ABSTRACT
Computer-mediated communication (CMC) sits at the crux of a number of interesting cognitive, behavioral, and organizational research domains. Communication analysis has led to countless insights within these domains by functioning as a window into real-world processes within small and large groups. Specific methods abound for communication analysis, which poses a challenge to researchers both in terms of selecting the right tools for the job, as well as implementing them correctly and consistently. The dramatically increasing use of computer-mediated communication in casual and organizational settings presents a variety of new challenges and opportunities for researchers. One challenge is the wide variety of technological alternatives to face-to-face (FTF) communication, each of which has unique features to consider, such as emoticons, avatars, and other novel nonverbal modes of expression. On the other hand, by virtue of being computer-mediated, gathering, organizing, and analyzing communication data has become more efficient and in many cases automatable. Fundamental cognitive processes, such as memory, attention, and decision-
making, can be placed under the microscope, so to speak, using a variety of reliable and well-validated stimuli and measurement methods. Communication, however, as a macrocognitive activity (involving concurrent use of multiple cognitive functions in naturalistic settings), is often more difficult to examine as precisely, or under such controlled laboratory conditions. As a result, many communicationrelated research questions require concurrent use of multiple methods in order to locate and evaluate a phenomenon of interest. For the research discussed in this chapter, the phenomenon of interest is the role of mood in computer-mediated communication. This chapter illustrates a selection of methods, some more
commonly applied to communication research than others, through a sequence of studies conducted with small physically distributed teams performing communicationheavy tasks in various induced mood states. These methods include simulated task environments, mood and stress inductions, quantitative and qualitative communication analyses, and a variety of measures including traditional self-report and psychological surveys, as well as psychophysiological data. These studies integrated multiple methods in order to achieve a whole that was greater than the sum of its parts. In addition to communication and psychological measures, these studies employed individual and team task performance metrics, such as decision-making speed and accuracy, team dynamics, and problem-solving strategies. Fusing the results from task performance (the “what”) and communication (the “how”) produced new insights into teamwork in stressful and emotionally charged environments (Pfaff & McNeese, 2010). This chapter begins with a brief summary of the history and significance of
CMC, followed by examples of the experimental methods and measures available for studying it. In the interest of brevity, only a sampling of representative results is presented here. The goal of this chapter is to demonstrate some of the opportunities for researchers to expand their methodological toolkits and further advance knowledge in the field of communication, computer-mediated and otherwise.
