Negotiating presence-in-absence: contact, content and context
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Contents |
Authors
Steve Howard, Jesper Kjeldskov, Mikael B. Skov, Kasper Garnæs, Olga Grünberger
Overview
Expanding on work done in the Mediating Intimacy work the authors dig deeper into a discussion of presence-in-absence, breaking it down into three terms:
- Contact
- Content
- Context
See table in the article for a nice expansion of these elements.
Presence-in-absence is our "subjective sense of social others whilst we are separated from them by time or space." This can be directly mediated such as an indicator that someone is moving or present in front of a sensor, or it can be less direct such as the feeling of presence felt when writing someone a letter.
Previous work in this area is listed, noting that some existing work "aims to support contact, sometimes provocatively at the expense of content." They also note that touch remains a "relatively unexplored yet emotionally vital aspect of much intimate communication."
The authors developed a computer program called The Cube to attempt a combination of presence-in-absence techniques: contact and content. The prototype was evaluated in a situated setting over 6 weeks time. The results showed that the contact ideas worked well, but that the content portion was ultimately overwhelming.
Reflection
I wonder how well it would have worked it if was not a screen-based device. In their definition of context they give an example of public/private, of the device being a closed communication channel. Other projects have also mentions this idea of a singular or specific device for communication between two people. Does having it run on a computer amongst so many other generic programs diminish this? Perhaps not, the program is still meant for two.
The author's own reflections on the results of their product evaluation are useful to note:
- The participants did not use the cube at times of tension.
- They used it for phatic communication but not for more content oriented tasks (communication breakdowns, etc.)
- The required personal effort to develop a coded content language was excessive.
I don't think it's impossible to combine the three approaches to presence-in-absence but I would agree with the authors that it's certainly challenging. Additionally, The Cube shows that frustration with one type (content) can lead to diminished use of another (contact).
General comments about earlier fieldwork are also noted in the paper:
- Intimate couples are willing to expend effort in maintaining presence-in-absence, and such expenditure is actually a feature of the exchange.
- Effective solutions have the following qualities:
- Information light: does not try to duplicate content that the partners already share, but leverages off that shared understanding.
- Narrow-band: does not try to maximize the communication bandwidth between the partners, but relies on their joint ability to flesh out narrow-band messages into rich and meaningful exchanges.
