Boston, Massachusetts USA* April24-28,1994

Human Factors inComputing Systems

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INFORMAL WORKPLACE COMMUNICATION: WHAT IS IT
LIKE AND HOW MIGHT WE SUPPORT IT?
Steve Whittaker7David Frohlich and Owen Daly -Jonest
Office Appliances Dept.
Hewlett-Packard Laboratories
Filton Road, Bristol,BS126QZ, UK.
steve.whittaker@ crd.lotus.tom, [email protected], [email protected]. com
ABSTRACT
We present new findings about the nature of informat com-
munications, derived from a naturalistic study of peoples
everyday working activities. We identify why such interac-
tions are so common, and valuable and how they are achieved
in the workplace. We also address weaknesses in current
systems that support such interactions remotely and identify
further requirements for better support. We also discuss the
implications of this work for conversational theories.
KEYWORDS: Informal communication, audio, video, CSCW,
workplace activity, ethnography.
THE NATURE AND IMPORTANCE OF INFORMAL COM-
MUNICATIONS
Informal communications we define as taking place syn-
chronously in face-to-face settings. They are distinct from
other methods of office communication such as phone, doc-
uments, memos, email, FAX and voicemail. For most office
workers, informal communication is a frequent workplace
activity and for many jobs such as management it represents
the most frequent workplace activity. Questionnaire data pro-
duce estimates of between 25% and 70% of time being spent
in face-to-face interaction, with these figures depending on
job type[8, 12, 14].
What then is the nature and function of informat communi-
cation? One of the few observational studies, showed it to
be brief, unplanned, and frequent[8]. Informal communica-
tion supports a number of different functions: the execution
of work-related tasks; co-ordination of group activity; trans-
mission of office cultur~ and sociat functions such as team
building[5, 8]. Its importance is shown by research into sci-
entific collaboration demonstrating that physical distance is a
strong predictor of whether scientists will co-publish, because
*Now at Lotus Development Corporation, 1Rogers St., Cambridge, MA
02142
t Also at Dept. of Psychology, U. of York, York YOI 5DD, UK.
[email protected];
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people who are physically collocated are more likely to com-
municate frequently and informally. Questionnaire studies
atso suggest that physicat proximity supports frequent op-
portunistic conversations which are vitat to the planning and
definitionat phases of projects[7]. Other questionnaire studies
support the effects of proximity and hence informal commu-
nications on social and cultural knowledge: Researchers are
more likely to be familiar with, and to respect the work of
colleagues who sit close to them[8].
This work indicates that physicat proximity is crucial for in-
format communication, but trends towards telework, mobile
work and the globalisation of business are geographically
separating workers. Given its importance, what systems
have been built to support informal interaction at distance?
In contrast to other methods of remote communication, in-
format interactions are poorly supported by technology[8].
The two main types of prototype system that have been built
both involve synchronous audio and video. The tirst pro-
vides a permanently open link between the commons areas
of two geographically separated sites, with the aim of fa-
cilitating unplanned conversations between workers at the
two locations [3, 4]. Commons area connections have been
moderately successful in promoting brief social interactions,
with 70$Z0of the Xerox Portland link conversations being
short remote drop-insin which greetings are exchanged[l].
Although these interactions would not have occurred with-
out the link, the general conclusion was that while the link
was barely adequate to promote shared context and cul-
ture it was insufficient for accomplishing tasks (P51)[5].
Bellcores Videowindow generated similar conclusions, with
unplanned interactions between remote sites atso occurring
over the link. However there was evidence that briefly
seeing someone over the videolink was less likely to pro-
mote an extended interaction, than an equivalent face-to-face
sighting[4].
The second class of system for remote informal communica-
tions involves Desktop video, either point-to-point[51 or be-
tween multiple locations [9]. Some of these systems provide
additional visual information about the communication status
of the call recipient, using a glance feature. Here callers can
check the availability of their recipient, by opening a visuat
link for a few seconds, prior to initiating the conversation.
An evahtation of one such system showed, however, that it
does not effectively replicate face-to-face interaction[5]. The
system was rated as closer to the phone than face-to-face in-
131
a
Human Factors inComputing Systems CHI94 * Ce/ebratin(q lnterdepende}tce
__,. ,_, ,
teraction, and less useful than face-to-face for doing work or
learning about their conversational partner. Furthermore, an
attempt to duplicate the process of opportunistically bump-
ing into someone in the corridor, which was implemented
by arbitrarily connecting two users was highly unsuccess-
ful with 97% of such links being terminated immediately[5].
One positive result. however, was that people atways chose
to use videophone over phone atone. Another study found
that Desktop videoconferencing partiatly replaced the use of
other media such ax email or brief face-to-face meetings. It
atso increased the use of Shared Workspaces and wax also
perceived to reduce phone use[17].
Informat communications also raise numerous questions for
interaction theories. Informal conversations are mainly op-
portunistic, so how do participants co-ordinate and initiate
them, given that they are unanticipated? There are also of-
ten time lags between informal interactions: how do people
maintain and re-establish context, given such lags? Finatly,
informal communications often occur between frequent inter-
actants who often share large amounts of background knowl-
edge. What affect does this shared knowledge have on initi-
ating conversations and managing conversation context?
We provide data on the basic properties of informal com-
munications such as their frequency, duration, whether they
are pre-arranged, and the role of documents in such interac-
tions. For interactions away from desk, we also look at where
they occurred. Next we look at their structural properties,
examining how conversations are opened and closed and the
ways that participants introduce and agree on conversation
context. We also test predictions about frequency: frequent
interactants should share background context as well as be-
ing familiar with each other. We therefore expected frequent
interactants to show less formatity in opening and closing
interactions as well as reduced need for context setting.
METHOD
Many previous studies of workplace communication have re-
lied on self-report techniques such as interviews, diaries and
questionnaires [12]. Unfortunately these methods are found
to be extremely inaccurate when reported estimates of ac-
tivity have been compared with actual activity measures [12].
More recent observationat studies of workplaces have be-
gun to provide a more accurate picture of communication
behaviour, usually by audio or video recording of activity
within a single medium such as face-to-face meetings[l 1, 16],
videoconferences [l O], or a single setting such as control
rooms[ 15]. The main problem with these studies, however,
is that they do not allow an anatysis of the evolution of longer
term communication patterns across media and settings.
To overcome these problems, we developed a new method of
workplace observation called remote shadowing in which
we tracked and recorded the activities of individual office
workers in the absence of an observer. We used a portable
Sony camcorder (CCD-TR303E), with a wide angle lens and
a radio microphone receiver, fixed in the corner of each sub-
jects office. Participants wore aradio microphone transmitter
which captured atl their spoken conversations around the of-
fice site, even when they were out of camera shot. Whenever
possible, arrangements were made to move the camcorder to
off-site locations and to special meeting rooms on-site when
communication happened there, but for the majority of out
of office communications, we have only audio data. Copies
of written correspondence were also obtained, together with
notes made in visually recorded meetings. Brief discussions
about work practice also took place every day between ob-
server and participant.
We recorded a full working week for both participants, ex-
cluding lunch hours, and confidential meetings. An inherent
limitation of our method is that it produces huge amounts of
video and audio data, which are time-consuming to process
and analyse. We therefore have only two main participants
in the study, but this is compensated for by the fact that they
talked to 97 other people, in a total of 294 different syn-
chronous interactions. We started with a total of 55 hours of
original recordings, for both participants combined. After we
excluded confidential data, interviews, solitary activity and
equipment failure there were 29 hours of conversational data.
The first p~ticipant B., is Communications Manager for an
industrial research laboratory. She manages public relations
and marketing communication, and facilitates collaboration
between research and manufacturing. She is often away from
her desk interacting with others mainly on site. During the
target week she was engaged in four main activities; organ-
izing a Lab visit involving 20 internal and external people,
identifying the marketing and communication requirements
for a research project, organizing a press conference, and
planning a communications strategy presentation.
The second participant, R., is a surveyor for a medium sized
consultancy dealing with commercial property letting and
valuation. He works as a professional negotiator for clients
facing rent reviews or lease renewals. He is often absent from
his desk, both within the office site and on frequent trips to
client premises within the city. He interacts frequently with
others, mainly using his office phone for business negotiations
with clients who are off-site. During the target week he
was engaged in about 30 ongoing cases. Three demanded
particul~ attention: a written response to an opposition report
about a rent review undergoing arbimation; arranging to act
for a new tenant client in a rent review cas~ and completing
three lease renewals.
We chose these participants because they are mobile profes-
sionals for whom communication is a central part of their
job. They exhibit two main forms of local area roaming:
in building roaming (B.) and out of building/metropolitan
area roaming (R.). Together these forms account for 87% of
the mobility exhibited by mobile professionals in the US,
in Contrast to wide area roaming outside the city or coun-
try base[2]. Future work should contirm how these results
generalise to larger numbers of participants in different pro-
fessions.
Boston, Massachusetts USAoApril24-28,1994 Human Factors inComputing Sys(ems
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RESULTS
The Nature Of Informal Communications
Below we present some typicat examples indicating the char-
acter and function of these interactions:
Example 1: R. and F.
R. IS STOOD UP READING A DOCUMENT BEHIND
HIS DESK WHEN HIS COLLEAGUE F. WALKS INTO
VIEW EN ROUTE TO HIS OWN DESK FROM ANOTHER
OFFICE.
1. R: ( LOOKS AT DOCUMENT)
F. can you reath read (--) this:s
report for me?
(1. 5s WALKING TOWARDS EACH
LOOKING AT THE DOCUMENT)
2. F : (WALKING AND LOOKING AT
DOCUMENT)
,,
E:::: rrh (.) now?
(1.0)
3. R: (LOOKING AT DOCUMENT)
OTHER BOTH
THE
.hhhhhhh Aiy if youve got a
minute
4. F: (LOOKING AT DOCUMENT)
Yeah - r
In this 8 second interaction, R. sees that F. is moving around
the office and hence is not currently directly engaged in work.
Hetherefore opportunistically engages F.s help. Note the
importance of a shared visuat environment in affording R.
this information about F.>savailability and allowing F to look
at the document.
Example 2: R. and E
R. IS DICTATING AT HIS DESK. F. IS ON THE PHONE
ACROSS THE OFFICE
1. F: A:lri_ghk thank you bye bye
(F PUTS DOWN PHONE)
R IS REPLAYING HIS DICTAPHONE
(0.7)
2. R: (TO F.)
Is he alright?
3. F: .Yeah
4a. R: Which ones he-hes got-
(0.7)
4b.R: Theres a restaurant
(0.5)
5. F: I said that 111 do this one
initially and then further afield
6. R: Which ones that?
7. F: Thats: eighdy two its the
offices
8.R: >Oh< th-(.) hhh (.) Yeah::h
we act for the landlord on that one. I
did a rent review against him on that
. . . . . . . . . . . .
This longer interaction fragment lastingl 5s, also showsan
unpkumedconversation. Itarosebeeause R.heardF.sphone
call and wanted to monitor the outcome. It finishes byR.
offering unprompted advice and assistance. The interaction
displays the implicit shared context between the participants.
Withoutbeingtold, R. knowstheidentity ofF.scaller(L2),
anddetails of thecase(L4a,4b). Unprompted, R, proceeds
to supply background information which F. may notalready
haveknown(L8). The sharedcontext results inacondensed
andcrypticconversational style. Thisconversation continued
for several more minutes after the extract. R. gave more
details and offered a warning about acting for both client and
tenant. Thus an unplanned conversation led to a detailed
task oriented discussion. A final example is an interaction
consisting of a single utterance, interrupting a person on the
phone Itstwen~fivep astfour, withanacknowledgement
okay. This served as a reminder that materials had to be
posted that evening to meet an important deadline. This again
indicates the brevity and context-dependence of this type of
interaction.
Figure 1 presents general data on: Own Office communi-
cation (face-to-face with others in ones own office), and
Roaming (Out of Office: in others oftices, meeting rooms,
offsite, public areas, including communication episodes in
transit between these). A communication event was defined
as a synchronous face-to-face verbal interaction, over and
above a greeting. It excludes asynchronous or technology
mediated communications such as phone, email, voicemail
and FAX, as well as non-communicative activity, e.g. soli-
tary actions at ones desk, or watking around the building.
Arranged meetings were defined as being explicitly agreed
and scheduled by participants.
Figure 1 shows that informat communication accounts for a
large proportion (31%) of work time. This overall figure,
however, is mainly composed of a large number of brief, un-
planned, dyadic interactions. Extended, arranged, multiparty
interactions are highly unusual. The brevity of the interac-
tions is striking: in the Own Office case, 50% of interactions
last less than 38s.
We also looked at where Roaming conversations occurred
and their mean duration. The majority of these (67%) were
in another persons office (mean duration, 1.94 reins), 1570
in public areas (mean, 1.06 reins), and 17% whilst on the
move (mean, 0.82 reins), A few longer interactions (1%)
took place in dedicated meeting rooms (mean, 13.13 reins).
These data show that the location of a roaming interaction
influenced its duration. Consistent with other work[13], we
atso found that 62% of outgoing phone calls by our partic-
ipants failed to connect with their intended recipient. This
may be explained by the large amounts of time spend roam-
ing, and it presents major problems for people trying to make
synchronous connections, especially from offsite.
Structure
Due to the lack of mobility of the camcorder, we only have
complete visuat information about the activities of both par-
ticipants in the Own Office case. Given the importance of
visual information, for our analysis, we therefore only looked
at conversation structure for the 152 Own Office interactions.
133
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Human Factors inComputiig Systems CM94~ Ce[ebrati\~j interdependence
Own office Roaming Overall
(N= 152) (N=142) (N= 294)
%Total Work 14 17 31
Mean duration 2.37 1.38 1.89
(reins)
Mean frequency 11.57 12.38 5.98
(reins)
% Unscheduled 89.47 96.48 92.86
% Dyadic 82.23 84.50 83.32
Figure 1: Informal communication characteristics, for
own office, and roaming
In a typicat scenario here, the recipient is engaged in prior
activity which is interrupted to initiate the interaction. We
noted the cues that the caller used to determine when to ini-
tiate. Very few of these interactions(11 %) were prefaced by
greetings (e.g. hello, hi) by either party. When the recip-
ient was already engaged in activity, the callers only waited
for a verbal or visual orienting sign of attention from the re-
cipient on 32% of occasions, other times they just launched
into the interaction. Vkual orientation was defined as a phys-
ical body movement towards the caller, and such movements
were obvious in the majority of cases, because attention had
previously been directed at the desktop (reading, writing,
phone) or at another person (talking), so that gaze at the
caller produced a distinct head movement. There was only
one instance of verbal orientation (Take a seat).
The recipients prior activity determined interruptibility. Ac-
tivities involving talking were less interruptible than silent
reading or writing, with callers being more likely to wait for
an orienting cue before commencing (X2 = 11.21, p <0.001,
df = 1). There were no differences in interruptibility, how-
ever, between the different forms of verbal activity, namely
talking, dictating and phoning.
We also analysed interaction closings. Only 3% of occasions
ended with formal farewells (bye, see you). There were
also few verbal or visuaf orienting signs (e.g. turning away)
given to indicate conversations were about to close: these
only occurred on 21 YO of occasions.
To determine how participants managed context we analysed
the first utterance of each interaction, after the greeting. We
noted whether or not this tirst utterance assumes a common
reference to a previous interaction or issue, and prior knowl-
edge on the part of the recipient. On 7570 of occasions, par-
ticipants assumed prior context, this was often accompanied
by deixis, e.g.
mm this invoice have you got the
original quote and also the quote from
Triangle?
I have taken a detailed look at this
now, and the problem was . . .
Frequent Infrequent Chi-Squared
Duration (sees) 37.8 219.0
%Greetings 2 23 12.06*
%Farewells o 10 5.13*
%Intermption 91 64 11.90*
%Final 21 43 5.86*
arrangement
%Previous context II 24 1 19 I 0.37 I
Figure 2: Impact of interaction frequency
Contrast this with interactions which have no prior history or
context.
Hello B., were doing a bit of an
audit around the site . . . .
,,
B I m taking a couple of days leave,
Mon&y and Tuesday.
Context management also involves planning the next time to
converse. Given the opportunistic nature of most of these
conversations, we examined when people formally made ar-
rangements to meet again. We looked at the final utterance,
or when there were farewells, the penultimate utterance. Ar-
rangements were defined as agreed future directed actions or
scheduling meetings. Formal arrangements were made on
28% of occasions only.
The Effect Of Interaction Frequency On Structure
Next we examined how Own Office communications dif-
fered depending on interaction frequency. Frequency af-
fects the interactants familiarity with the subject material
and each other. We identified interactions between people
who talked infrequently. This analysis was conducted only
for the dyadic interactions.
As we expected, more frequent interactants had briefer con-
versations (Pearson r = -0.24, p <0.05, df = 103). Frequent
interactants were much less likely to be format, producing
fewer greetings and farewells and more interruptions (defined
as an interaction that begins in the absence of a recipient vi-
sual/verbal attention cue). Asterisks in the Figure indicate
significance levels at p < 0.05. Frequent interactants atso
made fewer future-directed arrangements within the meet-
ing. Arranged meetings were also much less likely to occur
between frequent interactants (X2 = 10.58, p < 0.001, df
= 1). Contrary to our expectations, however, frequency had
little effect on whether participants chose to preface their con-
versations with remarks that reintroduced context. We had
expected familiar interactants to have little need for explicit
1Dem~d asth~,e Whoover the whole week averaged fewer than tWO
interactions per day. Thus we categorised 55% of conversations asoccurring
between infrequent interactarrts, and 45% between frequent interactants.
134
Boston, Massachusetts USA* April24-28,1994 Human Faciors inComputing Systems
%!!
Annotate Cue Answer Prop
Report 56.3 73.2 83.3 85.7
I
Memo 43.8 2.4 4.2 0
File o 14.6 8.3 0
Other o 9.8 4.2 14.3
% Joint 25 41.5 50 46.4
I
Figure 3: Document usage: type and function
context reintroduction, but it maybe that frequent interactants
share many potential contexts and it is therefore necessary for
them to be explicit about context in order to distinguish these.
The Role Of Documents
Documents were involved in 53% of atl Own Office inter-
actions. We anatysed the episodes containing documents.
The four main types of documents were reports (typed ma-
terials); memos (personal notes/postits/handwritten notes);
files (material accessed from an archive); and other (includ-
ing photos, viewgraphs, books). We also looked at how the
document was used during the conversation: for annotation
or signing; to ask a question; to answer a question; or as a
conversational prop, where participants used the document to
structure the conversation by repeated visual attention, refer-
ence and gesture at the document[16, 19]. When a document
served multiple functions we noted each of these. Figure 3
shows that reports were the most common type of document
involved in conversations, and that most of the time these
were talked about (for question, cue or prop). Annotation
of reports was less common, and atmost hatf of annotation
was personat notes. We also looked at when the document
was shared (defined as joint visual orientation). Information
cue, answer, and prop functions, normally involved sharing
documents. Annotation in contrast, was normally a solitary
activity.
SYSTEM IMPLICATIONS
How might we support informaf interactions when groups
are geographically distributed? Again we add the proviso
that these findings are based on a very small sample and may
be sensitive to job specification, physicaf layout and office
culture. We should also test our analyses against peoples
perceptions of the structure and function of these interac-
tions. This study did not determine, for example, the relative
importance of office versus meeting room conversations for
participants, or the perceived intrusiveness of different ways
of initiating conversations. Nevertheless, our study docu-
ments the frequency of informal communications: they ac-
count for 31% of office activity. Taken together with other
studies showing that removing such interactions significantly
decreases effective collaboration [7], this reinforces claims
that this is a major area for technology support.
Our results show that such interactions are generally dyadic,
very brief, with few format greetings or farewells, and callers
often began without waiting for visible signs of recipient
readiness. The absence of openings and closings and their
interruptive nature suggests a view of informat communi-
cations as one long, intermittent communication comprising
multiple brief related fragments with an open channel. Figure
2 also shows that infrequent interactants tend to have longer
conversations and be slightly more formal.
How might we support this in software? One possibility is
persistent attdio/video links to the set of frequent interactants,
offering minimat cost in initiating conversation, and ready
access to the current workgroup. For infrequent interactants,
a connection model may be more appropriate but connection
must still be quick and effortless: if the whole interaction
only lasts a few minutes, then startup and close must be brief
compared with this[5, 18].
How should we achieve initiation? Overall the data suggest
that frequent callers begin almost regardless of recipients
visual activity. Thus current implementations of glance
facilities [5, 9], in allowing the caller information about the
presence/absence of the recipient, and the recipient an audio
cue that they are being observed, may be sufficient here.
It does not seem to be necessary to supplement this with
more specific information about recipients visual attention,
e.g. whether they are reading or writing. Recipients verbal
activity was important in initiation, however, so that a brief
eavesdrop, giving an indication of whether the recipient
is talking, may be useful here2. More format methods of
initiation requiring recipient feedback may be needed with
less frequent catlers, given that they were more likely to
wait for a recipient cue before beginning, Visual recipient
feedback has been shown to be important for certain classes
of video mediated interactions[6].
Over half the interactions involved documents, suggesting
the need for an integrated Shared Workspace. Document use
indicates a requirement for simple systems rather than full-
blown shared editors. A system that allowed mutual viewing
of documents, with the ability to point at and possibly make
simple annotations, may be atl that is required here[19].
Most interactions were dyadic, arguing for videophone rather
than multipartys ystems, atthough 88% of interactions were
terminated by a third party joining an existing conversation.
There may therefore be a need to support this type of inter-
jection. Conversations in offices were more frequent than
commons area conversations, with only 15% of conversa-
tions occurring in public areas. This implies that we should
focus on desktop communications rather than commons-area
applications[4], although further data should be collected
about the relative importance to the participants of the differ-
ent classes of conversation.
A relatively large number of roaming interactions take place
in other peoples offices. This indicates that the callers were
deliberately looking for the recipients for aparticularpurpose,
rather than falling into conversation with others they hap-
pened to bump into while out of the office. Thus interactions
appeared purposeful even though they were not generally
scheduled to take place in advance. This was suggested by
the character of opening lines of interactions, and by the fact
2~is may have to be masked to preserve privacy, but the fiPowt
information to transmit is that the recipient is engaged in conversation
135
E!?!
Human Factors inComputiig Systems CHI94 * Ce/ebwitg Interdependence
that the majority of roaming interactions were self-initiated
(75%) whereas most own office interactions were initiated by
others (60%). This again argues for desktop connections and
explains the lack of success of attempts to connect arbitray
participants via videophones[4].
Consistent with other studies, our participants experienced
problems in achieving connection outside the building[13].
People are often away from their desks, explaining the ob-
served lack of success in making phone calls. Combinations
of communication technologies are needed to address this
problem. We need increased integration of synchronous
technologies with those that do not require temporat co-
ordination, eg. voicemail or electronic postits [1 8], for non-
urgent messages. For urgent communications, that require
immediate response, the requirement might be for a mobile
phone or pager. Further studies about the urgency, and hence
the requirement for synchrony for different types of inter-
personal communications are needed to determine the appro-
priate technologies here. We also need to understand how to
present these different communication options, eg. postit ver-
sus pager, to the caller, and to provide effective filters for the
recipient to prevent intrusions in non-urgent circumstances.
This integration should allow asynchronous technologies to
play an important role in co-ordinating remote interactants in
the absence of a shared physical environment.
THEORETICAL ISSUES
Our data also have ramifications for conversational theory.
Conversations are traditionally regarded as having a begin-
ning and ending, with conversational context evolving through
the discussion. In contrast, we found that informal commu-
nications seem to consist of one long intermittent conversa-
tion consisting of multiple unplanned fragments often lacking
openings and closings. This presents two major problems for
participants that do not occur in standard conversations ac-
counts (a) co-ordination to achieve co-presence, given the
unplanned nature of the fragments; (b) regenerating context
because of time lags and intervening activity between inter-
mittent interactions.
How is co-ordination achieved given the amount of time that
people spend away from their offices and in conversation with
others? Currently co-ordination works most effectively for
physically collocated people because they have multiple op-
portunities to find the other people available for conversation.
The challenge for future technology is in supplying this type
of information for geographically distributed groups. Com-
munication frequency atso affected the planning of such inter-
actions: people who met often, had little need to pre-arrange
meetings, because the frequency of interaction guaranteed
multiple future opportunities to interact. The opportunistic
nature atso explains another finding. Two person conversa-
tions are more likely than multipamy because the chances of
two people being at the same location at a given time are
greater than for three.
There may also be degrees of opportunism and another issue
concerns the differences between interactions that are: (a)
pre-arranged by both participants; (b) brought about when just
one participant seeks another out; (c) the result of genuinely
chance encounters, where neither intended the interaction
to take place. Our findings were that interactions on the
move are much shorter than those in meeting rooms, which
may support the view that genuinely chance encounters are
briefer than pre-arranged ones, but we need to validate this
against participants accounts of how different interactions
come about.
Another related variable is where the interaction occurred,
and we found differences in duration relating to location.
Why is this? Conversational resources such as documents
may be limited at out-of-office locations, such as commons-
areas or on the move, and this may reduce conversational
duration, because of the absence of these resources. Lo-
cations may also differ in their perceived intrusiveness: in
commons-areas or on the move the caller is not interrupting
the recipient in mid-activity, so that even infrequent interac-
tants may show little initiation behaviour.
How is context management achieved? Our initial view
was that it would be closely related to interaction frequency,
with frequent conversations among familiar people serving
to preserve context across interactions. We expected more
context-dependent, more cryptic and hence briefer interac-
tions among frequent interactants. Although conversations
among frequent interactants were shorter, however, we found
no effect of frequency on context management. Future work
should carry out more detailed analyses of other measures
of context-dependence, e.g. anaphors, deixis, personal pro-
nouns to find out whether these are prevalent among frequent
interactants. We also only looked at context management at
beginnings and ends of conversations, and future work should
analyse the whole conversation. A further possibility is that
documents carry context[16, 19], so we would predict more
context-dependence when conversations include documents.
A final related issue is the sheer brevity of informal commu-
nications. The absence of openings, closings, and the reduced
need to make arrangements for future meetings clearly reduce
conversational length, but are other factors at work? The pos-
sibility that shared context allows participants to be cryptic
remains to be substantiated. Another hypothesis relates to
planning: if participants are uncertain that they will meet
frequently they may condense multiple issues into a single
interaction. In contrast, familiar interactants know that future
conversations are guaranteed, so that only the most pressing
ones need be done now. Again however, this needs to be
tested.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thanks to Brid OConaill and Phil Stenton for discussions
and help with data analysis and to all the participants taking
part in the study.
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