Abstract
Communication on mobile devices plays an important role in people’s use of technology for leisure, but to date this communication has largely been one-to-one. Mobile internet connectivity can support a variety of group-based messaging and media sharing scenarios. Switching to group-based messaging should enhance the social and leisure aspects of the communication, but in what ways and to what extent? An experimental system for text and photo messaging on mobile devices was tested in a research deployment to four groups of 6–8 participants who used both a group-based and one-to-one version of the system. Results highlight a significant increase in message sending, in mobile device “fun”, and in the social qualities of mobile communication when messaging group-wide, along with a few minor costs. Qualitative feedback provides further explanation of the social benefits.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Aoki, P.M., M. Romaine, M.H. Szymanski, J.D. Thorton, D. Wilson and A. Woodruff (2003): The Mad Hatter’s Cocktail Party: A Social Mobile Audio Space Supporting Multiple Simultaneous Conversations. Proc. CHI 2003. ACM Press, pp. 425–432
Brawley, L.R., A.V. Carron and W.N. Widmeyere (1988): Exploring the Relationship Between Cohesion and Group Resistance to Disruption. Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology, vol. 10, pp. 199–213
Counts, S. and E. Fellheimer (2004): Supporting Social Presence Through Lightweight Photo Sharing On and Off The Desktop. Proc. CHI 2004. ACM Press, pp. 599–606
Darley J.M., Latane B. (1968) Bystander Intervention in emergencies: Diffusion of responsibility Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 8: 377–383
Davis, M, N. Van House, J. Towle, S. King, A. Ahern, C. Burgener, D. Perkel, M. Finn, V. Viswanathan and M. Rothberg (2005): MMM2: Mobile Media Metadata for Media Sharing. Late Breaking Results CHI 2005. ACM Press, pp. 1335–1338
Dourish, P. and V. Bellotti (1992): Awareness and Coordination in Shared Workspaces. Proc. CSCW 1992. ACM Press, pp. 107–114
Ito, M. (2005): Mobile Phones, Japanese Youth, and the Replacement of Social Contact. In R. Ling and P. Pedersen (eds), Mobile Communication s: Re-negotiation of the Social Sphere. New York: Springer-Verlag
Frohlich, D., A. Kuchinsky, C. Pering, A. Don and S. Ariss (2002): Requirements for Photoware. Proc. CSCW 2002. ACM Press
Grinter, R.E. and M.A. Eldridge (2001): Y do tngrs luv 2 txt msg? Proc. 7th European CSCW Conference. Dordrecht, Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers, pp. 219–238
Grinter, R.E. and M.A. Eldridge (2003): Wan2tlk?: Everyday Text Messaging. Proc. CHI 2003. ACM Press, pp. 441–448
Kindberg, T., M. Spasojevic, R. Fleck and A. Sellen (2005): I Saw This and Thought of You: Some Social Uses of Camera Phones. Late Breaking Results CHI 2005. ACM Press, pp. 1545–1548
Kurvinen, E. (2003): Only When Miss Universe Snatches Me: Teasing in MMS Messaging. DPPI 03. ACM Press, pp. 98–102
Ling R., Yttri B. (2002) Nobody Sits at Home and Waits for the Telephone to Ring: Micro and Hyper-Coordination through the Use of the Mobile Telephone. In: J. Katz, M. Aakhus (Eds.), Perpetual Contact. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 139–169
Makela, A., V. Giller, M. Tscheligi and R. Sefelin (2000): Joking, Storytelling, Artsharing, Expressing Affection: A Field Trial of How Children and Their Social Network Communicate with Digital Images in Leisure Time. Proc. CHI 2000, CHI Letters 2(1), The Netherlands: The Hague, pp. 548–555
Markopoulos, P., N. Romero, J. van Baren, W. Ijsselsteijn, B. Ruyter and B. Farshchian (2004): Keeping in Touch with the Family: Home and Away with the ASTRA Awareness System. Late Breaking Results CHI 2004. ACM Press, pp. 1351–1354
Masui, T. and S. Takabayashi (2003): Instant Group Communication with QuickML. Proc. of Group 2003. ACM Press, pp. 268–273
O'Reily, C.A. and D.F. Caldwell (1985): The impact of normative social influence and cohesiveness on task perceptions and attitudes: A social-information processing approach. Journal of Occupational Psychology, vol. 59, 193–206.
Rantanen, M., A. Oulasvirta, J. Blom, S. Tiitta, and M. Mantyla (2004): InfoRadar: Group and Public Messaging in the Mobile Context. In Proc. NordiCHI 2004, ACM Press, pp. 131–140
Sherif M. (1966). In Common Predicament: Social Psychology of Intergroup Conflict and Cooperation. Boston: Houghton Mifflin
Taylor, A. and R. Harper (2002): Age-Old Practices in the “New World”: A Study of Gift-Giving Between Teenage Mobile Phone Users. Proc. CHI 02. ACM Press, pp. 439–446
Turner J.C. (1980). Fairness or Discrimination in Intergroup Behavior? A Reply to Braithwaite, Doyle, and Lightbrown. European Journal of Social Psychology, 10:131–147
UPOC: http://www.upoc.com
UPOC Networks. http://www.upocnetworks.com/about-us.html
Vaananen, K. (2002): The Future of Mobile Communities: Evolution Towards Continuous Presence. SIGCHI Bulletin, May/June, p. 9
Van House, N. and M. Davis et al. (2005): The Uses of Personal Networked Digital Imaging: An Empirical Study of Camerphone Photos and Sharing. Ext. Abstracts CHI 2005. ACM Press
Vetere, F., M. Gibbs, J. Kjeldskov, S. Howard, F. Mueller, S. Pedell, K. Mecoles and M. Bunyan (2005): Mediating Intimacy: Designing Technologies to Support Strong-Tie Relationships. Proc. CHI 2005. ACM Press, pp. 471–480
Acknowledgments
Special thanks to Shelly Farnham and Jordan Schwartz for their work on the Slam project. Also thanks to Henky Alimin for his development work on Slam.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Counts, S. Group-Based Mobile Messaging in Support of the Social Side of Leisure. Comput Supported Coop Work 16, 75–97 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10606-007-9040-9
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10606-007-9040-9