5 I'm So Much Cooler Online

Howard Rheingold once wrote that, "The 'killer app' of tomorrow won't be software or hardware devices, but the social practices they make possible." That is, the most far-reaching changes will come from new kinds of relationships, enterprises, communities, and markets -- not from the technology itself.

What kinds of new relationships are enabled by technology?

Picture for a moment the stereotypical male online dater. Fat. Short. Bald. And quite possibly wearing dorky glasses.

In other words, the person you're imagining is actually George from Seinfeld.

So it's convenient then that Jason Alexander actually starred and directed in a Brad Paisely video about online dating.

How does the song portray this character -- let's call him George -- in real life?

• I work down at the pizza pit
• I drive and old Hyundai
• I still live with my mom and dad
• I'm 5'3 and overweight
• I'm a Sci-fi fanatic
• Mild asthmatic
• Never been to 2nd base

According to Wallace (1999), this may prove somewhat a liability. Wallace claims that attraction occurs along four dimensions:

• physical attraction
• proximity
• common ground
• disinhibition effects

First, George isn't exactly winning any awards in the physical attractiveness department. Also, the fact that he's in his forties, has never had a girlfriend, and still lives with his parents might be described as "a spiral of negativity." Second, lurking sci-fi forums might not be so great for common ground and intersection frequency. And we can only hope (for his sake) the disinhibition effects aren't kicking in.

Fortunately, George has found a solution. "But there's a whole nother me That you need to see Go check out MySpace."

Cause online I'm down in Hollywood
I'm 6'5 and I look damn good
I drive a Mazarati
I'm a black belt in Karate
And I love a good glass of wine

It turns girls on that I'm mysterious
I tell 'em I don't want nothing serious
Cause even on a slow day I can have a three way
Chat with two women at one time

I'm so much cooler online
So much cooler online

With just a couple slight exaggerations, McKenna’s (2007) relationship facilitation factors are now working in his favor. Without gating features he's able to get to "chat with two women at one time." And thanks to a few new interests, he can now experience controlled interactions with 'similar' others. And if he's playing mysterious, they can always "get the goods" on MySpace. Because if it's on the MySpace, it's gotta be true.

All of the lies mentioned so far are classic examples of identity-based deceptions. By changing his height, weight, location, and income, he isn't so much telling a lie as he is living a lie. George is even partially conforming to Catalina's model by choosing to fudge his height (but also his weight). Specifically, "But I grow another foot And I lose a bunch of weight every time I log in."

And the best part is that it seems to be working. I know it's only fiction, but can you really watch this video without being tempted to "update" your own profile? I thought not. From now on everyone who Googles me will see

I've always lived in Malibu
I posed for Calvin Kline, I've been in GQ
I'm single and I'm rich
And I got a set of six pack abs that'll blow your mind

I'm so much cooler online.

Assignment 5, Option 1: Away from Home

A relationship that I have had that has involved a substantial amount of mediated communication is actually still on-going. While I am here, at Cornell, my relationship with my family is quite mediated since I am from a different country: Canada. My family and I will correspond to each other via email, the phone, and the most recent way we talk is via text messaging (My parents just learned how to do it). I will be sitting in the library and all of a sudden I get a text message from my mom saying “how r u”: this is just one example.

McKenna’s relationship facilitation factors play a role in the way we communicate while I am at school in two forms: “interactional control” and “connecting to similar others”. Interactional control relates to how people converse with each other by how they choose how to present themselves, choosing the medium in which they use to talk with someone, and choosing the way they wish to present themselves through their communication methods. While connecting to similar others pertains to the common ground principle, how people can easily identify with each other; along with how people can connect across space and time and now how people can even connect to social networks (for instance: Facebook).

Regarding interactional control my family and I will choose the type of medium we feel is appropriate at the time since we understand that each other is busy and may not necessarily know what the other is up to and also the importance of the message. Emails have been used to remind me of things or bring longer sets of information to my attention, keeping me up to date with what is going on at home. While phone calls are for when the message is urgent or important or my family and I have set a time where we can just talk since it may have been a few weeks since we have. Lastly, my parents just started to text message and they will just send me messages throughout some days just to see how I am doing or to talk – this way I can respond back when I can just like email but in a far quicker manner. McKenna also talks about connecting to similar others and I feel this also pertains to my relationship with my family while I am at Cornell because not only do we share common ground on many things and can easily identify with each other, since I have been with them my whole life and they have known me all mine, but primarily how we can connect across space and time. My father works a lot all around the world and yet I will be able to receive messages from him and respond back when it is convenient with me without having to set up a time to talk or meet up which is helpful because then we are all able to keep in contact without having to be up at ridiculous hours or drive/fly to see each other.

5.1 Distance makes the Heart Grow Fonder??

When my boyfriend graduated from Cornell and started his career on the other side of the continent, I was convinced that our relationship would deteriorate. I always operated by the theory: “Out of sight out of mind.” Not because I am a cold and unfeeling person. I just tend to get considerably occupied and overwhelmed with schoolwork and extra-curricular activities. I barely have time to call my mother, who has time to sustain a relationship?

First, we tried to map out one another’s schedules and communicate solely via phone, but after a month of frustration my boyfriend suggested a different route. One day he suggested that we write one another poems. I screwed up my face and scoffed at his corniness. My final response was, “who has time to run to the post office?” Being the flexible and innovative person that he is, he told me to e-mail them to him instead. So, our poetry love-affair via webmail began. To my surprise it turned out great! Everyday we would send a different poem to one another and enjoy some a brief time on the phone discussing and trying to interpret one another’s poem. Not only did it give me privy to a different side of my boyfriend, it also allowed us to learn one another’s thoughts, values, and interests through a different venue. Sometimes the poems would reflect feelings that we share over being separated or they divulge information about preferences (such as my poem blatantly titled “My Ode to Autumn”). Other times, the poems were stories on different parts of our lives. Needless to say, the poems brought us closer together because they brought a different dimension to our relationship. We learned more intimate information about one another, which allowed us to identify similarities and become even closer.

Two of Wallace’s attraction factors played a role in my experience: common ground and disinhibition. Common ground, better known as the Law of Attraction, states that “people tend to like those with similar attitudes and ideas” and it “predicts liking from the proportion of shared attitudes, not the total number.” Exchanging poems allowed for us to uncover more common ground, which brought us closer together. For example, prior to our long-distance relationship, I did not know my boyfriend even read poetry let alone enjoyed writing it which is something that I have been doing since middle school (which he was unaware of as well). Our poems also showed our similar outlook on life and philosophies regarding family, friends, love, nature, and grief. As we located more similarities, it brought us closer together because people like someone who is similar to themselves.

The poems also correlate with disinhibition, which is the “role of increased self-disclosure in relational development.” Wallace explains that an intimate relationship requires a certain level of self-disclosure that will increase once you feel comfortable enough with the person to trust them. One of the reasons Wallace believes you disclose more information through the computer is because “at the keyboard you can concentrate on yourself, your words, and the feelings you want to convey.” I agree with this statement. Whenever I sat down to write a poem (I would type it later) I felt that this poem was the only way that I could express myself. I did not have visual or audio cues to help in my explanation of emotion; therefore, my poems ended up being more intimate because all I had to portray my feelings were words. Especially since I am not very vocal with my emotions, poetry and e-mail gave me the opportunity to express my emotions symbolically. Also, Wallace explained that people disclose more information because they feel “relatively anonymous, distant, and physically safe.” Although I was not anonymous, the distance did make me feel safe enough to express some thoughts and feelings that would have taken a lot longer to be explained in a face to face encounter. In person, I operate on the motto: Don’t say how you feel, show it! But once your in a long distance relationship the majority of your relationship is verbally communicating what you mean; you can not soothe someone a hundreds of miles away with a hug and a kiss. Sending information through e-mail gave me the buffer that I needed to disclose more information about how I was feeling.

Assignment 5 - "How did you meet your boyfriend?" is a question I dread.

I had known my significant other two years prior to us ever meeting face-to-face. We first met on a video game discussion forum and, after that community disbanded, continued to interact over AIM and later, via phone. The more-than-friendly aspect of the relationship had developed some time before the first phone conversation and before we had any idea of the other's physical appearance.

The initial attraction can be attributed to what McKenna describes as "Stranger on the Train" effect. Due to a certain degree of anonymity, we both felt more comfortable disclosing information about ourselves that we wouldn't ordinarily, as we're both relatively private people. However, I was also a relatively identifiable member of this online community (being relatively outspoken on certain subjects and keeping a fairly popular blog), so "Stranger in the Crowd" effect may have also played a role.

The removal of "gating features" such as physical appearance and our mutual, crippling social anxiety helped as well, because neither of us were self-conscious of being judged. In effect, we were able to express who we really were, independent of the usual criteria (race, social status, and otherwise) by which people tend to categorize those they interact with. By the time we had actually exchanged pictures, the attraction was already present.

Due to the nature of the online community, it was a given that we shared at least some of what Wallace refers to as "common ground." After all, we had both registered on the forum in an effort to connect to others with similar interests. We essentially bonded over gaming and related subjects, as well as having an extremely cynical view of the world; the last of which made us both the "black sheep" of our families, limited social circles, etc.

Interestingly, we both made several other lasting associations via our interactions on this discussion forum, which follow the same principles. The fact that we can only meet face-to-face twice a year is a bit of a strain; I theorize that it isn't as bad it it could be considering we spoke to one another over the internet for an extended period of time before, so we've both become used to the arrangement. However, due to the more intimate nature of the relationship now, we both prefer to use richer media (e.g. phone calls, Skype, etc.) whenever possible.

Comment 1

Comment 2

5 Coming Out of the (Machine-Shop) Closet

Six or seven years ago, I had my first heady taste of Love.

I got home from school, ran through my then-M.O. of string cheese with pizza sauce, and concluded that there was nothing interesting to read, watch, or destroy in my vicinity. Those of you with older siblings know that whenever you’re bored, they’re bound to be doing something intriguing that you’re not allowed to participate in (win-win!)... so I hunted Kelly down: in the study, tapping away at the keyboard. Ten minutes of begging later, she threw me a sideways smile and told me I could chat with her friend until she got back. I signed her off as soon as she left the room, but I couldn’t help shooting her friend a quick IM out of curiosity, who replied almost immediately.

Right from the start, she fascinated me. She had a conceited-sounding screenname, just like all the cute girls in my middle school did. She would circumvent all but the most direct questions, and even those she’d answer with riddles or throw them back at me: “so how do you know kelly?” “How I know Kelly? You tell me how I know Kelly,” she’d reply. Pretty much all I could gather was that she was from California and she liked the same movies and sports teams as me, but that was enough. The air of mystery that surrounded her was intoxicating, and when I got a real piece of information out of her it only fed my thirst for knowledge.

Wallace would be thrilled to find that every time I found a new area of common ground, I fell deeper and deeper in love; similarly, McKenna would say that I had (finally) managed to Connect with a Similar Other. She was a fast typer, too, just like me, and sometimes she tossed out non sequiturs, also just like me. If she didn’t initiate much conversation, that was fine—I had more than enough questions for the both of us. And McKenna’s model at least met me halfway on the self-disclosure front: I felt like the Stranger on a Train who needed no prodding to tell my new friend all about myself, but when I asked for a picture she just copied and pasted a set of X’s that formed a human shape. (The more I asked, the more she sent the same message.) Disappointing, but not a deal-breaker—I had a pretty firm idea that she was out-of-this-world attractive, but my gentlemanly Boy Scout motives ensured that I wouldn’t push too hard to replace the gating features that AIM had removed. I could have saved myself the coming heartbreak if I’d thought to “get the goods,” but I was too wrapped up in her words. Even that early in her career, my new Buddy would have returned a few too many search hits to ignore.

About half an hour after she’d left, Kelly returned to find me glued to the screen, beaming. I started telling her how well I’d hit it off with her friend, but she started laughing. It took about thirty seconds for her to calm down, and then five to wipe the smile off my face: “Oh my God, Ken, you're talking to a robot!”

She was right. Turns out SmarterChild was a “bot”—a program designed to match my questions to predefined patterns and throw answers at me until I was satisfied, especially by agreeing with me as much as possible. (If you haven’t tried it, toss her an IM, and make sure you tell her I haven’t forgiven her for completely devastating me. I hear she’s become much more businesslike and information-centered... so much the better. Never was much of a friend.) So thanks a lot, Wallace and McKenna. You've done an excellent job describing the dagger; leave it to robots to plunge it into my heart.

(TA: Comment 1 2)

Assignment 5.1

I have been dating my boyfriend for approximately sixteen months now. He lives only 10 minutes away from me in our hometown, and he graduated from ILR in May. It’s been a very interesting relationship, especially because of the situation, more specifically our locations. We started dating May of 2006, and our dating consisted of us getting together everyday—this means they were all face-to-face conversations. Occasionally we would discuss briefly on AOL Instant Messenger how we would want to spend the next day, whether it be bowling, or going to the beach, or running. This all changed when we arrived in Ithaca because not only did we see each other day, we pretty much lived together. So this cut out all of the CMC conversations, since we were together all of the time. Our relationship again changed this past August, when I came back to Cornell, and he moved to Brooklyn. Being apart, me in Ithaca, and he in Brooklyn, we have thus far been forced to adapt to the circumstances. Because we lived to close to each other at home on Long Island, and we lived together in Ithaca, the majority of our conversations were face-to-face, but we now have to choose another way to communicate (because of the distance). Currently, we keep each other up-to-date daily via AOL Instant Messenger, email, and phone calls, which is more CMC than we have ever used during the span of our relationship.

Looking at McKenna’s relationship facilitation factors, I recognize that identifiability plays a strong role in our relatively new CMC-based relationship. Identifiability notes that CMC in general has high levels of self-disclosure (Joinson 2001)—it revolves around the “stranger in the crowd effect” where because of the anonymity or even visual anonymity, there is an increased amount of self-disclosure, which eventually leads to increasing the strength and development of the relationship. I believe this occurs in my relationship because although there is no true anonymity or even visual anonymity, the fact still is that my boyfriend is not the same space as me, and I am not in the same space as him. This leads to our uninhibited behaviors online, where we often discuss (more often than when we communicated face-to-face) how we feel that we’re not together, and where our future lies. It is hard for us to talk about this issue face-to-face because when we are together, we both like to not worry about the future; we just like to live in the present. It’s different with CMC because one can’t see the other’s true emotions—there is a lack of social cues that would normally occur if the conversation happened face-to-face (facial expressions, hand gestures, etc.).

Another one of McKenna’s relationship facilitation factors that I recognize within my long-distance relationship with my boyfriend is getting the goods—which is the ability to get information about others prior to meeting. In the my situation, I know that I like to use facebook to get the goods about my boyfriend, whether it be status updates, a new person he has friended, or something he has added to his personal information (I do this for most of my friends, just to see how they’re doing if I don’t have time to talk to them). By being able to get information before my boyfriend volunteers the information, I know what he chooses to tell me, and what he chooses not to tell me (which is McKenna’s interactional control, on his part). I can also see if he is being honest with me (and he can see if I am being honest with him), which is an important part of the relationship, especially when we are so far away from each other. I have set my newsfeed settings so that I get the most information about my boyfriend (how convenient!), and it makes my life easier to see how he’s doing in times that he’s especially busy and can’t talk (due to the demands of being a first-year law student). Facebook got it right when they had settings for who you wanted more information about, and who you wanted less information about!

All in all, it has thus far been an interesting relationship in the progression of our relationship, and I think it will be important to recognize more of McKenna’s relationship facilitation factors just to have an idea of what our relationship will turn out to be.

5- Graduation (Friends Forever)

As we go on
We remember
All the times we
Had together
And as our lives change
Come Whatever
We will still be
Friends Forever

-Vitamin C "Graduation (Friends Forever)"

This was the song that my 8th grade class sung on June 15, 2001 when we graduated from elementary school. It was an interesting road for all of us. Many of us had attended school there from Pre-kindergarten. For me, I had moved from Florida and attended school there since 1st grade. On the first day of school when I was introduced to the class as a new student, I recall a brown-haired girl who was nice enough to share he crayons with me. That same brown-haired girl would grow into my best friend as the years progressed.

From that first day of class in 1993, my best friend and I were always together. While there were 2 classes per grade, we always found a way to assure that we would be in the same class. I remember a time in 3rd grade when I was assigned to class 3-1 and she was assigned to class 3-2. She and I cried all summer because we felt that we would never get to see each other. Granted, the total class size for our year was 60 people, but in the mind of a 3rd grader that seemed huge. Thus, after realizing just how important it was for us to be in the same class, our parents made a request to the principal. To our delight, she accepted their request and made sure that each year my best friend and I would be in the same class.

However, on June 15, 2001, graduation day served as the day in which everything changed between my best friend and I. After delivering my valedictorian speech on the podium, the principal approached the microphone to announce where each of us would be attending high school. While there were about 3 parochial schools in the area and 2 "good" public schools, the makeup of the class was primarily confined to those institutions. Then, my name came up. However, instead of naming one of the parochial schools or even one of the public schools, she mentioned a boarding school. Indeed, while all of my friends decided to pursue their high school degrees locally, I made the decision to attend boarding school in Upstate New York. I was lucky enough to be accepted into a scholarship program, which awarded me with a full scholarship to attend the number one high school in the Central New York region. I was excited about the possibilities, but needless to say my best friend thought it was the worst decision ever. This had a lot to do with the fact that no amount of talking to the principal or the program coordinator could change the situation. However, I knew it was something that I needed to do so despite my desire to stay in the area with my friends, I knew I had to put that aside and take a chance.

Over the course of the next 4 years, my relationship with my best friend involved a substantial amount of mediated communication. There was no longer the assurance of seeing each other every day to engage in face to face communication or the ability to run to each other's houses after-school. Our relationship turned into a long-distance one. During the course of the following four years, we spent countless hours trying to maintain our strong bond. We did this through emailing at first during my freshman year and she called me on the phone in the house where I lived. During my sophomore year, my mother bought me a cell phone and her mother did the same. Thus, we abandoned the emailing and communicated strictly through nightly phone calls. At the time, we were not allowed to use video-conferencing nor did we understand how to use it. Thus, we spent time IMing each other on AOL Instant Messenger. During my final years attending the school, we also employed the use of Myspace. Often, we would leave comments for each other or send messages. It was not the ideal situation, but at least we were updated on the events that were occurring in our respective lives.

In reflecting on the long distance relationship that I described, I noticed a degree of overlap with the ideas of "common ground" and "proximity", which Patricia Wallace discusses in her text "The Psychology of the Internet". According to Wallace, "common ground" serves as an attraction factor, which states that individuals who possess mutually shared assumptions, beliefs, and propositions, will hold a stronger bond, or become closer in a sense than individuals who do not share the aforementioned characteristics. Reflecting on my relationship with my best friend, I agree. Since my best friend and I did not really have the same social group anymore, it was pointless to talk about individuals from our respective schools in great deal. Although we did talk about boys we had crushes on (We're girls give us a break), we often spent time talking about individuals we knew from elementary school. For us, our common ground was our past experiences and upbringing. She too, lived in a single parent home. Her mother often worked long hours, similar to my mother, to help provide for the family. In addition, our parents attended the same church so we would have tons of time to hang out during youth group meetings. Through our shared experiences, upbringing, and socialization, we formed similar belief systems, propositions, and assumptions. As a result, we never felt uncomfortable speaking with each other about anything because often times we were in agreement about situations.

Additionally, another theory popped into my mind as I was thinking about my relationship with my best friend; proximity. Proximity is vital in making sure that a relationship is nurtured. In the early stages of our friendship proximity dominated my relationship with my best friend. Like I said before, we were in the same class from 1st grade until 8th grade. She lived a block away from school so often times we walked to her house as I waited for my mother to get off of work to come pick me up. On the weekends, her mother would take us to the mall and we would shop, talk, and or watch a movie. If we were together, one could assure that face to face communication was rampant. However, when I began attending school Upstate that was no longer possible. Thus, a lot of our interaction was confined to the Internet or telephones. Despite the distance we made sure to call each other every night (After 9 p.m. when the minutes were free) to check in with each other about current happenings. Although we hated the fact that we could not hang out like we used to, we made ample use of all of the other mediums we could to stay in touch. With respect to our intersection frequency, I think that it was incredibly high, since we felt very close to each other, and consequently volunteered or disclosed ample amounts of information with each other at the drop of a hat. I say this because if our intersection frequency was lower, we would feel like the other person was a stranger, and as a result would not feel comfortable disclosing a lot of information about our lives. I don't know about you but you don't just spread the word about the boy in your Pre-Calculus class that you would die to speak to. However, with someone that you trust, nothing is secret...well almost nothing.

A5.1 – Oh Father, Where Art Thou?

Ever since freshman year of high school I've lived on the opposite side of the world to my dad. My mom and I moved from Qatar, where my dad works, back home to Toronto, Canada and as a result I only saw my dad for a combined total of about a month to a month and a half every year. Needless to say, email, IM, and eventually Skype were the de facto means of communication, and there has not been a single week where I haven't spoken or written to my dad at least once thanks to the flexibility of computer mediated communication (CMC).

Due to being separated for such a long time, the natural question of how our relationship lived through a CMC system arises. Overall, my relationship with my dad has developed very positively and I am on very friendly terms with my Dad. We can easily joke about his work, my work, the memory of his university work, talk about cars, computers, sports, politics, movies and so on. Several factors can help to explain this development, specifically, proximity, common ground, and disinhibition effects from Wallace as well as certain aspects of identifiability, removal of gating features, interaction control, and connecting to similar others factors of McKenna

According to Wallace proximity, thus familiarity, online occurs due to intersection frequency, or rather the number of times one “meets” or interacts with someone else online. Our almost daily emails, IM's and Skype calls helped to hold on to and expand the familiarity achieved prior to moving back home. Common ground is represented in both Wallace and McKenna theories and represents the idea that one is attracted to people whom share beliefs and interests. Wallace, however, focuses on the proportion of shared attitudes, in that if one knows of less absolute shared interests, but proportionally higher, one would be more attracted. Fortunately, I developed similar interests and beliefs to my dad, with some stark exceptions mind you, which facilitated and strengthened the relationship as we were always able to talk and discuss some topic. As for Wallace's proportion based concept, it is hard to place in this study. The final Wallace factor is the dis inhibition factor, which also ties into McKenna's identifiability factor. Joinson (2001) showed that in CMC, people had higher levels of self-disclosure (disinhibited behaviour) as a result of visual anonymity. This ties in nicely in that, while I was certainly not a stranger to my dad, the visual separation of an email or IM makes it much easier to disclose bad news. In essence I do not have to see an angry dad. Sure I may get a stern email or heavy phone call, but the visual anonymity does much to remove the sting. The honesty that comes with the greater self disclosure though helps to further tighten the relationship.

Moving on to the more McKenna unique factors, the removal of gating features again helped to facilitate our relationship. There was not an immediate cue of “the father” who doles out the household rules and requirements, but rather in CMC this gate is removed or not as apparent. Instead my dad and I would simple talk about interesting subjects or funny jokes that we heard and how the day went. While my dad always reminded me to do my work and not slack off, it was not as particularly overbearing as it would have been if my dad could have told me FtF. Finally, the interaction control feature of McKenna's theory again helped to facilitate a positive and friendly relationship. Because of the mediated communication technologies I could pick and chose optimal times to communicate synchronously or spend the time to fine tune asynchronous communication. If I had a bad day I could choose to save my dad from listening to my sour mood if I so wanted.

After this overview, we can now see how multiple factors from both theories can help to explain the development of strong and positive relationships between people through CMC.

Comment 1

Comment 2

5.1 AOL Fairytale

Relationship Description

Once upon a time, a time long before Facebook, there was AOL where I met nYcxBoi, my online boyfriend. Our four year relationship started in a chatroom in high school. We would email at night and IM during the day. We engaged in light flirting by leaving each other quotes on our away messages and when we would have serious conversations I would hold onto my mouse as if I was holding his hand. He attached a model-like picture of himself once but I never got to send mine because I was waiting to lose weight. He ended up never seeing a picture and once we began dating people from the non-online space, we grew apart.

Analysis

Although early CFO studies suggest that the lack of cues in CMC would lead to neutral and cold relationships, the naturally-formed relationship described show that warm and meaningful ones could form over time. My experience can be explained using McKenna’s approach, which shows how relationship facilitation factors such as identifiability and removal of gating features allow for relationship development.

The identifiability factor suggests that because people are anonymous online, it would increase self-disclosure (revealing information that is not publicly known), which would then lead to relationship development (“Stranger in the Train Effect”). I felt comfortable opening up to him because he was faceless and when I did, he would reciprocate. I was also comfortable because we were visually anonymous. According to Joinson, increased private awareness and decreased public awareness leads to self-disclosure. This means that because we were physically alone when conversing we did not have to worry about how we looked, which then allowed us to concentrate more on ourselves and our feelings. By remaining anonymous, we disclosed more information, the exchange deepened, and we were able to have an intimate relationship.

Another factor that played a great role is the removal of gating features (physical attractiveness, social anxiety etc.), which increases the chances of forming a CMC relationship. It refers to a unique characteristic of online attraction in which the sequence of attraction is reversed online because one gets to know the person first and then becomes attracted rather than vice-versa. This means that if we had first met ftf and he did not find me physically attractive, there is the chance that he would not have taken time to get to know me. It also may explain why I found him physically attractive when he sent a picture after a couple of months of talking.

While McKenna’s factors explain why we were able to form a fantasized and idealized relationship through a lean media, I wonder if it would if we would have made it through a richer media. Perhaps just as our fairytale relationship started online, it was supposed to end happily on AOL as well.

Comment 1
Comm 245 Blue: 5.1 Distance makes the Heart Grow Fonder??

Comment 2
Comm 245 Blue: 5 Is an Online wedding adultery?

5: Summer Lovin', Had Me a Blast

Though we've got to say good-bye
For the summer
Darling, I promise you this
I'll send you all my love
Everyday in a letter
Sealed with a kiss
-"Sealed With a Kiss", #1 Song on Billboard Hot 100 in 1962

If Brian Hyland, singer of the smash hit "Sealed With a Kiss", were a college student in 2007, not only could he have sent his lover letters, but he could also send her e-mails, texts, and instant messages galore, packed with even more love than he thought possible. And why limit yourself to a kiss when you can use emoticons ranging from :* to 8) to :D ? That would have shown her how he really felt!

Eons ago, I made several close friends my freshman year among the people who lived in my dorm. After second semester had ended, a relationship bloomed between me and Chase*, a nice guy and a good friend I had made in Low-Rise 6*. The relationship took us both by surprise, as we realized how much common ground we really shared in terms of how we thought and saw things, and needless to say we were quite disappointed that the relationship had not started during the school year, when it would have been easier to see each other. Chase was Ithaca-bound and pursuing a job at Student Agencies, while I was eager to get back to NYC for my first long vacation home from Cornell. Because of the distance between us, we relied heavily on little gadgets like AIM, facebook, text messaging, and cell phones to keep in touch as we watched our friendship metamorphose into a relationship.

My and Chase's frequent use of AIM catapulted our friendship to the more-than-friends stage. Just like most college students out there, we constantly had our Buddy Lists open, which we would refer to in search of interesting conversation when our otherwise real lives were getting boring. Wallace's attraction factor of proximity most certainly played a role here as Yeehaw7686 and GreenFlamingo talked daily on AIM. Here, familiarity bred attraction, or in the least, strengthened our friendship by high intersection frequency online. Someone should write a song about Instant Messaging because having the ability to talk to your 'special friend' at anytime, anywhere there's a computer, is a blessing, and surely beats a lousy daily letter that doesn't get to you on time anyway.

In this same venue, AIM also allowed us to discover more of our common grounds. The way in which Chase and I communicated did not evolve from knowing each other's categorical common grounds, and later discovering conversational common grounds. This was simply because Chase and I had not met online i.e. at match.com, but had met FtF at Low Rise 6. AIM is a vast online community that is accessible to literally everyone with a computer, and has no priority for those with special interests like dog shows or The South Beach Diet. In this respect, my online fairy-tale comes into conflict with Wallace's common ground theory. However the "Law of Attraction" still holds salience in that Chase and I got to know each other conversationally first, then became attracted to each other based on common ground. Chase and I were both loquacious, analytical types who made a lot of stupid jokes, thus we got along swimmingly.

Finally, Wallace's factor of disinhibition effects certainly held true for this relationship. Chase sent me a cute text message while we were in the "macking" stage. He was watching "War of the Worlds" in a movie theater at the time and walked out for five minutes to send this:

"Lol…Sorry…I’m seeing war of the world now…So far- it’s not so great :-( (talking to you would be much more fun ;-))"

Increased self-disclosure is much easier at the technology level because saying something flirtatious like this must be much easier to type than to say to a girl's face. Technology also lent itself for us to talk about other subjects. Although he and I were both pretty open and tolerant individuals in person, technology created a smoke screen in which we felt comfortable discussing anything from religion to sexual openness. To spare your virgin ears, I'll leave it at that.

Many of Wallace's theories on online attraction factors held true for Chase and me. While nothing beats a FtF relationship, which finally happened for Chase and I after dragged out months of longing and separation over the summer, online communication definitely fosters a long-distance relationship.

*names have been changed

Comment 1: http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/09/a51-oh-father-where-art-thou.html

Comment 2: http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/09/5-im-so-much-cooler-online.html

5- Staying in touch with a cousin

I have stayed in touch with a cousin who has moved all over the country in recent years via mediated communication, most specifically instant-messenger. I have not spent time with this cousin in several years, so we have been keeping up a friendly relationship primarily by communicating online. Three of McKenna's relationship facilitation factors that have played a role in our online exchanges are "Getting the Goods", interjectional control, and connecting to similar others.

"Getting the Goods" is basically a stalker-type method of learning about a person, via blogs, Google, facebook, etc., before really communicating or meeting that person. My cousin writes a blog online, and I read it to keep up-to date with what she is doing with her life. I also occasionally check her facebook site. I'm sure she checks mine as well. This give us both methods to find "common ground" things to talk about which is a basis for connecting to similar others. We want to find things we have in common in order to make conversations easy, free-flowing, and not awkward. This way we keep things friendly and continue to have a friendly relationship. It is easier to stay in touch with someone who has similar intrests, so finding common intrests is one of the main ways we try to keep our friendship in tact. Of course sometimes we talk about problems, but we like to focus on fun topics such as movie and music interests.

These interests are easily updated on facebook also, which is another way of "getting the goods". Using facebook also provides us with interactional control. We both have an idea of who is reading our facebook profiles on a regular basis and update interests and profile aspects that we believe those specific others will care about and are likely to respond to. This is a form of selective-self presentation because we are chosing what we want others to see about us. Interactional control also suggests we apply media richness theory and talk online because the nature of our conversations is often unambiguous. So, even without seeing eachother in person to hang-out, or even talking on the phone much, we gain a general sense of what eachother is doing and is currently interested in. Thus, the three features help open up the pathways for conversation, helps us stay in touch, and facilitate a friendly relationship.

Comm 245 Blue: 5 The Future Lawyers of America
Comm 245 Blue: So Close...Yet, So Far... From the Coast to the Prairies

Assignment 5: Long Distance Friendship

Although long distance relationships can be challenging, through the use of mediated communication, they can also turn out to be extremely rewarding. The long-distance relationship I wish to describe doesn’t involve a significant other but instead my best friend who moved to Georgia when we were seventeen. Since her trek down the east coast, we’ve spent many hours developing and strengthening our relationship by talking on the phone, texting, IMing, video-conferencing and exchanging emails. I hope to explain how our relationship thrived through two of Wallace’s interdependent attraction factors; “proximity” and “common ground”.

Proximity is a huge motivator and perpetuator of friendship. Physical proximity and face-to-face conversations actually account for how Kayla’s and my relationship started. Once Kayla relocated to Georgia, we began interacting repeatedly over the Internet. No matter how busy we each were with our separate lives we would still save time to communicate on a weekly basis updating each other on the progression of our lives. Since our intersection frequency was high, we felt more familiar with each other and in turn, disclosed more information than we would have if we rarely communicated.

The second attraction factor that helped our relationship thrive is “common ground”. Common ground argues that those with “mutually shared beliefs, assumptions and propositions” will become closer. A basis of my friendship with Kayla was all of the things we shared in the past. Our families grew up together, played the same sports, and attended the same school and church. Through our shared past and present (attending college) experiences, we formed similar values and memories. This common ground led us to converse freely with each other through mediated communication without a fear of being judged.

Assignment 5.2: Online Relationships in 'Second Life'

An article in the Wall Street Journal entitled "Is This Man Cheating on His Wife?" discusses a 53-year-old man's 'obsession' with Second Life, an online virtual world in which players create online personalities, 'avatars', characters who interact with each other doing everyday things such as shopping and getting married.

The man described in the article met a female character in Second Life, and married her in-game. The man's wife in real-life is concerned about her husband's obsession with this game. He spends day and night interacting online with his Second World wife.

Digital deception plays a major role in the Second Life game. Users are able to control what their characters look like; as seen in the image to the right, the online physical characteristics of these real-world individuals do not really match. I would consider the online images of these two individuals to be false representations of their real-life images. This could be a reason why they enjoy spending so much time playing the game: the real personalities of these individuals can come through in their characters who might look different than the individuals do in real life. Assessment signals can be controlled by Second Life users by buying physical characteristics for their online characters, including 6-pack abs.

Relationships and interpersonal attraction play very large roles in the Second Life online world. The online relationship that the two individuals in this article share has been growing for some time. Intersection frequency has kept their online relationship going and thriving, while the man's real-life relationship with his wife is suffering. If he spends all of his free time online, he does not spend much time with his actual wife.

The hyperpersonal effect perhaps plays a role in this situation, beginning with their portrayal of physical characteristics in this game. While it is not written anywhere that your online character must resemble the physical attributes of the real-life individuals, online games like Second Life present users with a great opportunity to play off of each other and make themselves to be different than they are in real life.



Comment 1
Comment 2

So Close...Yet, So Far... From the Coast to the Prairies

Entering my senior year of high school or what I call grade 12 since I am Canadian I was leaving my hometown of Cole Harbour, Nova Scotia to attend school in Wilcox, Saskatchewan. At the time I was in a relationship with a girl who I had been dating for a few years. We quickly adapted to CMC communication and found a new connection that we may have never found if I had not moved away. Our similarities or what Wallace calls our “common ground” helped us to maintain a close relationship. At times it felt that we became even closer because our conversations were often much more intimate or revealing than they had ever been before. We were engaging in the removal of gating features. We would share embarrassing childhood stories that we would probably never tell one another face to face and may have even convinced ourselves that we would be able to deal with the distance forever. However, when I returned home and had decided that I would attend Cornell the following year our expectations of the relationship seemed to change. Perhaps it was because we felt that four years would be a long haul, but I seem to think that we were more realistic in our FtF conversations. It felt like the CMC communication made us feel that we were indestructible or that we could take on the challenge of living apart when in reality it was a long shot. As we got closer and closer to my departure for Cornell we decided that it would be too hard to tackle the distance. Ever since my arrival at Cornell we have stayed in touch through instant messaging and of course, Facebook, and maintained a great friendship. The laws of attraction describe how the proportion of shared activities, beliefs, etc cause us to remain attracted to each other. Although we are no longer dating we still share a very strong emotional bond which is why we have remained such good friends. Without CMC communication, I think it would be much more difficult to hold our relationship together the way that we have.

Assignment 5 Option 1: Long Distance Relationship

For this assignment I will be analyzing my long-distance relationship with my girlfriend over this summer using Wallace’s attraction factors. I will try to maintain a certain amount of anonymity since she is not only in this class, but also in this blog. I will tell you, however, that her name begins with “B” and ends with “ianca”. We became very good friends last year, both of us transferring to Cornell in the fall and living in the Transfer Center on the same floor. By the end of the year we were dating and when summer came around we were forced into long-distance relationship. We could no longer see each other everyday and communicate face-to-face, as she lives almost two hours away from me in Philadelphia, so we had to communicate through mediated channels such as AIM.
One way in which my long-distance relationship can be analyzed is through the proximity factor. In face-to-face interactions, familiarity with another person proves to enhance attraction based on one’s location. The closer someone is to someone else, and therefore the more they come into contact with that person, the more attraction there will be. In computer mediated communication, attraction is determined by the intersection frequency. The intersection frequency is how often one will encounter another in an online space such as a chat room, blog, or instant messenger. In CMC, the higher the intersection frequency, the more familiarity, and therefore more attraction there exists. In this case, my girlfriend and I both utilized AOL Instant Messenger almost everyday during the summer. She was online nearly every time I was and we talked online on a regular basis. In other words, our intersection frequency was very high. Although we could not speak face-to-face, our high intersection frequency on AIM proved to increase our familiarity, therefore increasing attraction.
Another way the long-distance relationship can be analyzed is through the common ground theory. The idea here is that individuals are attracted to others who share the same beliefs, assumptions, attitudes, etc. These shared attributes, together taken as common ground, help determine how attracted one is to another; the more they share in common, the more attracted they will be. In my case this summer, I knew a lot about my girlfriend from being friends with her the whole year, but also learned a lot more that we shared in common through CMC. I learned about everything from literary interests we shared, to beliefs on social issues, even to certain attitudinal traits that came out during our communications. Over the course of the summer I was astonished to see how similar we were, both with my previous knowledge from our face-to-face interactions and the new knowledge from the mediated ones. These findings of common ground proved to increase attraction even further and since we share such a large proportion of these beliefs, assumptions, and attitudes, the Law of Attraction further states that there will be a high level of attraction between the two of us.

http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/09/5-my-e-mail-relationship.html
http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/09/assignment-5-option-1-away-from-home.html

Assignment #5.1

For this week’s assignment, I decided to describe a relationship that has required a great deal of mediated communication. To describe this long distance relationship, I will use Walther’s (1999) attraction factors. Of the four (physical attraction, proximity, common ground and disinhibition effects), proximity and common ground are the two that will best assist me in explain my friendship with Alex.

I met Alex during my sophomore year of high school in our geometry class. Since then we’ve had some rough times but she has remained one of my best friends. When we both left for school in the fall of 2005, Alex went to Columbia University in New York City while I went to Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ. We were only about 30 minutes away by train and saw each other almost every weekend. Although we didn’t spend as much time together as we did during the previous years, it was still easy to keep in touch. My sophomore year though, I transferred to Cornell. Almost four hours away from Alex. This made it a lot more difficult to maintain contact and interact as much did before. We both feared that the distance would threaten our friendship and thus decided to set some ground rules: we would email back and forth at least twice a week and speak on the phone every Sunday.

Two years later, we are both juniors and have remained very close friends. Walther’s proximity and common ground can easily help illustrate how this has happened. PROXIMITY is the idea that familiarity breeds attraction. Familiarity is something Alex and I developed during our time together in high school (full of face to face interactions), which flow from location (same neighborhood). As our relationship became mainly computer mediated, our bond grew stronger on the basis of recurring interactions (intersection frequency – how much “…you run into a person on the net” (Wallace, 139)). Another very important element is the idea of COMMON GROUND. This factor entails the belief that mutually shared beliefs, assumptions and propositions propagate familiarity. It can be either conversational (common interest or belief is discovered during a conversation –face to face interactions-, i.e.: both persons like the rock music) or categorical (both persons belong to a group –CMC interactions-, i.e.: both from Cornell). Alex and I are both from the same hometown, attended the same high school, share a great number of friends, like the same type of music, appreciate poetry, love Thai food, have the same political views, attend Ivy League schools, are both bilingual and both very close to our families. All these factors are common grounds and have strongly facilitated our friendship by making it easier and more comfortable to share opinions and facts knowing that they will most likely be understood and supported. Some of these are also what drew us closer during the beginning stages of our friendship. For instance, during one of our first interactions I found out that both Alex and I went to Thai restaurants for our birthdays and were both very politically active. Just knowing these two elements of her personality attracted me to her right away. The Law of Attraction explains this idea. The theory states that the greater the proportion of shared attitudes and beliefs, the more we are attracted to the other person. Although I only knew two things about Alex’s personality, I agreed with both of them 100%, leading me to draw exaggerated conclusions about her personality and that her and I would be great friends. The theory also states that if I had know more about Alex, but had agreed with her on less issues, my opinion would have been that I don’t know enough about her to draw a solid conclusion.

Just like we did in high school, Alex and I still argue and disagree on some issues. Although we have both matured and changed in many ways, had our bickering ceased after graduation it would have probably been as a result of poor communication. Walther’s factors, proximity (familiarity breeds attraction) and common ground (mutually shared beliefs, assumptions and propositions) help explain how my bond with Alex remained so strong during the years. We were able to retain a solid relationship by maintaining a good level of familiarity through frequent online interaction (proximity) and through the joint beliefs (common ground) we had shared in high school and that we still agree upon.



COMMENTS:

http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/09/a51-oh-father-where-art-thou.html.

http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/09/5-is-online-wedding-adultery.html

5/1: Distance Makes the Heart Grow Fonder?

Throughout first semester of last year, I developed a quasi-relationship with a boy who will we will hereby refer to as “Billy.” Though, by the time he went abroad for spring semester, our little fling wasn’t the most serious of college relationships I’ve seen, Billy and I meant enough to one another to commit to keeping in touch as best we could. A romantic connection is not the easiest of relationships to maintain via cyberspace, but we made it work and, in fact, strengthened our relationship despite the distance.
McKenna’s relationship facilitation factors were particularly applicable to my and Billy’s situation last spring. The removal of gating features was one factor I found particularly striking while communicating via CMC. By gating features, I refer to the guards he was able to let down when communication took place over the Internet, sans the many easily observed FtF cues. Billy’s shyness in talking about his emotions was a gate which I often had trouble opening when we were together. Once separated by such great distance, there was no other way to maintain our feelings for one another than to discuss them. Because he felt more comfortable talking about his innermost feelings when he didn’t have to see my FtF reaction, he revealed much more to me via instant message, phone calls and e-mail than he was ever able to in person. He was able to be more honest and emotional when not worrying about potential aversive reactions I might visibly experience to what he said.
Interactional control, or the jurisdiction we exercise over self-presentation when in control of media choices, was another factor that came into play more than a few times throughout the months we spent apart. Obviously, I wouldn’t Skype with Billy when I looked bad. On the way out for the night, I always loved to Skype so that the impression Billy would maintain of me was a good one. When wearing a retainer or zit cream, I’d usually blame my unwillingness to Skype on my roomate’s studying or the “nap” she was taking. In addition, I usually chose text to communicate with Billy (as opposed to calling) when I was out at loud parties. This way, he wouldn’t have to hear the loud crowds and worry that anything fishy was going on: all he read was all that he could perceive of where I was and what I was doing. I hoped that this mode of self-defense helped to maintain his trust in me.
Finally, getting the goods was a factor of our relationship that kept us honest. We didn’t necessarily find everything out from one another before seeing pictures posted on Facebook from the night before. Having photographic information about one another before discussing with each other, Billy and I often pulled information out of one another if we had not yet admitted to a specific occurrence or event. In the end, this made our bond both strong and honest.

5 The Future Lawyers of America

After my sophomore year in high school, I went to a summer program at The University of Chicago to study American Law. Thrust into a situation where I was forced to either make friends quickly or suffer a lonely four weeks sitting alone in my dorm room (even though at the time the idea of living in a dorm room was exciting all by itself!), I learned how to make friends fast. I soon became very close with three girls, all of whom came from very different areas of the country. Crystal is from New York City, Naomi is from Indiana, Sara is from Los Angeles and I am from New Jersey. We all come from completely different backgrounds, yet somehow we had so many similarities and became extremely close in such a short amount of time.

When the program ended, each of us sadly went our separate ways. Since four way conference calling was a little difficult for us, we resorted to email in order to keep in touch. We each sent out weekly emails updating one another on the daily routines that were our lives at the time. Soccer practice. Mock trial. Student Government Association. We each had our own stories to tell. Crystal, Naomi and Sara's stories became a little more interesting when they applied to college an entire year before I did. I would hear their horror stories of writing applications along with the decisions to go to one school or another. I even came very close to convincing Naomi to go to the University of Pennsylvania, which is just fifteen minutes from my home. Every week, I would look forward to these emails because at the time it was the only conversation I could have with all three of my friends at the same time.

Keeping up our friendship using CMC with one, let alone three people is extremely hard. One of Wallace's factors regards proximity, which is very evident as a factor in my friendships. Because Wallace says that familiarity breeds attraction, it is only natural to assume that since the four of us go to different universities and live in completely different parts of the country, we have become less and less familiar with each other's lives on a daily basis. No matter how much we tell each other about what is going on in our day to day experiences, we are not physically with one another to experience these things together. Even with forums such as Facebook where we are able to increase our interseciton frequency and constantly check up on one another, there can be no true substitute for actually sharing experiences with each other rather than simply telling them of my daily experiences. With Facebook, I can easily look at their pictures and see how much fun they are having with their friends, but the problem remains that I am not there as one of those friends on a daily basis. Facebook almost makes our situation more painful because I get to see how much fun each of my friends are having without the rest of us. Everyone is making new friends and making new memories, while all we have are the few weeks we spent together. The truth is that no matter how many emails we send to remain in contact with one another, being far away from each other has really resulted in a diminished relationship between all of us. Wallace's idea that familiarity flows from location really resonates in my personal experience with CMC communication.

From what I have said so far, it seems as if the early CFO studies suggesting that fewer cues and less emotion leads to a less developed relationship would seem to be true in my case. However, there is more of the story to tell...

Wallace also developed the idea of "common ground" where we tend to become attracted to people that have common attitudes and beliefs. Because I spent four weeks with these girls in an environment that intensifies relationships, (since we spent twenty four hours a day together for four weeks and needed to find friends quickly) we quickly learned the similarities we had with one another despite our diverse backgrounds. This continued in our online conversations, and since we were aware of what similarities we had, each of us was able to share our stories with one another knowing that we would understand completely. This is the main difference between our relationship versus each of our individal relationships at home or at school. In face to face relationships, the proportion of similarities tends to be smaller since there are many more cues and much more availability to spot differences. In our weekly email conversations, we already new each other and what was similar and different about one another. However, all the new pieces of information we shared with each other tended to revolve around the similarities we already knew we had! Telling each other something that we would not have in common would simply put more of a strain on the distance of our relationships. Therefore, the proportion of similarities we had in CMC was higher than the proportion of similarities that Crystal, Naomi, Sara and myself were developing with our friends at home and at school! So THIS is what allows for us to have a continued relationship! We simply make sure we keep telling each other pieces of information that we share in common so that we do not fade out of each other's lives! We future lawyers of America have solved the problem of keeping online relationships going...simply tell each other what you think they want to hear!


http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/09/5-im-so-much-cooler-online.html
http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/09/5-is-online-wedding-adultery.html

5 Online relationship of lies

I came across a story in the news about an Internet relationship formed by an online predator.

Girl seduced by a web of lies

The article describes a man posing as a 17-year-old boy in an Internet chatroom. In reality, he is a 34-year-old married father of two children. This man attempted to seduce a 14-year-old girl over a three-month period through a complex sequence of lies. First, he pretended to be a 17-year-old boy called Jakson who had just moved into her town, and he began an intense online relationship with her. He then switched into the role of "Lorenzo," Jakson’s friend. As Lorenzo, he blamed the girl for causing Jakson to lose his job. The man put psychological pressure on the girl by claiming that she would be responsible if Jakson tried to commit suicide. To remediate this situation, Lorenzo suggested that she sleep with Jakson’s "boss," allowing the man to meet this girl in person.

The man responsible for this ill-behavior used both identity-based and message-based deception. His identity-based lies are prominent – he posed as the 17-year-old Jakson, Lorenzo’s friend, and then Jakson’s boss. But he also employs message-based deception by saying Jakson lost his job. The identity-based lie makes it easy for him to cover up the message-based lie, and vice-versa. Since almost all interaction took place through text-based CMC, the cues are largely assessment signals. This makes it difficult for the girl to detect the lies.

Social distance theory would predict that it is harder to lie to someone who is physically closer to you. Since the man lied over Internet chat rather than FtF, his actions support social distance theory. Media richness theory predicts that lying (an equivocal task) tends to favor richer communication mediums. But since the man only lied in CMC, this situation offers evidence against media richness theory. Lastly, chatrooms are a synchronous, distributed, recordable medium. The feature-based model predicts that the synchronicity and distributed nature of this medium would be favorable for lying. This case supports the feature-based model despite being a recordable medium. Indeed, the man may not have been aware of the medium’s recordability – chat logs were later used as evidence against him in the courtroom trial.

Some of McKenna’s relationship facilitation factors are at work here. First, "gating" features are removed. Specifically, the man was much older and may have been unattractive, but the girl cannot glean this through online chat. Therefore, she is not instantly turned away from him. Second, the man exerts interactional control. He can dictate what parts of his character to reveal or withhold at certain moments. And he uses this to great effect when he takes on the role of three distinct characters. Third, this is a case of "connecting to similar others." The man initiated the interaction by saying that Jakson had recently moved into the area she lived in. This gives them some common ground (geographic location) to relate to. The presence of these relationship facilitation factors were enough to allow the man to manipulate girl’s psychology in the way he desired.

Comment 1
Comment 2

5 My Mediated Relationship According to Wallace

I met my girlfriend of 2 years in October my senior year in high school.  She attended a neighboring high school and we both volunteered at the same hospital.  When we were accepted to different schools, we knew things were going to be rough.  We mutually decided to stay together, despite the challenges of being apart, and both of us are happy about it.  

Obviously, the hardest thing about long-distance relationships is the distance.  Proximity is argued as the greatest indicator of friendship.  Proximity is essentially how close you are.  This can be physical closeness, or how frequently you interact with someone online.  If you meet someone online frequently, you can say you have closeness with them.  This makes plenty of sense, saying you can't become friends with a person you never cross paths with, whether it be in the real world or online.  The problem with attending different universities, though, is greater than just being apart.  We both have full schedules, and are busy doing many different things.  This means that even if we'd like to, we can't even engage in CMC when we'd like too.  Its during these bouts of limited interaction that we are most likely to get into arguments.  This element of our relationship that is best explained by Wallace, when she says that we experience the most attraction to people who we are familiar with and spend a lot of time with.  When we are together, over breaks, and the summers, we spend every day together, and we get along swimmingly.

The second attraction factor presented by Wallace is physical attraction.  In the online world, this is created by getting to know someone.  This doesn't necessarily apply to our relationship, because we met in person first.  I'm sure my dashing good looks had everything to do with our falling in love.  But seriously, the first time I saw Lianne, I was immediately physically attracted to her, but when she responded positively to my introduction, and she displayed potential interest in me, that was even cooler.  This shows how positive feedback can enhance attraction.

When Lianne and I departed for different colleges, we knew we would be losing common ground.  Having coming from different high schools, we'd already gone through having different circles of friends and trying to mesh spheres of influence.  As our college experiences continued, we lost more common ground as we gathered new friends and experienced.  We overcome this issue by making sure to introduce each other to all our friends, and show each other our respective schools when we visit each other.  By sharing this with each other on the phone, and than showing each other in person, we can maintain common ground.  With out this element, I'm fairly certain our relationship wouldn't work.  It would be like just pushing pause whenever we are apart, and than play when we got together.  Relationships really can't function like that.  

So even though our relationship started in the real world, Wallace's attraction factor's still apply.  

5 - Metaworld relationship

From two years ago till this summer I was a participant in the online world known as World of Warcraft. This online space proved to be a fruitful place to form friendships, despite the fact that it features computer mediated communication instead of face to face interactions. I will focus on one particular individual within the group of player I frequently played with in the game.

Wallace uses proximity as core a factor in online attraction. Proximity is defined in an online space as the frequency of intersection between individuals. Users who often cross paths in a space, such as two posters on a message board who frequently reply to each other, are said to have close proximity, whereas users who may see each other only once or twice in space have much less proximity. In the space of World of Warcraft, I encountered my friend quite often through group quests (multiple individuals work together to accomplish a set task within the game) and “hanging out”, so to speak, in the game's main area. This close proximity lead to familiarity, and then to trust, both of which are key to building a relationship. This proximity increased even further when I joined his guild (a group of players who share common interests and goals.) Our intersections were more numerous as I gained access to the guild only online chatting withing WoW, as well as access to their discussion forum (asynchronous communication) and voice chat server (synchronous.) It is at this juncture that our friendship truly formed, as almost any time I played WoW, he was either on the voice chat server, or in game.

Wallace also defines common ground as an attraction factor online. Common ground as used by Wallace is the impression that the person one is observing has similar interests, beliefs, and background as oneself. She also mentions something called the “Law of attraction,” which states that the amount of attraction is proportional to the observed set of shared beliefs and interests. The implication of the proportion being based on observed similarities is if one knows less about the other subject, but observes more similarities, they will be more attracted than if they knew more, but observed a lesser percentage of them as similar.

At each stage of proximity in our friendship, my observed set of shared beliefs was very high. When I knew him merely through the game, we knew relatively little about each other, but what we knew had a high proportion of similarity. In each stage of escalation in the relationship (in game friends to acquaintances, to guild mates, to good friends) the proportion declined a little, but remained high enough that I still remained interested in getting to know him more.


Comment 1

Comment 2

5 - My e-mail relationship

Back when I didn't have schoolwork overpowering my life, I used to frequent a Buffalo Sabres forum. My membership lasted for about two years, and over that time, I formed a group of forum friends--people who seemed to support my posts and whatnot. Every time each member posted, whatever information they chose to reveal about themselves was posted under their names (like age, location, etc.). One such poster caught my attention when I noticed that he was my age, also a Sabres fan, but from Finland. I'd always wondered what caused people from different countries to be fans of particular teams, so I sent him a private message (PM) asking him this question.

He responded, and eventually we exchanged our email addresses. For nearly a year, we sent each other emails almost daily. We talked about everything from our favorite foods to our families and the differences between American and Finnish lifestyles. Fun fact, he also told me recently that two former Cornellians play for his favorite Finnish league team (Charlie Cook is one, I can't remember the other right now). We wrote in English (which was good for me since I don't have any background in Scandinavian languages), and he often told me that it was good practice for him for his English tests. Eventually, we began referring to each other as pen pals, and, later on, friends. Since then, we only email each other about once a month (I suspect both of us moving on from high school has a lot to do with the decrease in email frequency), but we still do try to keep up with each other's lives. He has also sent me postcards from various family vacations.

In regards to how the theories we have learned so far apply to my correspondence, the main point that stuck out to me was Wallace's "common ground" aspect of relationships and attraction. This also works with McKenna's "Connecting to similar others" factor, both of which suggest that we find people we have common interests with more attractive and would more likely seek out a relationship with them because of this. Because I was on a specialized forum where I would meet people who had a big interest in common with me (being a Sabres fan), it comes as no surprise that my pen pal and I often devote at least a paragraph about the team and recent developments each time we email each other. Also, his interest in the Sabres is what led me to initially contact him.

The second of Wallace's factors that apply to my situation is "disinhibition," which states that we disclose more online and we have an increased sense of self disclosure in relational development. As I said, after we got past introductions, my pen pal and I shared a lot about each other. I didn't feel overly cautious about sharing this information, and I don't think he did either (though other theories have shown us that self-disclosure leads to more self-disclosure from the other person, so that may have something to do with that). However, I can't be certain that I wouldn't have disclosed an equal amount if these conversations were taking place in a richer medium.

5 - Unexpected Long-Distance Relationship

Personally, I never thought long-distance relationships could work --- Until I had one forced upon me nine months ago. My best friend of three years, who I have been dating for the past two years, joined the Army last semester. I particularly found Professor Hancock’s lectures interesting last week because it really made me think about my relationship and how it changed once my significant other unexpectedly joined the Army. I am going to discuss the role of Wallace’s attraction factors with respect to my long-distance relationship. Wallace’s four attraction factors include:

(1) Physical attraction – Generally, if you meet someone in person you become attracted to him/her based on looks and then you get to know him/her. If you meet someone through some type of mediated communication you are inclined to get to know someone before developing attraction to him/her.
(2) Proximity – You become attracted to people who are familiar. For example, if you are in constant contact with someone in person, location caters to familiarity. In online spaces, however, intersection frequency defines familiarity. If you see someone on AIM frequently, he/she is familiar and you are more inclined to become attracted to him/her.
(3) Common Ground – You are attracted to people who share your beliefs, interests, etc.
(4) Disinhibition – You tend to self-disclose yourself in a more honest and intentional way when a relationship gains intensity.

Proximity definitely played a huge role in our relationship at first because we lived in the same dorm and had the same circle of friends. I suppose common ground applies to my previous statement because we obviously had a lot in common if we were in the same social circles and we were both freshman engineers taking the same classes. As our relationship started to develop, we began to open up to each other more. Since we began to have greater intentions of maintaining a long-term relationship the disinhibition factor came into play.

Of course, when my significant other joined the Army I was devastated. With limited means of communication, I was forced to sit tight for three months of no communication. Then, when he was done with basic training we had to resort to e-mail and Myspace while he was in Military Intelligence training. While he was all the way in Arizona and I was stuck up here in Ithaca, I couldn’t help but think that our relationship was going to take a detrimental hit. Oddly, I was extremely jealous of every female in training with my significant other because I was afraid that the proximity and common ground factors that helped me in the past would work against me now that we were literally in two completely different worlds.

However, once he was allowed to have a cell phone, it was just like we had started from scratch. To my surprise, we actually still have a lot in common. In this case, absence did make the heart grow fonder and we became closer because with limited opportunity to interact face to face we were forced to actually get to know each other which then led to a stronger attraction on a different level. Because I am still close to his fraternity brothers on campus, I remain familiar to him and I can keep him updated on his house and brothers’ activities. Our high frequency of interaction through e-mail, telephone calls and Myspace messages helps too. Thanks to Wallace’s four factors I am still in a ‘healthy’, functional relationship.

http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/09/assignment-51_25.html

http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/09/so-closeyet-so-far-from-coast-to.html

5 Is an Online wedding adultery?

I read an article in Wall Street Journal online edition. Feel free to check it out at http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB118670164592393622.html.

It was about a man who after being married for several years, found the online gaming world called Second-Life. It seems like a MUD to me, though I have never seen it myself, and it is never reffered to as such. This 50 year old started a relationship in this world with a woman who he has never met before in his life. In this world, he asked her to marry him. Keep in mind that he is already married in real life.

The article says that he sometimes plays for 6-8 hours a day, once playing for 20 hours straight. I feel bad for someone with so little quality of life. The article also said that people who play these games average 20-40 hours a week. That's a full time job people.

In relation to deception, this article brought up a good question which we just brushed on in class. Is it considered deception if you are not who you say you are; I am not who I say I am; and we both know both of these things? Who is the sender and who is the receiver? Is it really just one big game of deception detection?

Clearly, this type of relationship could only take place in a CmC, as I venture that all would consider it unethical in FtF because the man is already married. That's not to say what he is doing is any better. This is clearly not technologically deterministic because both parties chose to use CmC to make their "relationship" socially acceptable.

If there is indeed deception here, it is identity-based. In my understanding of this virtual world, there are very few cues which cannot be changed relatively easily (assesment). I would also venture that there is no deception detection, as both parties seem content to remain "anonymous".

I don't believe the theories (Feature-based, Media Richness, or Social Distance) can be properly applied to this type of relationship. The socially acceptable aspect outweighs all of these.

Some of the studies we went over do apply though, indirectly. They are both lying about age and appearance, but they both know this fact.

Regarding relationships, I have a few observations. Both of these people are anonymous, but display a lot of self-discolure (via McKenna's view of identity). They are therefore attracted to each other and as stated in class (more elegantly), disclosure creates more disclosure. The gating features are those in the MUD, not those present in real life. Though, from the pictures in the article, I must say that the man is much more life-like in appearance than the woman.

They both control their own interaction and appearance by themselves. Hyperpersonal takes over, as the man is a rich retail and club owner, and only gets richer and happier in this world, now earning over 1.5 million "lindens" (virtual dollars).

They both don't care to "get the goods" on each other indirectly. According to them, they haven's looked each other up, and keep information raking to CmC conversations.

They still haven't met yet, and Physical Atrratction still only applies in their MUD. They are still in the first step of backward attraction.

Their intersection frequency is high in this MUD, but from what I understand, they don't see each other outside or in other media. They clearly have some common ground, enough to virtually marry. If anything, their both on what the article calls "Everworld Evercrack".

The one thing our class discussions didn't discuss in theories was the effect of online relationships on outside relationships. And, we didn't discuss overuse of the Internet, who defines it, and if it even exists. We also could probe how online social life relates to real life social life.

5 long distance

A couple years ago I was in a long distance relationship with someone who was a senior in high school when I was a post grad at Loomis Chaffee. It did not last very long, but while it was going on, McKenna’s relationship facilitation factors were definitely involved. I was really busy with soccer and getting used to the new school and meeting lots of people everyday. We would talk on the phone a lot in the beginning, but then it slowly moved to mainly talking through AIM, emails or texts. Going to school, both of us knew that it would be hard to stay together. We were both really busy applying to colleges and thinking about the future. He wanted to go to Lehigh and I was applying early to Cornell. We were clearly going our separate ways, so we tried to make it last as long as possible, but we both knew that it would be tough. McKenna’s identifiably factor had an impact on Glenn and my relationship. This factor talks about either the greater the anonymity or identifiableness, the greater the self disclosure, and therefore the greatest relationship development. Each are referred to as the “stranger on the train” and “stranger in the crowd effect” respectively. Joinson in 2001 also added to this idea by saying that computer mediated communication (CMC) in general has higher levels of self disclosure. This makes total sense because the visual anonymity is what makes people feel more comfortable to self disclose and let someone into their lives without having to worry about the facial expressions or the person’s actual first reaction. When Glenn and I would talk on the phone it would be a rushed conversation because both of us would not want to end with awkward discussions or silences. But when we would talk online, we were able to tell each other how we really felt about things and not worry about awkward silences or other things that being on a phone cause. It was helpful to touch base online because then I would begin to understand where he stood with our relationship and the future etc. Another factor that really hit home with this long distance relationship was McKenna’s idea of connecting to similar others. This part of the theory includes connecting with people across space/time (through internet) and also through social networks. Glenn and I did not form our relationship online, but over time we realized that we connected in similar groups on facebook and had similar interests and a common ground which we stood on. As we moved away from each other (proximity plays a role as well), we began to become interested in other things and exploring parts of our selves that we had never done before. We did not share as much as we once had, and filling him in on all the little daily changes was tiring and frustrating. We fell out of understanding and began forming better relationships with other people, people who were closer to us.