Book Reading #48: Media Equation

Part 1
Title: Machines and Mindlessness: Social Responses to Computers
Authors: Clifford Nass, Youngme Moon
Publisher: Journal of Social Issues, Volume 56, Issue 1


Part 2
Title: Computers Are Social Actors
Authors: Clifford Nass, Jonathan Steuer, Ellen R. Tauber
Publisher: CHI '95: Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems


Part 3
Title: Can Computer Personalities Be Human Personalities?
Authors: Clifford Nass, Youngme Moon, B.J. Fogg, Byron Reeves, Chris Dryer
Publisher: CHI '95: Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems


Part 1
Summary
This paper talked about the social rules that get applied to computers and the expectations of the computers. Users tend to apply social categories to computers. For example, in one experiment, the testers had their users be tutored, tested and evaluated by a computer with a male/female voice. They found that people found the male voice to be friendlier. People also acted polite towards their computers. 


The researchers also showed how people value information given by a computer when it was identified as a "specialist". Television and news shows were given as the supporting example. The researchers explored anthromorphism, the belief that everything is human.


Part 2
Summary
Part 2 describes why people act the way they do with computers. It is easy and commonplace to generate consistent responses. There were many experiments conducted to test whether a person will be polite to a computer, whether a person will apply the notion of 'self' to the computer, how a person distinguishes between 'self' and 'other', how a person distinguishes between the two and whether or not gender stereotypes are also applied. They find that the computer-human relationship is a social one.


Part 3
Summary
Part 3 talks about the personality of a computer. Computers can either be dominant or submissive. They tested this to see how a user would react to each personality trait. A dominant computer used strong language and displayed high confidence. A submissive computer asked a lot of questions and made suggestions. The researchers found that when a person's personality trait matched that of the computer, a satisfying interaction occurred.


Discussion
I had never really thought that a computer could have a personality but this does make sense. It's amazing that dominance or submission has such a large impact in the way people feel about their computers. I should take note of stuff like this when I'm talking. There is a rather large difference in "Please do this" and "Would you like to do this?"