Introduction
Human communication has evolved from prehistoric times with paramount changes in communication technologies where oral or spoken tradition was its earliest form. The oral tradition was followed by the development of written forms of communication which has evolved from pictograms made in stones, through writings appearing on paper, papyrus, wax and clay media, to transfer of information through controlled waves of electromagnetic radiation.
Ancient forms of communication required information to be passed through face-to-face interaction between individuals and were the distance of communication was limited since they often communicated orally. However, with the development of computer and the internet connection that was evidenced in the 20th century, challenges presented by oral communication and other ancient forms of communication were eradicated.
These developments led to the appearance of social Medias such as Facebook and Skype, which brought many effects to the interpersonal and cross-cultural conversation. This paper will focus on the impacts of computer-mediated communication; it will argue that computer-mediated conversation has positive effects on intercultural communication while it has negative impacts on interpersonal discourse.
Effects of Computer-Mediated Conversation on Interpersonal Discourse
Computer-mediated communication usually affect interpersonal communication negatively because it makes people less engaged in interpersonal discourse and threatens to alter the ancient meaning of the concept interpersonal communication.
Verbal Conversaton
In the past people formed a relationship as well as communicated through physical interactions and personal presence such as, face-to-face communication which has been altered by use of media technology to deliver (Walther, 2012, pp. 397-414). Therefore, recently many people are opting to pass information to others using social networks which are faster and disregarding the traditional forms of communication which have accounted for the significant impacts of computer-mediated communication on traditional forms of communication.
Moreover, before the development of social networks, verbal communication was detailed and involved a full process of communication, but communication through social media is short and lack details of communication since it highlights the main points of discussion only (Hunt, Atkin, & Krishnan, 2012, p. 189). For instance, when illustrating about a venue of an individual ceremony via Facebook, only the key landmarks are given without further elaboration which limits verbal communication as well as interpersonal communication because interested people may have limited knowledge about indicated markers.
Therefore, contrary to traditional forms of expression, computer-mediated communication does not incorporate the complete conversation process, such as sender of the text, the idea being communicated, encoding information, the channel used to pass information, receiver of the message, decoding of the text and feedback. Besides, use of computer-mediated communication often lack significant parts that improve the understanding and mastering of skills related to interpersonal communication; thus, it limits use of verbal cues such as facial expression, body language, and tonal variation.
In accordance to Madianou, & Miller, (2013), increased use of computer-mediated communication such as Twitter, Facebook, Skype, and others forms of social networks, is likely to make people less experienced in their interpersonal skills. Moreover, it will disable people from the efficient handling of their daily life interpersonal communication.
Perception of Interpersonal conversation
Computer-mediated technology often affects people’s use and understanding of interpersonal communication, but it usually challenges and threatens the extent to which they perceive interpersonal communication. Therefore, they may believe that computer-mediated communication is an entirely new version of interpersonal communication due to its widespread and significance in the lives of a given group of people.
In accordance to Woods (2013), transactional is a significant characteristic of interpersonal communication which means that interaction among distinct parties is continuous and simultaneous. For instance, individuals usually nod to show that they agree to the sender’s point of view while they may look up to indicate that they do not comprehend the issue articulated by the other party.
Computer-mediated communication often lacks the transactional feature of interpersonal communication, for instance, when a post is made on Facebook concerning another person, an immediate response or reply is barely not expected. Therefore, there is no communication until the recipient access the message and he or she may read or ignore the message.
Consequently, it is important to mention that interpersonal communication occurs when two or more parties are well organized to convey messages because the interpretation of all actions and inactions are immediate, as postulated by the first principle of interpersonal communication.
Nevertheless, computer-mediated technologies usually subject people to false perception and interpretation which are a bigger problem to the interpersonal communication. Failure to respond to a message posted on social media may be interpreted as a sign of ignoring and resisting to communicate while the other party was not in a position to reach the message.
For instance, a person may post a message on the Facebook page of an individual, but the other part fail to see the information because of lacking access to a smartphone or a computer. Besides, the wrong perception about the next party of communication may be created because a person may forget that they are not technically present at a similar time and location in the time of conversation via a smartphone or a computer medium. Thus, computer-mediated conversation lacks relevant characteristics that qualify it as a current form of interpersonal discourse and relating both interpersonal communication and computer-mediated conversation may misshape and entirely change the meaning of interpersonal discourse.
Non-verbal conversation
According to Walther (2012, pp. 399), computer-mediated communication does not embrace non-verbal cues; therefore, it usually lack a significant element of communication between individuals that enhance mutual understanding of the receiver of the message regarding the message. Consequently, interpersonal communication largely depends on non-verbal communication to interpret the emotions and moods of the sender of the message, thus, lack of non-verbal cues such as facial movements, gestures, eye contact, and others is a bigger minus to the computer mediated communication.
This is because they are extremely essential as they may exceed the significance of the word spoken and their content. For example, when a manager of a company is communicating to an employee through Twitter, it may fail to show the signs of respect from an employee which are largely shown via non-verbal cues such as facial expression, body movements as well as gestures.
Additionally, lack of non-verbal cues indicates that individual’s real and spontaneous emotions are not shown; hence, the genuine and true understanding of a person regarding other people usually reduces. Therefore, reduced understanding may at long run force individuals to turn away from engaging in traditional interpersonal communication.
Contrary, social media is used by many people to express their feelings and personal life; hence, improving interpersonal communication via such actions because it presents a platform through which they share their emotions out of will initiatives while giving chances to others to care for them. For instance, a person in Dubai is enabled by social media to communicate with a family member in America promoting their interpersonal communication. Moreover, by means of a series of inventions, social media has presented some of the internet applications that allow face-to-face conversation with a person who is far away.
For instance, applications such as Skype usually allow video call; hence, it is said to enhance interpersonal discourse. However, computer-mediated communication often assists two or more individuals to relate and support each other, but it does not create an actual presence of other people. Therefore, computer mediated communication often increases interpersonal communication, but as argued before, it cannot be substituted for interpersonal communication because in any conversation physical presence is paramount.
Effects of Computer-Mediated Expression on Intercultural Discourse
Intercultural communication is positively affected by computer-mediated communication because it prevents more people with opportunities to engage in cultural interaction and obtain an improved understanding of distinct cultures all over the world. Moreover, it makes people forget their cultural differences as well as issues and embrace opportunities provided by social Medias relating to the promotion of individual business to another culture.
Social media has provided an online dating forum; thus, many couples from distinct cultures have known each other through such platforms. Besides, social media have stimulated cross-cultural marriage regardless of differences in customs of couples. It is significant to note that, the more interactions between different cultures are steered by social media, the more individuals are given the opportunity to learn and understand as well as appreciate other cultures. Social media is applied by all people around the world which make it a paramount tool to enhance intercultural communication as well as cross-cultural interactions (Nguyen, & Fussell, 2013, p. 19-32).
Consequently, computer-mediated is viewed to assist people to overlook unjustified cultural issues thereby creating a conducive environment for individuals of distinct cultures since it is perceived to help people to acquire a better understanding of other people’s cultures (Spottswood, Walther, Holmstrom, & Ellison, 2013). It is believed that people often condemn other people’s culture because they do not share same cultural values as well as ideas which are necessitated by the lack of enough knowledge about other cultures.
For instance, many people have an unjustified and ill feeling about some religion of other cultures, but when such people engage in computer-mediated communication their view of other cultures changes because of health interaction and learning that their unjustified beliefs about other cultures were misguided and inaccurate.
Computer-mediated communication usually incorporates use of different social media which can be applied to connect people universally; which makes it easier for people from different cultures to interact with each other for various reasons. For instance, a business person from the United States with an aim of setting up a business empire in the United Arab Emirates is obliged to learn the culture of the Arabs which he can only learn from Arabian people through social media before he travels to this region (Esser, & Hanitzsch, 2013). Furthermore, international students learn about different cultures of the world through following such people to gain required understanding about those cultures which is primarily necessitated by using various social media.
Additionally, computer-mediated communication is used to enhance e-commerce and globalization of different companies; therefore, it is used to promote business to another culture different from home culture. For example, a large number of firms and individuals have embraced the use of Twitter accounts, which are created to promote the sales of different commodities through the gaining of many followers from distinct cultures and parts of the world. Therefore, individuals are forced to learn about other cultures to know how to communicate with the online consumer segmentation since different cultures call for different communication skills because of differences in cultures thus improving intercultural communication.
On the other hand, computer-mediated conversation which is facilitated by use of various social networks has some negative impacts on the intercultural discourse. It may promote loss of individual’s cultural identity because of the cross-cultural nature of computer-mediated communication, which is necessitated by cultural mix steered by use of social media. According to Lusti, & Koester (2010), cultural identity is the feeling of belonging to a given cultural or an ethnic group which incorporate acceptance of heritage, language and traditions of the culture of a given society.
Moreover, research has indicated that people who engage in computer-mediated communication usually use a language that is different from their culture’s language just to conform to the prescribed culture of the social media. For instance, many people often change their dressing codes to obtain photos to post as profile picture, thus, the modified dressing code may undermine individual traditions prescribed by the culture.
Besides, Africans have changed their dressing codes to embrace the western cultures learned through social media; eventually, it has led to a change of African culture for the Western culture which leads to forego some elements of cultural identity. It is noted that excessive exposure to distinct cultures through social media and access to the internet, in general, has mostly affected the younger generation because they usually engage in more computer mediated communication (AbuSeileek, & Qatawneh, 2013).
Hence, many young people have foregone their cultural values and traditions for other cultures that they have learned through social media which has led to the loss of cultural identity among the younger generation. Finally, an increase of computer-mediated communication has forced cultures to be unable to contain their traditions as well as the cultural values which have been neglected to assimilate other cultures learned using social networks.
Conclusion
To sum up, the discussion has analyzed the effects of computer-mediated communication on interpersonal communication and intercultural communication. Use of social media has negative effects on interpersonal communication while it has positive impacts on intercultural communication. The results are facilitated by the virtual of computer-mediated communication threatening to alter the meaning of interpersonal communication as well as assisting more people to acquire a precise understanding of other cultures. Enough support is required to guide young generation on health use of computer-mediated communication as there are indications that it will continue to grow; which means that it will continue to affect both interpersonal and intercultural communication.
References
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