Mediated Contexts

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Our e-mails, text messages, tweets, and wall postings lack the nonverbal cues and hints that we provide in face-to-face conversation.

Have you ever sent an e-mail or a text message that was misunderstood by the recipient? It has happened to all of us—often because our e-mails, text messages, tweets, and wall postings lack the nonverbal cues and hints that we provide in face-to-face conversation. So if you text your spouse to say that you both have to spend Friday night with your slightly quirky aunt Ethel, and he texts you back “Great,” is he really excited? Is he being sarcastic? “Great” could mean either thing, but you can’t see his nonverbal reaction to know if he’s smiling or grimacing and rolling his eyes. That’s why communication in mediated contexts must be extra clear to be effective (Walther, 2004).

Other characteristics of our online language can make a difference as well. For example, people in computer-mediated groups who use powerful language, such as direct statements of their personal goals, are seen as more credible, attractive, and persuasive than those who use tentative language (hedges, disclaimers, and tag questions) (Adkins & Brashers, 1995). However, in a recent study of an international adolescent online forum, students who were elected as “leaders” (Cassell, Huffaker, Tversky, & Ferriman, 2006) made references to group goals and synthesized other students’ posts. This group-oriented language was seen as more persuasive and effective than language pushing personal goals.

Interestingly, sex and gender can influence the language you use with technology. In computer-mediated games, for example, people who were assigned avatars of their own gender were more likely to use gender-typical language (more emotional expressions, apologies, tentative language if assigned a feminine avatar) than those assigned mismatched avatars (Palomares & Lee, 2010). Another study found that people infer a person’s sex from language cues online (such as amount of self-disclosure or expression of emotion) and conform more to computer-mediated partners whom they believe are male (Lee, 2007).

But technology affects language use in broader ways as well, including the proliferation of English as the language of the Internet. Individuals in Salt Lake City, São Paulo, and Stockholm can all communicate digitally, often in English. Critics often claim that because English dominates the mass media industries, English speakers’ values and thinking are being imposed on the non-English-speaking world. Nevertheless, many non-Western countries have benefited from this proliferation, with countless jobs being relocated to places like India and Hong Kong (Friedman, 2007). The fact is, every day brings increasing language diversity to the Internet, and Internet-based translators make it much easier to translate material into innumerable languages (Danet& Herring, 2007).

Despite the controversies surrounding English and the Internet and mass media, technology has, in some sense, created a language of its own. The language of text messaging and chat rooms frequently relies on acronyms (IMO for “in my opinion,” LOL for “laughing out loud”) that people use in other contexts now. Acronyms are useful in texting because they enable rapid keystroking. However, it’s important to keep text language in its appropriate context. If your professor writes you an e-mail asking about your recent absences from class, it’s probably not a good idea to respond with “NOYB, IMHO” (“none of your business, in my humble opinion”). That would show not only a lack of respect for your instructor but also a lack of understanding regarding context. E-mail etiquette calls for more complete sentences.