Copyright Warning & Restrictions The copyright law of the United States (Title 17, United States Code) governs the making of photocopies or other reproductions of copyrighted material. Under certain conditions specified in the law, libraries and archives are authorized to furnish a photocopy or other reproduction. One of these specified conditions is that the photocopy or reproduction is not to be “used for any purpose other than private study, scholarship, or research.” If a, user makes a request for, or later uses, a photocopy or reproduction for purposes in excess of “fair use” that user may be liable for copyright infringement, This institution reserves the right to refuse to accept a copying order if, in its judgment, fulfillment of the order would involve violation of copyright law. Please Note: The author retains the copyright while the New Jersey Institute of Technology reserves the right to distribute this thesis or dissertation Printing note: If you do not wish to print this page, then select “Pages from: first page # to: last page #” on the print dialog screen The Van Houten library has removed some of the personal information and all signatures from the approval page and biographical sketches of theses and dissertations in order to protect the identity of NJIT graduates and faculty. ABSTRACT AN EXAMINATION OF COORDINATION AMONG FRIENDS AND STRANGERS FROM A COORDINATION THEORY PERSPECTIVE by Christopher D. Wamble Within mobile social coordination, there is a field of study known as outeraction, the communicative processes used by people to manage future interactions. It is an important area of research because it identifies how informal interactions support complex collaboration between individuals and groups. Outeraction is primarily conducted through the interpersonal communication channels of texting, instant messaging (IM), face-to-face, and mobile phone or Skype conversations. Currently this area of research in mobile outeraction support systems is weak. It lacks a firm foundation in system building, has very few if any conceptual frameworks, and little empirical knowledge of user requirements and attitudes is known. As smartphones are becoming more common these days allowing people to conduct their outeraction on the go, the need for mobile outeraction support systems will also be on the rise. This thesis seeks to investigate how people use technology to help them coordinate social activities with friends as well as activities with strangers. From semi- structured interviews it was found that individuals use a primary and secondary means of communication when coordinating with friends. These means of communication will also shift as the agreed upon time of the activity approaches. Other findings describe how group decisions can frequently change, how individuals immerse themselves in activities with strangers, and how individuals decide on a place to do an activity. These and other findings are further described in this thesis. AN EXAMINATION OF COORDINATION AMONG FRIENDS AND STRANGERS FROM A COORDINATION THEORY PERSPECTIVE by Christopher D. Wamble A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of New Jersey Institute of Technology in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Information Systems Department of Information Systems January 2012 APPROVAL PAGE AN EXAMINATION OF COORDINATION AMONG FRIENDS AND STRANGERS FROM A COORDINATION THEORY PERSPECTIVE Christopher D. Wamble Dr. Quentin Jones, Thesis Committee Chair Date Associate Professor of Information Systems, NJIT Dr. Michael Bieber, Committee Member Date Professor and Associate Chair, Academic Programs Director of Information Systems, NJIT Dr. George Widmeyer, Committee Member Date Associate Professor of Information Systems, NJIT IOGAICA SKEC Athr: Chrtphr . Wbl r: Mtr f Sn t: nr 202 Undrrdt nd Grdt Edtn: • Mtr f Sn n Infrtn St, r Inttt f hnl, r, , 202 • Mtr f Sn n Cptr Sn, r Inttt f hnl, r, , 200 • hlr f Sn n Cptr Sn, Unvrt f Mrlnd, Cll r, M, 200 Mjr: Infrtn St v to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and to the Almighty God of Heaven and Earth v ACKNOWLEDGMENT I would like to offer my gratitude to my Thesis Advisor, Dr. Quentin Jones, for his guidance and support in finding a topic that I could call my own, and granting me the opportunity to further my interest in the area of Human-Computer Interaction and Social Mobile Computing. Special thanks are given to Dr. Michael Bieber and Dr. George Widmeyer for participating on my Thesis Committee. I wish to thank Ketan Patel for being an excellent colleague and friend in the SmartCampus research laboratory as we both discussed and shared creative ideas on creating mockups for applications being developed. I would also like to thank Steven Ricken, Sukeshini Grandhi, Sara Motahari, Richard Schuler, Julia Mayer, Nathaniel Laws, Noah Melamed, John Lin, and Mohammed Ismail for being excellent colleagues who I had the pleasure of working with and getting feedback from in regards to my Thesis. I would also like to acknowledge support from the National Science Foundation (NSF). This material is based on work supported by the United States National Science Foundation under Grant Number DST 0534520. Many thanks to Dr. Ronald Kane, Ms. Clarisa Gonzalez, and the Graduate Office staff for their patience and guidance in the completion of my Thesis. Particular thanks go out to Dr. George Olsen and Ms. Kathleen Price for their patience and guidance as my counselors for the often confusing task of helping me organize my credits such that I could graduate with a Master degree in both Computer Science and Information Systems. Special thanks also to my family and church family for their emotional support. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter Page 1 INTRODUCTION ...…............................………………..………………………… 1 2 THEORIES OF COORDINATION ..……………………………………………… 3 2.1 Coordination Theory Perspective ……………………………………………... 3 2.2 Language/Action Perspective ...………………………………....…………….. 5 3 IDENTIFY EXISTING OUTERACTION SUPPORT SYSTEMS………………... 6 3.1 Mobile Multi-Channel Communication Systems ……………………………... 6 3.2 Calendaring Systems ………………………………………………………….. 8 3.3 Event Management Systems …………………………………………………... 9 3.4 Agent-Based Meeting Scheduling Systems …………………………………… 10 4 RESEARCH QUESTIONS ………………………………………………………... 12 5 METHOD ………………………………………………………………………….. 15 5.1 The Hermeneutic Circle ……………………………………………………….. 15 5.2 Principle of Context ……………………………………………………………. 16 5.3 Principle of Dialogical Reasoning ……………………………………………... 18 5.4 Interaction Between the Researcher and the Subject …………………………... 20 6 RESULTS ………………………………………………………………………….. 23 6.1 Means of Communication ……………………………………………………… 23 6.1.1 Various Forms of Primary Means of Communication ..………………… 24 6.1.2 Communication Shifts based upon an Activity Coordination Timeline 30 and Circumstances ………………………………….…………………... vii TABLE OF CONTENTS (Continued) Chapter Page 6.2 Factors that Affect Group Participation ……….……………………………….. 33 6.3 Challenges in Coordination Processes ………………………..………………... 35 6.4 Activity Immersion with Strangers ……………………………………….……. 36 6.5 Planning Activity Events with Friends …...…………………………...……….. 38 6.6 Activity Events without Friends ……………………………………………….. 41 7 INTERPRETATION ………………………………………………………………. 43 8 RECOMMENDATIONS FOR DESIGNING MOBILE OUTERACTION 49 SYSTEMS …………………………………………………………………………. 9 LIMITATIONS ………………………...…………………………………………... 57 10 DISCUSSION ...............................………………………………………………… 59 APPENDIX A SEMI-STRUCTURED INTERVIEW DOCUMENTS ………………. 65 A.1 Instructions to the Semi-structured Interview Artifact ...…………………........ 65 A.2 Table of Activities and Category Listings as Part of the Semi-structured 66 Interview Artifact ...………………………………………………………………… A.3 Subject Form to Input their Activities and Category Labels with Checkmarks 67 to Indicate who they do their Activities with. Part of the Semi-structured Interview Artifact …………...……………………………………………………… A.4 Consent Form ...………………………………………………………………... 68 A.5 Interview Guide: Pre-interview Steps and Introduction Speech ………………. 70 A.6 Interview Guide: Biographical Questions and Interview Steps ……………….. 71 A.7 Interview Guide: Conjectures and Leading Questions ...……………………… 71 viii TABLE OF CONTENTS (Continued) Chapter Page APPENDIX B SEMI-STRUCTURED INTERVIEWS TRANSCRIBED …………… 75 B.1 Interview with Subject 1 ………………………………………………………. 75 B.2 Interview with Subject 2 ………………………………………………………. 90 B.3 Interview with Subject 3 ………………………………………………………. 105 B.4 Interview with Subject 4 ………………………………………………………. 121 B.5 Interview with Subject 5 ………………………………………………………. 143 B.6 Interview with Subject 6 ………………………………………………………. 156 B.7 Interview with Subject 7 ………………………………………………………. 160 B.8 Interview with Subject 8 ………………………………………………………. 165 B.9 Interview with Subject 9 ………………………………………………………. 175 B.10 Interview with Subject 10 ……………………………………………………. 184 B.11 Interview with Subject 11 ……………………………………………………. 192 B.12 Interview with Subject 12 ……………………………………………………. 203 B.13 Interview with Subject 13 ……………………………………………………. 217 B.14 Interview with Subject 14 ……………………………………………………. 228 B.15 Interview with Subject 15 ……………………………………………………. 242 B.16 Interview with Subject 16 ……………………………………………………. 251 B.17 Interview with Subject 17 ……………………………………………………. 262 B.18 Interview with Subject 18 ……………………………………………………. 277 B.19 Interview with Subject 19 ……………………………………………………. 285 ix TABLE OF CONTENTS (Continued) Chapter Page B.20 Interview with Subject 20 ……………………………………………………. 296 B.4 Interview 4 ……………….…………………………………………………….