Asignment 11

Early this semester my group of friends from home decided that we wanted to surprise our friend Courtney, whose twenty first birthday was the first week in November, with a visit. Courtney goes to Fairfield University in Connecticut and the rest of us are scattered around from up here in Ithaca to down in DC. To make sure we were welcome I contacted one of her housemates (through facebook, of course). From September to November we exchanged many messages, setting up logistics, sharing excitement, and some small talk.

Looking back at the messages in my facebook, the first thing I notice is how friendly she was. She messaged me back almost immediately, saying she has heard about us and knew Courtney would be so excited for a surprise visit. The messages seem to closely follow the hyperpersonal model. Initially we had a positive exchange, and from there we seemed to become more and more friendly. In the second message, she noticed our similar majors and we exchanged more messages about that. We also brainstormed ideas for exactly how to surprise her, what to bring, party ideas, etc. The messages were always upbeat and included a lot of explanation points, making me feel friendlier towards her, in line with the hyperpersonal theory. The little bit of her personality I observed through our messages and the parts of her profile that made us seem similar were amplified due to the CMC communication. By the time we were ready to head to Fairfield, I was also looking forward to meeting her.

According to Ramirez and Wang, the hyperpersonal theory predicts that after an extended period of time communicating in CMC, the participants would likely “fill in” missing details about the other, likely contradicting already formed impressions. However, due to the relatively short term nature of our contact, I believe this effect was minor in our meeting face to face. There were small things I thought would be different about her, for example, I thought she would be more outgoing from our message exchange than she was in reality. Ramirez and Wang state that modality switching gives access to new social information, filling in the blanks from CMC, enhancing partner perceptions and furthering relationship growth. This applies to my experience, I had a glimpse of who she was and since our contact in CMC was relatively short, meeting in FTF solidified my impression. They also state that modality switching diminishes communication process and social outcomes when FTF is different than what was perceived in FTF. I only noticed this slightly and it didn’t have an affect on our meeting. By the time we left, I felt like I was saying goodbye to another friend!