Keywords
media email, voicemail, emotion, psychophysiology, media naturalness theory
Abstract
Lean asynchronous computer mediated communication is often considered poor for communicating emotion, yet individuals continue to use it for business, personal, and even romantic communication.We used a lab experiment to investigate the influence of media (email and voicemail) and task type (romantic and utilitarian) on both the psychophysiological responses of senders and the content of the resulting messages. Message senders had more arousing physiological responses when sending emails than when leaving voicemails. An interaction exists between media and task such that the content of romantic email messages was more positive than romantic voicemails; while the opposite was true for utilitarian tasks. Thus the choice of media triggers different emotional responses in the sender and leads to different message content.
Original Publication Citation
"To email or not to email: The impact of media on psychophysiological responses and emotional content in utilitarian and romantic communication", Computers in Human Behavior, Volume 54, Pages 1-9, Elsevier, 2016
BYU ScholarsArchive Citation
Wells, Taylor M. and Dennis, Alan R., "To Email or Not to Email: The Impact of Media on Psychophysiological Responses and Emotional Content in Utilitarian and Romantic Communication" (2016). Faculty Publications. 9521.
https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/facpub/9521
Document Type
Peer-Reviewed Article
Publication Date
2016
Publisher
Computers in Human Behavior
Language
English
College
Marriott School of Business
Department
Information Systems Management
Copyright Status
© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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