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1.3.
Concept of interactivity
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Interactivity is perceived as a characteristic of ICTs? that enables multidirectional communication (see McMillan?, 2002, p. 163). Thus, interactivity is attached to (communication) media enabling individuals to interact socially. Certainly, social interaction can also happen without any medium in between. However, the scope of political participation has tremendously changed since individuals and interest groups have started making use of (new and old) media for their political purposes. Importantly in this context, though, “interactivity is not just about ‘exchange’ of communication but also generation of content” (Richards, 2006, p. 533). In media and communication studies, there are three (partly overlapping) forms of interactivity that are important to be considered in discussions about (on and offline) political participation: The user-to-user, user-to-documents and user-to-system interaction (see McMillan, 2002, p. 166ff.):
- User-to-user interaction focuses on forms that individuals use to interact with each other.
- Research areas: Social interaction; Interpersonal interaction; Symbolic interaction etc.
- Applications: E-mail; Electronic bulleting boards, discussion for a, chats etc.
- User-to-documents interaction deals with ways that active audiences choose in order to interpret and use mass media messages. The audience interacts with the messengers and gets involved in the process of content creation.
- Research areas: Parasocial interactions in radio, television, film and the illusion of face-to-face relationships with moderators, performers etc.
- Applications: Early forms of teledemocracy; interactive television; news-on-demand systems etc.
- User-to-system interaction involves all forms of interaction between people and computers.
- Research areas: Explorations of Human-Technology Interfaces
- Applications: Web-based forms; any computer-based instruction etc.
References:
McMillan? (2002)
Richards, R. (2006). Users, interactivity and generation. New Media & Society, 8(4), 531-550.
ePart2011 - Deadline extended to 14 April 2011
