Kruger et al. Egocentrism Over E-Mail: Can We Communicate as Well as We Think? (PDF)
If comprehending human communication consisted merely of
translating sentences and syntax into thoughts and ideas, there
would be no room for misunderstanding. But it does not, and so
there is. People convey meaning not only with what they say, but
also with how they say it. Gesture, voice, expression, context—all
are important paralinguistic cues that can disambiguate ambiguous
messages (Archer & Akert, 1977; Argyle, 1970; DePaulo & Friedman,
1998). Indeed, it is not uncommon for paralinguistic information
to more than merely supplement linguistic information, but
to alter it completely. The sarcastic observation that “Blues
Brother, 2000—now that’s a sequel†may imply one thing in the
presence of paralinguistic cues but quite the opposite in the absence
of them.
The research presented here tested the implications of these
observations for the rapidly escalating technology of e-mail, a
communication medium largely lacking in paralinguistic information.
We predicted that because of this limitation subtle forms of
communication such as sarcasm and humor, would be difficult to
convey. But more than that, we predicted that e-mail communicators
would be largely unaware of this limitation. Because participants
knew what they intended to communicate, we expected them
to assume that their audience would as well.