Wiley: Human Communication Research: Table of Contents

Merging Mass and Interpersonal Communication via Interactive Communication Technology: A Symposium

Joseph B. Walther, Patti M. Valkenburg — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 00:00:00 -0700

This introduction to the special issue describes the impetus for a review of the merger of mass and interpersonal communication processes in light of recent developments in communication technologies. It reviews historical arguments about the need for integration in theorizing about communication processes. Then, it discusses the potential for communication technologies to combine mass and interpersonal communication in ways that obviate the traditional distinction between both types, and how interactive communication technology offers unprecedented analytic approaches for research. Finally, it previews the 11 essays that follow by identifying 4 types of convergence of mass and interpersonal communication: concurrence, integration, transformation, and evolution.

Entertaining Each Other?

Arthur A. Raney, Qihao Ji — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 00:00:00 -0700

Television (TV) is reemerging as a focal point for common experiences and community formation through the use of various digital technologies while viewing. A prominent example of this is second screening, or the use of various technologies to share reactions to and attitudes and opinions about what we see and hear while watching TV with other (virtual) viewers. We contend that second screening requires communication scholars to rethink the nature of the TV entertainment experience, as the practice increasingly blurs lines between interpersonal and mass communication processes. In this article, we introduce a conceptual model designed to identify key issues to be considered and addressed by those seeking to better understand entertainment experiences during socially shared TV viewing.

The Merger of Mass and Interpersonal Communication via New Media: Integrating Metaconstructs

Joseph B. Walther — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 00:00:00 -0700

The convergence of mass and interpersonal communication requires integration of underlying processes, or theoretical metaconstructs, that originated in formerly separate research domains. Several previous efforts to integrate mass and interpersonal communication fell short in this regard, and correspondent empirical work provides limited explanations. The article nominates 9 metaconstructs: distribution capacity, message persistence, audience, channels and cues, relationships, temporality, interactivity and mutual influence, message characteristics, and social goals. It suggests how these metaconstructs, in manifestations afforded by new media, can affect communication in important ways, with examples of studies that benefited from their inclusion. Consideration and integration of these metaconstructs, in individual studies or in streams of research, can expand the explanatory power and precision of research involving new media.

When News Meets the Audience: How Audience Feedback Online Affects News Production and Consumption

Eun‐Ju Lee, Edson C. Tandoc Jr. — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 00:00:00 -0700

Innovations in communication technology have changed the way news is produced and consumed. Various digital platforms, ranging from news websites to social media sites to personal blogs, have enabled news users to indicate how much they like the news they have read, to share it with others, and to leave comments. News users' mouse clicks are automatically recorded and aggregated by computational systems and made publicly visible (e.g., “Most Read Articles”). This essay reviews the ever-growing research on how audience feedback online, a hybrid form of interpersonal and mass communication, alters various stages of news production and influences the way people select, process, and make sense of the news. Future research agendas are proposed.

Embracing the Challenges and Opportunities of Mixed‐Media Relationships

Malcolm R. Parks — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 00:00:00 -0700

Social relationships unfold face-to-face and across an increasingly diverse set of mobile, Internet-based media. Research on these mixed-media relationships (MMRs) offers a unifying focus for understanding of how media use reflects and drives social relationships. Impediments to research on mixed-media interaction include an over-reliance on research focused on a single medium, incomplete and conceptually problematic classifications of media, and limited theoretic approaches. An alternative approach to understand MMRs, grounded in the challenges of managing complex, recurring interpersonal demands, is proposed. These demands include social coordination, impression management, regulating closeness and distance, and managing arousal and anxiety. Implications of MMRs for mediatization and mass communication are briefly examined.

Understanding Self‐Effects in Social Media

Patti M. Valkenburg — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 00:00:00 -0700

The aim of this article is to improve understanding of self-effects in social media, and to compare self-effects with reception effects. Self-effects are the effects of messages the cognitions, emotions, attitudes, and behaviors of the message creators/senders themselves. A total of 4 theories have tried to explain self-effects in offline environments: self-persuasion, self-concept change, expressive writing, and political deliberation. The article reviews research into online self-effects that evolved from each of these theories, and argues why self-effects may be stronger online than offline. Based on this review, a model is introduced that helps explain how online self- and reception effects may coalesce and amplify each other. The article ends by presenting some suggestions for future research.

Vectors into the Future of Mass and Interpersonal Communication Research: Big Data, Social Media, and Computational Social Science

Joseph N. Cappella — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 00:00:00 -0700

Simultaneous developments in big data, social media, and computational social science have set the stage for how we think about and understand interpersonal and mass communication. This article explores some of the ways that these developments generate 4 hypothetical “vectors”—directions—into the next generation of communication research. These vectors include developments in network analysis, modeling interpersonal and social influence, recommendation systems, and the blurring of distinctions between interpersonal and mass audiences through narrowcasting and broadcasting. The methods and research in these arenas are occurring in areas outside the typical boundaries of the communication discipline but engage classic, substantive questions in mass and interpersonal communication.

Revising the Communication Mediation Model for a New Political Communication Ecology

Mon, 11 Sep 2017 00:00:00 -0700

A long tradition of research focuses on conversation as a key catalyst for community integration and a focal mediator of media influence on participation. Changes in media systems, political environments, and electoral campaigning demand that these influences, and the communication mediation model, be revised to account for the growing convergence of media and conversation, heightened partisan polarization, and deepening social contentiousness in media politics. We propose a revised communication mediation model that continues to emphasize the centrality of face-to-face and online talk in democratic life, while considering how mediational and self-reflective processes that encourage civic engagement and campaign participation might also erode institutional legitimacy, foster distrust and partisan divergence, disrupting democratic functioning as a consequence of a new communication ecology.

Online Social Influence and the Convergence of Mass and Interpersonal Communication

Andrew J. Flanagin — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 00:00:00 -0700

Mass and interpersonal communication are rapidly converging as people integrate an assortment of Internet-based tools into their communication repertoires. This convergence prompts dramatic changes in the conditions that once were presumed to distinguish mass from interpersonal communication, most notably differences in communication directionality and scale, audience size and identification, and a host of cues that signal source credibility. This article proposes a number of features of technological convergence in this context—including shifts in message control, audience scale, and source, receiver, and temporal ambiguity—and describes illustrative implications for social influence processes. These features highlight areas that traditional mass and interpersonal communication perspectives cannot fully describe alone, and suggest new methods and directions for the examination of online social influence.

Online Information and Communication Systems to Enhance Health Outcomes Through Communication Convergence

Gary L. Kreps — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 00:00:00 -0700

The growing use of digital health communication channels has produced dramatic changes, providing broad access to information for making health decisions and addressing users' emotional needs. Digital health communication channels combine mass and interpersonal communication in different ways. Type 1 convergence occurs sequentially: Individuals obtain health information online that they discuss interpersonally with health providers. Type 2 convergence involves discussions occurring via online health information systems. The effectiveness of these systems depends upon seven communication design and implementation strategies. Emerging interactive health information systems provide customized responses tailored to individuals' specific needs and situations. All these forms of media convergence can improve health education, health promotion, and health behavior change.

Opinion Climates in Social Media: Blending Mass and Interpersonal Communication

German Neubaum, Nicole C. Krämer — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 00:00:00 -0700

Social media's capacity for users to generate, comment on, and forward content (including mass media messages) to other users has created new forms of mass interpersonal communication. These systems render observable processes underlying the formation of opinion climates. Five attributes of contemporary electronic opinion environments can alter the way users gauge, form, and express opinions on topics of public interest: the juxtaposition of mass media and user-generated content, ideological homogeneity and heterogeneity of online networks, technical ease with which to express opinions, the reach of messages, and networked audiences. These attributes facilitate analysis of theoretical and empirical works from different scholarly traditions, suggesting lines of inquiry that can enrich the analysis of (public) opinion formation via current communication technologies.

Intermediality and the Diffusion of Innovations

Ronald E. Rice — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 00:00:00 -0700

Interpersonal and mediated communication both play important roles in the diffusion of innovations, as part of the process, as well as the content, of diffusion. Yet the diffusion of new media has blurred the boundaries across interpersonal and mediated communication, and emphasized the decoupling of media from their attributes, summarized in the concept of intermediality. This article briefly considers implications of this intermediality for new media as process and content in five major components of the diffusion perspective: sources, rate and categories of adoption, attributes, communication networks, and consequences.

Correction Notice

Mon, 11 Sep 2017 00:00:00 -0700

Human Communication Research, Volume 43, Issue 4, Page 573-573, October 2017.

To Walk a Mile in Someone Else's Shoes: How Narratives Can Change Causal Attribution Through Story Exploration and Character Customization

Nathan Walter, Sheila T. Murphy, Traci K. Gillig — Wed, 28 Jun 2017 00:00:00 -0700

This study provides evidence for the independent and additive effects of story exploration and character customization induced by fictional narratives on causal attribution and support for marginalized groups. In Study 1 (N = 163), participants read a story about a transgender teenager. Story exploration influenced identification and narrative engagement, increasing external attribution for the character's negative actions, as well as engendering more positive attitudes toward transgender individuals. Study 2 (N = 116) replicated these results in the context of undocumented immigration. Study 3 (N = 230) focused on a story about a Muslim teenager. Analysis suggested that the strongest impact on causal attribution is achieved by allowing readers to design the main character (i.e., customization) and control the narrative (i.e., exploration).

The Relationship Between Media Multitasking and Attention Problems in Adolescents: Results of Two Longitudinal Studies

Thu, 15 Jun 2017 00:00:00 -0700

The increased prevalence of media multitasking among adolescents has raised concerns that media multitasking may cause attention problems. Despite cross-sectional evidence of the relationship between media multitasking and attention problems, no study has yet investigated this relationship longitudinally. It is therefore unclear how these two variables are related. Two 3-wave longitudinal studies with 3- and 6-month time lags were conducted. In total, 2,390 adolescents aged 11–16 provided data on media multitasking and attention problems. Findings from random intercept autoregressive cross-lagged models suggest that media multitasking and attention problems were strongly related between individuals. Empirical evidence for a potential detrimental long-term effect of media multitasking on attention problems was only found among early adolescents but not among middle adolescents.