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<Paper uid="P80-1020">
  <Title>THE PROCESS OF COMMUNICATION IN FACE TO FACE VS. COMPUTERIZED CONFERENCES; A CONTROTT.~n EXPERIMENT USING BALES INTERACTION PROCESS ANALYSIS</Title>
  <Section position="3" start_page="0" end_page="75" type="metho">
    <SectionTitle>
BACKGROUND: THE BALES EXPERIMENTS AND INTerACTION
PROCESS ANALYSIS
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> Working at the Laboratory of Social Relations at Harvard, Bales and his colleagues developed a set of categories and procedures for coding the interaction in small face-to-face decision-making groups which became very widely utilized and generated a great deal of data about the nature of co~unicmtion and social processes within such groups.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="1"> Coding of the co~nunications interaction by Interaction Process Analysis involves noting who makes a statement or non-verbal participation (such as nodding agreement); to whom the action was addressed; and into which of twelve categories the action best fits. These categorles are listed in subsequent tables and explained below. The distribution of co~z~unications units among the twelve categories constituted one of the main dependent variables for this experiment. We expected significant differences associated with mode of communication. We also expected some differences associated with task type. We did not feel that we had enough information to predict the directions of these differences. For almost every category, we could think of some arguments that would lead to a prediction that the category would be &amp;quot;higher&amp;quot; in CC, and some reasons why it might be lower.</Paragraph>
  </Section>
  <Section position="4" start_page="75" end_page="75" type="metho">
    <SectionTitle>
METHOD
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> The number of Bales units per face to face group was much greater than the number for acc group. Therefore, each individual and group was transformed to a percentage distribution among the ~velve categories.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="1"> Then statistical zests were performed to determine if there were any significant differences in IPA distributions associated with mode of communication, probblem, order of problem, and the interaction among these variables in relation to the percentage distribution for each of the Bales categories.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="2"> There are many different ways in which the percentages could be computed. To take full advantage of the design, we cumputed the percentage distribution for each individtu~l, in each condition. Thus, we actu~S-ly have the Bales distributions for each of 80 individuals in a face to face conference, and in a computerized conference. null The mode of analysis was a two by two factorial nested design. If there was no significant group effect, then the error terms could be &amp;quot;pooled&amp;quot;, meaning we could use the 80 observations as independent observations for statistical test purposes. We also performed a non-parametric test on the dat~ for each Bales category, which gave us similar results.</Paragraph>
  </Section>
  <Section position="5" start_page="75" end_page="76" type="metho">
    <SectionTitle>
DIFFERENCES ASSOCIATED WITH COmmUNICATION MODE
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> Two of the detailed analysis of variance tables on which the st~mary here is based are included as an Appendix. Note that the analyses were first performed separately for the two problems, using c~unication mode as ~he independent variable. For each problem, we tested the significance of mode of c~unication, order (whether it was the first or second problem solved by the group), and the interaction between mode and order* Listed in figures two and three is a su~nary of the statistical results of the 24 analyses of variance which examined observed differences between communication modes for each of the two rases. The first two colu~us show the mean percentage of co~nunications in each category. For example, in the first table, results for Forest Ranger, the first column shows that on the average less than 1% of an individual's communications were verbally &amp;quot;showing solidarity&amp;quot;, but in CC, 3.22% fell into this category. The third column shows that the results for the 16 groups in the nested factorial design were significant at ~he .005 level, meaning that the probability of tae observed differences occuring by chance in a sample this size is one in 200.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="1"> The fourth column shows the level of significance if the group was not a significant variable and the observations could be pooled, with the 80 individuals treated as independent observations. In this case, group was significant, so the pooled analysis could not be done.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="2"> In looking at these data, there is an apparent coding problem. Even for the Forest Ranger problem, face to face, we obtained a somewhat different distribution of coding than did persons coding problem discussions such as this who were directly trained by Bales. (See Bales and Borgatta, 1955, p. 400 for the complete ~ qtributions). Our coding has 20% more of the statements clsssified as &amp;quot;giving opinions&amp;quot; than Bales and Borgatta code, and correspondingly lower percentages in all of the other categories. This means that our results cannot be directly compared to those of other investigators, since apparently ~he training for coding interpreted many more statements as representing some sort of analysis or opinion than &amp;quot;should&amp;quot; be there, according to the distributions obtained for similar studies by Bales and his colleagues. (Other possible explanations are that Upsala College has produced an ~nusually opinionated and analytic set of students or that the effect of pre-experimental training in cc raises opinion giving even in subsequent FtF discussions.) It does not affect the comparisons among problems and modes for this stu~, since all of the coders were coding the data with the same guidelines and interpretations. In ~he majority of cases, the same pair of coders coded both the CC and FtF condition for the same group. In any case, the seven individuals who did the coding had been trained to an acceptable level of reliability.</Paragraph>
  </Section>
  <Section position="6" start_page="76" end_page="76" type="metho">
    <SectionTitle>
DISCUSSION OF THE RESULTS
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> The twelve categories in Bales Interaction Process Analysis can be combined into four main zhlnctional areas. Categories 1-3 and 10-12 are the &amp;quot;social-emotlonal&amp;quot; functions, oriented towards internal group process. The first three are called &amp;quot;social-emotional positive&amp;quot;, while 10-12 are &amp;quot;negative&amp;quot;. Categories 7-9 are &amp;quot;Task oriented&amp;quot;, giving answers or contributions to solving the problem faced by the group, and categories h-6 are varieties of &amp;quot;asking questions&amp;quot; in the task oriented area.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="1"> It will be noted, by wa~- of further introduction, that there are some very strong differences in the profiles, even In the same medium, depending upon the type of task faced by the group, and that there is some interaction between task type and medium. For example, more tension was shown in the arctic problem in the CC condition; more in the Forest Ranger problem in the FTF condition.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="2"> We will take each of the categories, describing more fully what is included in them, and then discuss the extent to which there appear to be significant differences between the media in the relative prevalence of communications of that type. We will also try to explain the possible reasons for or implications of significant d/fferences that are discovered.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="3"> 1. &amp;quot;Shows solidarity, raises other's status, gives help, reward&amp;quot; Included in this category are initial and responsive acts of active solidarity sad affection, such as saying &amp;quot;hello&amp;quot; and making friendly or congenial remarks to &amp;quot;break the ice&amp;quot;; praising or encouraging the other(s); giving support or sympathy or offers of assistance; urging harmony and cooperation. These are all overt attempts to improve the solidarity of the group.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="4"> Note that there is a significantly greater amount of &amp;quot;showing solidarity&amp;quot; in computerized conferencing. This is probably because much of the behavior of this type in a face to face situation is non-verbal, such as smiling in a friendly manner while nodding encouragement. Non verbal acts in this category are not eodable from the tapes of the discussions. In the CC condition, however, the participants realize that they must put such things into words.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="5"> Another possible explanation is that the greater tendency towards overt, explicit showing of solidarity is an attempt to compensate for the perceived coldness and impersonality of the medium.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="6">  2. &amp;quot;Shows Tension Release, Jokes, laughs, shows satisfaction&amp;quot; null  This includes expressions of pleasure or happiness, making friendly Jokes or kidding remarks, laughing.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="7"> There was significantly more tension release overtly expressed in the face to face groups. Much of this was waves of laughter, particularly in the arctic problem. The participants did not put this into words in the conference when typing. Observing them, however, there was much private laughter and verbal expressions showing &amp;quot;tension release&amp;quot;, but these do not appear in the transcript. It is part of the private &amp;quot;letting down of face&amp;quot; that occurs but is not communicated through the computer.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="8"> 3. &amp;quot;Agrees, shows passive acceptance, understands, concurs, complies&amp;quot; This occurs as concurrence in a proposed course of action or carrying out of any activity which has been requested by others. There is significantly more agreement overtly expressed in face to face conferences than in computerized conferences. We suspect that this is related to the pressure to conform created by non-verbal behavior and the physical presence of the other group members. In any case, it is undoubtedly related to the greater difficulty of CC groups in reaching total consensus.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="9"> h. &amp;quot;Gives SUggestion, direction, implying autonom~ for other&amp;quot; Includes giving suggestions about the task or sUggesting concrete actions in the near term to attain a group goal. There is a tendency for more suggestions to be given by more people In computerized conferencing. This is part of the equalitarian tendency for more members to actively participate in the task behavior of a group in CC. In one of the problems, the d/fference was statistically significant at the .05 level; whereas in the other, it was sizable but did not reach statistical significance.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="10"> 5. &amp;quot;Gives opinion, evaluation, analysis, expresses feeling, wish&amp;quot; Includes all reasoning or expressions of evaluation or interpretation.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="11"> This is the most frequent type of co-,~unication for both problems and Both modes. For the Bales problem, there was no difference in its prevalence associated with mode of co~nuaication. For the Arctic problem, however, there ~&amp;s a large and statisticaJ_ly significant difference, with more opinion giving in the CC condition. null 6. &amp;quot;Gives Orientation, information, repeats, clarifies, confirms t, This includes statements that are meant to secure the attention of the other, (such as &amp;quot;There are two points I'd like to make...&amp;quot;), restating or reporting the essential content of what the group has read or said; noninferential, descriptive generalizations or summaries of the sit%latlon facing the group. There are no clear differences here. Whereas there is a statistically significant difference in the direction of giving more orientation in CC for Forest Ranger, for the other problem, the difference is reversed, 7. &amp;quot;Asks for orientation, information, repetition and C On i~I rmat i on '' There is a significant tendency for this to occur more often in face to face discussions. This is probably because of the frequency with which a group member does not hear or understand the pronunciation of a sentence or partial utterance. In CC, people are usually more careful to state their thoughts clearly, and the recipient can read it several times rather than asking for repetition if it is not understood the first time or is later forgotten. We have noticedmany CC participants going back and looking at co~nents a second or third tim~ in a face to face discussion, they would probably ask something like: &amp;quot;What was it you said before about x?&amp;quot;. 8. &amp;quot;Asks for opinion, evaluation, analysis, expression of feeling&amp;quot;  This occurs more frequently in ccmpuZerized conferencin~. For one of the problems, the difference reached statistical significance, whereas it did not for the other. ~his tendency to more frequently and explicitly ask for the opinions of all the other group members, as well as to more spontaneously offer ones own opinions and analyses in C0, does seem to qualitatively be characteristic of the me~i~.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="12"> 9. &amp;quot;Asks for s~estion, direction, possible ways of action&amp;quot; This includes all over~, explicit requests, such as &amp;quot;What shall we do now?&amp;quot;. It is not very prevalent in either medi,~, and there are no significant differences.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="13"> i0. &amp;quot;Disagrees, shows passive rejection, formality, witholds resources&amp;quot; This includes all the milder forms of disagreement or refusal to ccaply or reciprocate. This is also an infrequent form of communicntion, but it occurs more in face to face discussions than in CC.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="14"> ii. &amp;quot;Shows tension, asks for help, withdraws out of field&amp;quot; Includes indications that the subject feels -nYious or frustrated, with no particular other group member as the focus of these negative feelings. The results on this are rather puzzling. We end up with a statistically significant tendency for there to be more tensions when in CC for the Forest Ranger problem, hut in FTF for the Arctic problem.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="15"> Substantively, the proportion of these communications is very ~m~ll in nny c~e, and therefore, the small differences are not importasz.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="16"> 12. &amp;quot;Shows antagonism, deflates other's s~atus, defends or asserts self&amp;quot; This includes autocratic attempts to control or direct others, rejection or refusal of a request, deriding or criticizing others.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="17"> This is infrequent in both media and there are no significant differences.</Paragraph>
  </Section>
  <Section position="7" start_page="76" end_page="76" type="metho">
    <SectionTitle>
EFFECTS OF ORDER
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> For the most par~, it did not matter whether the CO or the FtF discussion was held first. However, more saggestions were offered on the arctic problem if it was discussed in CC as ~e first problem, but more in FTF discussion if the FTF was preceeded by a CC condition. This is consistent with the tendency for CC to promote more giving of sugEestions; apparently, the tendency carries over to a subsequent f~ce ~o face conversation. This raises the interesting possibi'It&amp;quot;/ that the group process and structure can be permanently changed by the experience of interacting through CC, a change that will carry over even to communications in other modes. Other pieces of evidence from other s~udies, including self reports of participants in long term field trials, indicate the same poasibillty.</Paragraph>
  </Section>
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