Transcript jennifer-kim-birthdaywishesx

USE OF FB BIRTHDAY WISHES
TO FOSTER
RECIPROCAL RELATIONSHIPS
Jennifer Kim
FB birthday wishes
• How we can make the best use of FB b-day wishes
in a way to foster reciprocal communications?
Three types of communications on FB
• Directed communication with individual friends
• Personal one-on-one exchanges
• Wall posts, synchronous chat, inline comments, like button, and
photo tagging
• Passive consumption of social news feed
• Broadcasting via status message
[Burke 2011]
Importance of reciprocal communication
• Among these three types of communications,
only reciprocal communications affect to
bridging social capitals on Facebook
[Burke 2011]
WHY?
• Only reciprocal communication implies allowing
acquaintances to call on each other for help.
• Content is likely to be rich to strengthens
relationships.
• Reciprocal communication is a signal of the
importance of relationship.
[Burke 2011]
Reciprocal communication
• People have reciprocal communication with a much
smaller set (5-7) of people among a moderate
number of friends (120). [Marlow 2009]
FB Birthday wishes
• One of the most important days people get a lot of
messages from friends.
 A potential for expanding reciprocal communications
that impact bridging social capital.
Problems of FB Birthday wishes
1. overload messages
[Jones 2004]
2. superficial and monolithic
content of happy birthday
messages
seem to prevent effective
reciprocal communications.
Gift-giving Theory
• Theoretical analysis of the gift-giving process [Mauss
1954]
• Giving, receiving, and reciprocating
• Feelings of obligation to reciprocate
• “A person who gives a gift is escalated to a position of
superiority until the recipient reciprocates the action of
giving, thus reestablishing equal status.”
• Balanced reciprocity [Sahlins 1972]
• Obligation to return a gift in a way to balance "benefits”
between parties
Gift-giving Theory applied in
Computer Mediated Communication
• SMS as a gift [Taylor 2002]
• Facebook poking [Golder 2007]
• “virtual intimate object” (a desktop-based poking tool
for romantic couples) [Kaye 2005]
 What kinds of FB birthday messages would foster
obligation to reciprocate communications?
What causes reciprocal communication?
• Factors that increase likelihood of reply [Burke 2009]
• Self-disclosing introductions
• Personal connection to the topic of discussion
• Making requests
• Requests and questions are calls to action
What kinds of FB b-day wishes would foster
obligation to reciprocate communications?
• H1. Disclosing personal story in birthday day wishes will
foster reciprocal communication.
• H2. Questions in birthday day wishes will foster reciprocal
communication.
• H3. Facebook real gift-giving feature for birthday day
wishes will foster reciprocal communication.
Study plan
• Quantitative method
• Facebook application
• Get all wall post and private messages people got from friends
• Categorize the messages based on the intensity of reciprocity
Like button, number of comments, another wall post to friend’s wall etc.
• Qualitative method
• Follow-up interview
• Ask people if there is any off-line reciprocal communication
(phone call, sms, face to face meeting) happened because of
FB birthday wishes.
Design Implication
• Based on this findings suggest how we can make the
best use of FB birthday wishes in a way to foster
building reciprocal relationships.
Thank you