confidence in their ability to communicate effectively with peers and instructors; and improving the instructors' pedagogical focus and questioning techniques.

Factors influencing the use of computer mediated communication by teachers in secondary schools

In this article, a survey on the factors influencing the use of computer mediated communication (CMC) by teachers in secondary schools in Brussels is described. The survey compared a group of CMC users with non-CMC users. It is demonstrated that language teaching was the best predictor for the use of CMC. The main reason for this is that education policy within the area under investigation has developed a specific CMC project that is primarily oriented towards a target group of language teachers. A second predictor of CMC use was the degree of technological innovativeness. This instrument is a measure of the willingness of the teacher to adopt technological innovation in his own teaching practice. A third predictor was perceived CMC attributes. This instrument indicates the degree to which users observe any congruence between the characteristics of CMC as a medium and their own teaching practice.

Creating a “Connected” Community? Teachers’ Use of an Electronic Discussion Group

As information and communications technology (ICT) becomes more commonplace in educational settings the use of computer mediated communication (CMC) between teachers is increasingly being seen as a valid form of professional dialogue and support. Indeed, the promotion of online discussion groups as “virtual meeting places” for teachers has formed a central part of the UK government's £1 billion drive to make ICT use part of day-to-day practice in British schools. However, amidst the enthusiasm for creating “virtual communities” of teachers, little is known about how educational professionals are using such resources in practice. To this end the present paper reports on a study of UK teachers’ use of an established online discussion group over a two-year period. It shows that, although the online forum was widely being used both as an information and empathetic exchange resource, many of the claims of establishing collectively focused virtual communities of teachers remain exaggerated as the forum was limited by a number of caveats associated with CMC groups in general.

Creating a “Connected” Community? Teachers’ Use of an Electronic Discussion Group

As information and communications technology (ICT) becomes more commonplace in educational settings the use of computer mediated communication (CMC) between teachers is increasingly being seen as a valid form of professional dialogue and support. Indeed, the promotion of online discussion groups as “virtual meeting places” for teachers has formed a central part of the UK government's £1 billion drive to make ICT use part of day-to-day practice in British schools. However, amidst the enthusiasm for creating “virtual communities” of teachers, little is known about how educational professionals are using such resources in practice. To this end the present paper reports on a study of UK teachers’ use of an established online discussion group over a two-year period. It shows that, although the online forum was widely being used both as an information and empathetic exchange resource, many of the claims of establishing collectively focused virtual communities of teachers remain exaggerated as the forum was limited by a number of caveats associated with CMC groups in general.

The relationship between computer‐mediated communication and communication related anxieties

This study examines how communication related anxieties are related to individuals' use of computer mediated communication (CMC). 225 respondents were given the PRCA‐24, WAT, and RAT tests. They were also given a measure of computer anxiety. Respondents were then asked to indicate the extent to which they used e‐mail, interactive messaging, or web browsers. The results indicate that there is no relationship between communication anxieties and CMC use. Computer anxiety appears to be the main predictor of e‐mail, chat, and web use.