The video conference we had on Tuesday with Jerry, the Olsens and Eric was a great example of presence awareness. Presence awareness is important in video conferencing because video conferencing adds a level of “richness” to the medium that is not available with texting, email or other forms of CMC (except for voice, which surprisingly had the same effect in the Bos, Gergle, Olson and Wright experiment as video). It allowed each “user” to see what the other is doing as well as observe the other’s environment. It was almost like talking to the other person FtF so we could gather a lot more cues if need be.
Video conferencing worked well in terms of presence awareness by “forcing” all parties to pay attention. For the most part, you could not focus on other tasks without the person on the “side” seeing you. For example, I did not feel comfortable eating during the session because not only could Jerry, Eric and the Olsens see me, but everyone else in the class could as well. Video conferencing seems to be a tool that would work well in establishing trust through presence awareness because you have a visual at all times. In the Bos, Gergle, Olson and Wright study, results showed that groups that had some visual of the other “party” tended to establish trust more quickly and consistently.
Video conferencing isn’t perfect, though. In trying to establish presence awareness all the time, we ran into a problem with privacy. This occurred when we started a video conference with the Olsens, even though they weren’t there. Even if you can change this setting, I feel like I would be very uncomfortable with this setting as a default. If I wasn’t there or if I was busy, I would prefer to have presence awareness to either be low or non-existent. There is also the problem of orientation, which we experience with our camera angle with the Olsens. It must have looked weird to the Olsen’s because they commented on how we weren’t looking at them. Lastly, if the connection isn’t solid, or if the cameras aren’t working, then it is very hard to see the other person clearly, which makes video conferencing less efficient and useful.
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I think it's interesting how you mention that you felt uncomfortable eating not only because of te other conferencing parties, but also because the image of the class was projected on the big screen as well. It seems like the video conferencing setup brought up a heightened degree of self-awareness because we could see ourselves as well as the people we were communicating with. In situations like this I almost think it makes you pay less attention to other people because you're looking at yourself and how you appear a lot more.
ReplyDeleteAll good points. I agree, it's interesting that you mention that you were uncomfortable eating in class because our class could see you as well. Does this imply a heightened sense of awareness over a regular class session? Would this be the same if you were to sit in front facing the class?
ReplyDeleteI wonder if your self awareness was heightened because you could see yourself? Maybe I don't speak for everyone, but I wouldn't care any more if I saw you eating via the display than in person. An interesting point point that was brought up was the lack of self presentation on other displays. For example, they mentioned that volume settings might make your lunch much louder than intended.