Distance, ambiguity and appropriation: Structures affording impression management in a collocated organization

• Published in: Computers in human behavior 2012-05, Vol.28 (3), p.1028-1035
• Main Authors: Birnholtz, Jeremy, Dixon, Graham, Hancock, Jeffrey
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adaptive control systems; Adaptive structuration; Adaptive structures; Ambiguity; Appropriations; Biological and medical sciences; CMC; Communication; Cooperation; Distance; Flexibility; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Home Workplaces; Human behavior; Impression Management; Language; Language Usage; Mass Media Effects; Occupational psychology; Organization and management. Professional relation; Organizations; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Teams; Telecommunications; Transparency; Virtual organization
• ISSN: 0747-5632; 1873-7692
• DOI: 10.1016/j.chb.2012.01.005

► Language was used to affect others’ interpretations of available information. ► Collocated participants enacted structures that reflected effects of distance. ► Social structures limited acceptable tactics for getting information about others. Communication and collaboration technologies have recently given rise to unprecedented flexibility in work arrangements, including telecommuting and virtual teams with geographically distributed participants. Much research has consisted of comparing distant and collocated teams, arguing that distance constrains communication opportunities, but this effect can be countered somewhat with communication media. In an “always connected” world, however, traditional conceptualizations of distance may be less useful in that communication opportunities are virtually constant for both distant and collocated teams. Working from an adaptive structuration perspective, we argue for a more nuanced treatment of distance, looking at its more specific effects, such as regulating the probability of unexpected face-to-face encounters, and affecting individuals’ control over the release of information. We show that even in a collocated setting, members of the organization we studied enacted structures that reflected the effects of distance on their behavior, but also reflected social constraints that enabled control over information flow, and the use of language to explain their behavior and maintain positive impressions.