Revisiting Group Polarization and Computer-Mediated Communication;Social Presence View vs. Anonymity View

집단극화와 컴퓨터 매개 커뮤니케이션에 대한 재고;사회적 존재감 관점 vs. 익명성 관점

The objective of this paper is to contemplate a possible alternative to the examination, published as a research article in Information Systems Research(Sia et al. 2002), of the effects of communication cues, anonymity, and social presence on group polarization in computer-mediated communication(CMC) settings. Sia et al. introduced the concept of social presence to explain the effects of communication cues and anonymity on group polarization, but we believe that anonymity alone provides a clearer explanation of the results. This paper classifies levels of anonymity to provide possible explanations for Sia et a1. (2002)'s results and presents the results of a new experiment to confirm our explanation. We also want to emphasize that our comments are not intended to disparage the usefulness of social presence as a mediating variable to explain group polarization; our intention instead IS to encourage further investigation to better understand group polarization in CMC settings.