CHI 97 Electronic Publications: Doctoral Consortium

CHI 97 Electronic Publications: Doctoral Consortium

Enhancement of Communicative Presence in Desktop Video Conferencing Systems

Alessandro Barabesi
The Centre for People and Systems Interaction
South Bank University
103 Borough Rd., London, England
+ 44 (0) 171 815 7421 barabea@vax.sbu.ac.uk

ABSTRACT

Communicative presence (CP) has been defined as "... the capacity of a system to transfer mutual communicative signals of interlocutors." [2]. The main objective of my research is to define communicative presence more precisely and improve it in Desktop Video Conferencing Systems (DVCSs). An initial experiment has suggested that the modality of all available channels should be consistent.

Keywords

video conferencing, communicative presence, communication tools.

ABSTRACT
Keywords
INTRODUCTION
RESEARCH QUESTIONS
METHOD
PROJECT STATUS
IMPLICATIONS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
REFERENCES

INTRODUCTION

DVCSs are the next big advance in the world of communication. Although video conferencing is already a reality for thousands of people, existing DVCSs are unable to support a large variety of communication purposes. This is caused by a number of reasons, ranging from technological constraints to human factors. Several researchers have identified a number of issues for DVCSs (video and audio quality, privacy, interface design) [4], [7] but most of the basic design decisions are still driven primarily by technology [5]. The consequence is that once again users are being asked to adapt themselves to the technology.

Aspects such as video and audio quality have been, and are still being, investigated by a number of researchers and for this reason my research will not focus on these features. Instead, I will try to fill the gap in the literature relating to the integration of video and audio connections with additional tools and communication channels. To fulfill this aim the usefulness of a number of features will be tested in different sets of communication tasks. The project will focus primarily on communication tasks that are usually accomplished within an educational domain.

RESEARCH QUESTIONS

Two major issues will be investigated:

What are the characteristics of a communicative act that can be used to describe and measure the CP of a DVCS?

Is it possible to give a clearer definition of CP in terms of the number of communicative behaviors supported by the system?

How can the CP of a DVCS be related to the tools and features of a system and to the communication tasks that it should support?

To what extent is the CP of a DVCS a direct consequence of the features of the system? Does it depend largely on the communication task? Does a certain tool or feature enhance the CP of a DVCS or does it decrease it in a particular communication task?

METHOD

A number of experiments, where users will be monitored while accomplishing communicative tasks using DVCSs, will be conducted. So far the experiments have been conducted in a laboratory but whenever possible they will take place in natural settings. This monitoring phase will be carried out by videotaping the interactions and obtaining users' feedback through questionnaires. The analysis of the videotapes and the questionnaires will lead to the definition of a number of features and tools that might enhance the CP of the system. The effectiveness of these characteristics will then be tested under different conditions. The study will be conducted using either available DVCSs or extending existing DVCSs in order to add required features.

PROJECT STATUS

A review of existing literature and a categorization of communication tasks is being carried out. In addition a list of features to be investigated has been compiled (Table 1).

Feature/Tool	Details
Text channel	Synchronous or asynchronous?
Remotely controlled camera	The capability of changing your point of view
Personal data sharing	A "virtual" business card that can be sent and received automatically. All the cards received could be stored in a database.
Private channels in multipoint interactions	Capability of private channels in multipoint connections
Document sharing	More people working on the same document.
Shared whiteboard	More people working on the same graphic context.
Usage statistics	Who, when and how long was connected?

Table 1

These features have been identified using the results of introductory work carried out on three different levels:

Analyzing the results of experiments (the text channel and the whiteboard) conducted at the Centre for People and Systems Interaction [6].
Discussing the issue with researchers working in related areas during seminars and conferences.
Investigating the use of computer mediated communication tools in working environments visiting companies where such media are used regularly (virtual card, private channels).

Experiments have been conducted which give some indications for the direction of future work. One experiment is concerned with the usefulness of a text channel alongside the video and audio channels for an information sharing task. The need for a textual record has already been demonstrated for informal communication [6]. In this experiment all the subjects who successfully completed the task either used the text channel or made a written note, confirming this need. At the same time the use of a synchronous and an asynchronous text channel was compared in order to determine which mode is more effective. The experimental hypothesis is that users of synchronous communication media, such as a DVCS, expect every available channel to be synchronous. This has been confirmed by the results of the experiment where more than 53% of the subjects assumed that the text channel was synchronous. It is also clear from the data collected that the use of a synchronous channel leads to shorter completion time [1].

At the same time the use of a DVCS is being investigated in three different contexts:

Information sharing.
Laboratory simulations with volunteers are being conducted. Every volunteer (subject) is asked to communicate with one or two other people (collaborator/s) using a DVCS. The collaborator has been instructed to behave using a standard protocol in order to have a constant environment for every subject.

A working environment.
Each member of the Center for People and Systems Interaction has been provided with a DVCS and its use is being monitored.

Distance learning.
A distance M.Sc. course for students in a different European country, where e-mail and a DVCS will be used as the main communication channels. This study has just started and the convenience of using a DVCS is being investigated.

In all these environments the DVCS used is CU-SeeMe^TM which is designed by Cornell University for the use on IP networks [3]. A license for the source code has been obtained allowing required features which are not present to be added. Other systems will be used during the project, but CU-SeeMe^TM has been chosen for the following reasons:

Macintosh and Windows interoperability.
Source code is available.
Multipoint connections are supported.
Interoperability with Network Video; an X Window System DVCS.
Available free of charge.

IMPLICATIONS

The outcome of this research will be an increased understanding of what features of DVCSs are most appropriate to different communicative acts. This will enhance the usability of DVCSs by determining which additional communication channels are required, and how they should be presented to the user.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to thank all the members of the Centre for People and Systems Interaction for their help and support.

REFERENCES

1. Barabesi, A. A Textual Memory in Videoconferencing Systems. Submitted to the CHI' 97 conference.

2. Bocker, M. and Muhlbach, L. Communicative Presence in Videocommunications. Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 37th Annual Meeting, 1993.

3. Dorcey, T. CU-SeeMe Desktop Video Conferencing Software. Connexions, Vol. 9, No.3 (1995).

4. Fish, R. S. et al. Evaluating Video as a Technology for Informal Communication. Proceedings of the Conference on Computer Human Interaction (CHI) '92, 37-48.

5. Fussel, S.R. and Benimoff, I. Social and Cognitive Process in Interpersonal Communication: Implications for Advanced Telecommunications Technologies. Human Factors, 37, 2 (1995), 228-250.

6. Ramsay, J., Barabesi, A. and Preece, J. Informal Communication is about sharing objects and media. Interacting with Computers, 8, 3 (1996).

7. Tang, J. C. and Isaacs, E. Why do Users like Video? Studies of multimedia-supported collaboration. Computer Supported Cooperative Work, 1, (1993) 163-196.

CHI 97 Electronic Publications: Doctoral Consortium