COMM 502 Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Social Desirability Bias, Media Richness Theory, Social Presence Theory

• School: Bloomsburg University
• Department: COMM - Communication
• Course: COMM 502
• Professor: La Valley, Angela

Document Summary

Introduction: walther initially developed sip to explain how people form relationships across the communication technologies. Scholars who studied new electronic media have offered a variety of theories to explain the inherent differences between computer-mediated communication (cmc) and face-to-face communication. Social presence theory suggests that text-based messages deprive cmc users of the sense that other people are jointly involved in the interaction. Media richness theory classifies each communication medium according to the complexity of the messages it can handle efficiently. A third theory concentrates on the lack of social context cues in online communication. Each of these theories favors a cues filtered out interpretation that regards the absence of nonverbal cues as the medium"s fatal flaw. Joe walther, a communication professor at michigan state, argued that given the opportunity for sufficient exchange of social messages and subsequent relational growth, face-to-face and cmc are equally useful mediums for developing close relationships.