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.
3 comments:
I agree with your section about Wallace's disinhibition factor in online relationships. The lack of physical presence seems to promote more openess in self-disclosure between subjects, like you and your father.
Its interesting that this effect takes places in relationships that have an offline component in addition to the online one. In my experience I've noticed that I am more open with self-disclosure with people I know in CMC than in real life, even if I've known them in real life for a long time.
Hey Joe,
I really liked you post. First, I can relate to your experience and your use of CMC to build, maintain and develop relationships within your family. Ever since I can remember “someone” in my family has lived abroad. First, while I lived in Italy, my dad resided in Sweden and then in several US cities. Then, after I moved to Philadelphia, PA, my mom began traveling a lot for work. Further, while I was in high school, both my sisters traveled to a great extent for summer internships and semesters abroad. Needless to say, Skype, IM, and email are now my preferred ways to communicate with my parents and siblings.
Second, I like your use of the common ground and proximity theory explained by Walther. Because my family gets together only about a week every year, keeping up with each other’s lives and day-to-day occurrences can be hard. Walther explains way I invested so much time and dedication in maintaining these relations: our “common ground” (shared beliefs and assumptions) and our “proximity” (familiarity) it was imperative for us to remain in constant contact
You have certainly written a wonderful and poignant post. I enjoyed your analysis of proximity and disinhibition effects - communicating with someone important in your life on an almost daily basis certainly fills your heart, whether it be in person or over CMC, because it gives you something great to look forward to each day. I lived apart from my parents for 4 years from the ages of 9-12, and we used the phone a lot before email and webcams were as ubiquitous as they are today, so I can relate to your story. Also, having to write out your thoughts and feelings to someone who isn't physically close to you gives you more time to think of what you're going to say. It gives you the opportunity to emote and to even wax poetic when you might not have had the agility or motivation to do so in person. I also agree with your analysis of McKenna's removal of gating factors - if Mom ever wanted to yell at me over the phone for not brushing my teeth enough, I could just hold the phone away from my ear to keep from hearing the punishment. (I assure you now, that I do brush my teeth twice a day.) CMC provides for a smoother means of communication with your parents. Do you think, however, that because you have been able to mediate your communication with your father that that has made your relationship with him better? You've remarked many times in your blog post that you have a great relationship with your dad, which is fantastic, but do you think your relationship would be different had he seen you on those days when your mood was sour? I wonder about this for myself and my relationship with my own parents.
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