The writers of this book seem to think that every single one of their findings would defy the logic of any normal person, even though many things they have found seem perfectly reasonable. Particularly their insistence that humans reactions to media are surprising. I think we have known for a long time that people become psychologically engaged with media even though they consciously know that it is not real. I mean that is what theater is, is it not? People have been going to plays for millennia, knowing full well that what they are watching is in fact not real, but they become engaged in it nonetheless. I would argue that this is just an early form of media, a way of presenting information like stories. People have known for a long time then that media can deeply affect how people feel. The idea that the media equation is a new idea is somewhat surprising to me considering this.
What is new is understanding how people deal with interactive media. However it seems that in many cases, the author's studies elicited responses from people by anthropomorphising the study devices (using voice or human-like text). What might be more interesting is how people react to non-anthropomorphic interactive media. Do people react in a social way to computers if computers act nothing like a person? How is it surprising that people react to computers like people if computers are acting like people?
I feel it has been well known for a while that a conscious knowledge that something is not real does not in any way lessen the feeling of reality if media is presented correctly.
Howdy George,
ReplyDeleteI largely agree with your precedent, but I feel chapters 6-8 were less "OMG they totally buy it!" and more, "Hey, this could be a design principal worth looking into."
Generally, I feel like the book is fairly academic in nature and less "Hey, we did the research and here's what we came up with" (which I would prefer). Hopefully the later chapters will focus on principals (and perhaps even implementation ideas?).
I also wonder how the results of these experiments performed today would differ, given the more modern impression of computers and widespread adaption.
Hell, I probably should have saved that for a blog post. :)
j.c
Agreed. I'm sure it would've been better to have just read the papers based on the book.
ReplyDeleteHaving the papers would have been a nice addition, have to agree with you there.
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