10th May/mis Mai 2023: Caroline Tagg

Mobile conversations in context: how patterns of engagement shape mobile messaging interactions

Wednesday 10th May/mis Mai 2023(week 12 of term): Caroline Tagg, The Open University

1pm in Room 3.62 of the John Percival Building on Colum Drive and via Zoom

One key feature of digital interaction is that it unfolds between people embedded in distinct physical contexts who are often simultaneously engaged in other offline and online encounters and activities. This talk focuses on mobile messaging apps such as WhatsApp and SMS, exploring how ‘mobile conversations’ are shaped by people’s shifting focus of attention across physical contexts and digital spaces. I draw on data from a recent project, Mobile conversations in context (or MoCo), which combines mobile messaging data with interviews and time-use diaries to explore how mobile conversations shape, and are shaped by, the offline activities and encounters in which interlocutors are engaged.

In the talk, I report on the identification and categorisation of four distinct ‘engagement styles’ which include task attending (where messages are sent as part of a broader goal-oriented activity), world attending (where a sender’s attention is on sharing certain aspects of their immediate physical or online world) and device attending (when an individual more purposefully immerses themselves in the digital world, taking time to ‘check their messages’ and reply to multiple messaging threads). I show how these engagement styles encourage distinct patterns of interaction, drawing on a combination of quantitative and interactional analysis. Overall, this new perspective shows how mobile conversations cannot be fully understood without consideration of the wider (physical and digital) contexts in which they take place and the ways people juggle relationship concerns with competing demands on their attention.

This seminar will be hybrid although Caroline will be present and we encourage in-person attendance in Room 3.62 of the John Percival Building. To join online click here.