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Communication Technology and New Media Commons

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Full-Text Articles in Communication Technology and New Media

Smoothing Out Smart Tech’S Rough Edges: Imperfect Automation And The Human Fix, Christian Katzenbach, Christian Pentzold, Paloma Viejo Otero Apr 2024

Smoothing Out Smart Tech’S Rough Edges: Imperfect Automation And The Human Fix, Christian Katzenbach, Christian Pentzold, Paloma Viejo Otero

Human-Machine Communication

In this article, we take issue with an idea of autonomous and efficient automation that is upheld through the paradoxical conjunction of a flawed vision of the technological fix and the under-acknowledged human work required to fill in the gaps between machines and users. Our argument is based on two case studies that sit at opposite tails of automation processes: the front end of self-service checkouts and the back end of content moderation. This juxtaposition allows us to surface three themes on how the hype around automation is enabled by human interventions: the ad-hoc sociality in situated practices of automation, …


Valenced Media Effects On Robot-Related Attitudes And Mental Models: A Parasocial Contact Approach, Jan-Philipp Stein, Jaime Banks Jul 2023

Valenced Media Effects On Robot-Related Attitudes And Mental Models: A Parasocial Contact Approach, Jan-Philipp Stein, Jaime Banks

Human-Machine Communication

Despite rapid advancements in robotics, most people still only come into contact with robots via mass media. Consequently, robot-related attitudes are often discussed as the result of habituation and cultivation processes, as they unfold during repeated media exposure. In this paper, we introduce parasocial contact theory to this line of research— arguing that it better acknowledges interpersonal and intergroup dynamics found in modern human–robot interactions. Moreover, conceptualizing mediated robot encounters as parasocial contact integrates both qualitative and quantitative aspects into one comprehensive approach. A multi-method experiment offers empirical support for our arguments: Although many elements of participants’ beliefs and attitudes …


Gender Ambiguity In Voice-Based Assistants: Gender Perception And Influences Of Context, Sandra Mooshammer, Katrin Etzrodt Dec 2022

Gender Ambiguity In Voice-Based Assistants: Gender Perception And Influences Of Context, Sandra Mooshammer, Katrin Etzrodt

Human-Machine Communication

Recently emerging synthetic acoustically gender-ambiguous voices could contribute to dissolving the still prevailing genderism. Yet, are we indeed perceiving these voices as “unassignable”? Or are we trying to assimilate them into existing genders? To investigate the perceived ambiguity, we conducted an explorative 3 (male, female, ambiguous voice) × 3 (male, female, ambiguous topic) experiment. We found that, although participants perceived the gender-ambiguous voice as ambiguous, they used a profoundly wide range of the scale, indicating tendencies toward a gender. We uncovered a mild dissolve of gender roles. Neither the listener’s gender nor the personal gender stereotypes impacted the perception. However, …


Out With The Humans, In With The Machines?: Investigating The Behavioral And Psychological Effects Of Replacing Human Advisors With A Machine, Andrew Prahl, Lyn Van Swol Apr 2021

Out With The Humans, In With The Machines?: Investigating The Behavioral And Psychological Effects Of Replacing Human Advisors With A Machine, Andrew Prahl, Lyn Van Swol

Human-Machine Communication

This study investigates the effects of task demonstrability and replacing a human advisor with a machine advisor. Outcome measures include advice-utilization (trust), the perception of advisors, and decision-maker emotions. Participants were randomly assigned to make a series of forecasts dealing with either humanitarian planning (low demonstrability) or management (high demonstrability). Participants received advice from either a machine advisor only, a human advisor only, or their advisor was replaced with the other type of advisor (human/machine) midway through the experiment. Decision-makers rated human advisors as more expert, more useful, and more similar. Perception effects were strongest when a human advisor was …


Toward An Agent-Agnostic Transmission Model: Synthesizing Anthropocentric And Technocentric Paradigms In Communication, Jaime Banks, Maartje M. A. De Graaf Feb 2020

Toward An Agent-Agnostic Transmission Model: Synthesizing Anthropocentric And Technocentric Paradigms In Communication, Jaime Banks, Maartje M. A. De Graaf

Human-Machine Communication

Technological and social evolutions have prompted operational, phenomenological, and ontological shifts in communication processes. These shifts, we argue, trigger the need to regard human and machine roles in communication processes in a more egalitarian fashion. Integrating anthropocentric and technocentric perspectives on communication, we propose an agent-agnostic framework for human-machine communication. This framework rejects exclusive assignment of communicative roles (sender, message, channel, receiver) to traditionally held agents and instead focuses on evaluating agents according to their functions as a means for considering what roles are held in communication processes. As a first step in advancing this agent-agnostic perspective, this theoretical paper …


Opening Space For Theoretical, Methodological, And Empirical Issues In Human-Machine Communication, Leopoldina Fortunati, Autumn P. Edwards Feb 2020

Opening Space For Theoretical, Methodological, And Empirical Issues In Human-Machine Communication, Leopoldina Fortunati, Autumn P. Edwards

Human-Machine Communication

This journal offers a space dedicated to theorizing, researching empirically, and discussing human-machine communication (HMC), a new form of communication with digital interlocutors that has recently developed and has imposed the urgency to be analyzed and understood. There is the need to properly address the model of this specific communication as well as the roles, objectives, functions, experiences, practices, and identities of the interlocutors involved, both human and digital. Reading these seven articles is an advantageous intellectual exercise for entering this new field of research on Human-Machine Communication. The present volume contributes substantially both at theoretical and empirical levels by …