User:Shoton35mm/Media richness theory

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(Bolded text is my own)

E-mail[edit]

Schramm's model of communicating a messgage.

In recent years, as the general population has become more e-mail savvy, the lines have blurred somewhat between face-to-face and e-mail communication. E-mail is now thought of as a verbal tool, with its capacity to enable immediate feedback, leverage natural language, and embed emotion via acronyms and emoticons.

However, there is a downside of e-mail: volume overload. Emails often have large unnecessary quantities of information which is non-job essential and/or spam. Filtering through this junk does require additional time. The time required to manage email can cause an information overload. With excess email, people may feel that they will miss information due to the sheer volume on content they receive. Some individuals may find this volume to be a barrier to swift responses to emails.

Email do have the capacity to transmit more informational content than other channels such as voicemail. Perception of email as a rich platform varies among users though. This perception contributes to how the individual will use the channel. For some, the choice of content will differ. They may include images or videos if they recognize email as a rich channel whereas others may only leverage text. This perception also affects choice of linguistic features. Those that see email as similar to an oral channel will type differently than those who see email as a written channel.

Parents favor using email to communicate in cases that involve their child's academic status. When communicating to teachers, parents favored a more asynchronous form of messaging, to clearly state their concerns about their children. This, in turn, creates a clear communication channel between the teacher and parent.

Email and Virtual Teamwork [Edit]

When virtual teams were tasked in completing projects, many directed their attention towards email, even though it ranks lower in richness. Emails, although low in richness, provide the rehearsability and reprocessability (ability to read over messages before sending and read over to facilitate better understanding) than other mediums higher in richness may not.

Facebook[edit]

The social media platform, Facebook, has been found to be even richer than email. Facebook business pages offer such features as immediate feedback from customers, linkage to additional webpages, customization to customers/potential customers, as well as a language variety. Businesses have been able to use this platform to successfully connect with their customers but at a cost of quality and access potentially decreasing.

Other Applications

Gender and Media Richness Theory[edit]

Male and female minds vary in communication styles

Studies have been conducted to determine which medias allow different genders to become more productive in the workplace. In Gender Differences in the Effects of Media Richness the researchers found that women tend to work better with nonverbal communication than men. In general, nonverbal cues and communication is more easily broken down by women, due to their ability to be expressive more frequently than men.

Researchers found that men are more likely to appreciate task-oriented projects where women prefer social-oriented activities. Men are found to be able to make quicker decisions while women facilitate conversations deeply in order to fully understand what is being talked about.