Abstract. As the Internet and other forms of computer-mediated-communication increasingly become entwined in our daily lives, scholars from a variety of fields have begun to ask questions regarding the nature computer-mediated communication, its consequences, and how to best study it. The current paper suggests that, in addition to the fact that computers have become new tools for mediating messages, they have also spawned a radically new, and fundamentally different, hyperpersonal communication system. Moreover, the paper explains how extant theories of interpersonal or mass communication systems are unable to define or explain hyperpersonal phenomena. The paper reviews the nature of interpersonal and mass communication systems and then illustrates the characteristics of hyperpersonal communication that resist categorization into either of the extant systems. Rather than proposing some sort of bridging or merging of interpersonal and mass communication theory, the paper proposes that researchers begin to approach hyperpersonal communication as fundamentally different system all together, and engage in research aimed toward understanding its nature and its consequences.

“The medium is the message . . . the personal and social consequences of any medium—that is, of any extension of ourselves—result from the new scale that is introduced into our affairs by each extension of ourselves, or by any new technology.” (McLuhan, 1964, p. 23)

McLuhan’s (1964) assertion that new communication media introduce a “new scale” into our affairs, clearly applies to the current evolution of computer-mediated communication (CMC). Although not all forms of computer-mediated communication are fundamentally different kinds of communication, there are computer-mediated communication phenomena that do represent new extensions of ourselves, and, consequently, an entirely new communication system. In other words, a growing number of CMC phenomena resist or defy classification or understanding within traditional notions of “mass” or “interpersonal” communication systems. The current paper examines whether the distinctions between “mass media” and “interpersonal communication” are still relevant in the age of CMC, identifies areas of CMC that resist classification into either domain, describes the nature of this emerging communication system, and explores how we might go about studying it.
The first section of the current paper explains the fundamental distinction between mass and interpersonal communication systems. A second section argues that, although some CMC phenomena are examples of mass and interpersonal communication, there are phenomena that resist such classification. The final sections of the paper elaborate on the nature of a newly emerging hyperpersonal communication system (Walther, 1996). Finally, the paper proposes some questions that might constitute a basic research agenda for studying hyperpersonal communication.

Almost a decade before the Internet became a household term and a commonplace communication technology, communication scholars had begun asking questions about CMC, especially how it might be studied and who (i.e., mass or interpersonal researchers) should be studying it (for examples see DeFleur & Ball-Rokeach, 1989; Pingree, Wiemann, & Hawkins, 1988; Reuben, 1985). Since then, a growing literature has noted the difficulties of trying to classify or study CMC in light of the basic “mass-interpersonal” communication system distinction. For example, Lea and Spears (1995) describe CMC phenomena as “blurring the boundary between interpersonal and mass media” (p. 201). In one recent review of this dilemma, O’Sullivan and Hoffner (1998) assert that “new ways of communicating are emerging that do not fit the traditional definitions of either mass or interpersonal communication . . . [and] as a result, the old distinctions between the two areas of study are becoming outdated and increasingly blurred" (see also Lea & Spears, 1995; O’ Sullivan, 1999). Indeed, a number of scholars have suggested “blurring,” “merging,” or “bridging” the long-held distinction between mass or interpersonal communication in order to find some way to make sense of CMC (e.g., see Gumpert & Cathcart, 1986; Newhagen & Rafaeli, 1996; O’Sullivan, 1999; Pingree, Wiemann, & Hawkins, 1988; Rafaeli, 1988; Reardon & Rogers, 1988; Rubin & Rubin, 1985; Weimann, Hawkins, & Pingree, 1988). Yet, an important question remains as to whether the sorts of proposals described above are warranted given the clear distinctions between mass and interpersonal communication systems in our discipline. The following section briefly identifies the basic and incommensurate differences between interpersonal and mass communication systems.

The traditional distinction between “mass” and “interpersonal” communication systems invoke a fundamental division among research, teaching, and publishing efforts within the communication discipline: Communication scholars and students often are classified according to this basic division. Moreover, researchers of interpersonal or mass communication seldom borrow theories, research results, or even literatures from one another. There is some rationale behind this division: Interpersonal and mass communication are fundamentally different systems of communication, and consequently, there is a limit to which of our theories of either system can be bridged or merged.

The fundamental difference between mass and interpersonal communication systems has little to do with whether a message is mediated, or whether such mediation involves technology. Certainly, interpersonal communication can involve mediated messages, (i.e., not face-to-face) and, more importantly, interpersonal communication can be mediated by technologies (e.g., a telephone, a typewriter, or an answering machine). Thus, technological mediation is not a useful distinguishing feature between these two systems of communication. The following paragraphs will briefly elaborate on the basic differences between mass and interpersonal systems.

Mass Communication Systems

The most salient elements of a mass communication system (i.e., those that distinguish it from an interpersonal system) are that mass communication involves an organizational source that conveys messages to a large, relatively unknown, and relatively unresponsive audience. Littlejohn (1996), for example, identifies mass communication systems as involving “the process whereby media organizations produce and transmit messages to large publics and the process by which those messages are sought, used, understood, and influenced by audiences” (p. 324). Similarly, DeFleur and Ball-Rokeach explain that a mass communication system “is not interactive, because the flow of one-way communication does not permit audience members to provide, or mass communicators to receive . . . traditionally, this has been one of the major characteristics of mass communication” (1989, p. 341-342). Of course, there are slight variations that would still fall within the purview of a mass communication system (i.e., an individual source of mass communication, such as the President, conveying a message; audience members engaging in various forms of feedback to a media source with letters or telephone calls); yet, the important features here are the relatively anonymous relationship between the sender and receivers, the size of the receiver base compared to the sender, and the typically unidirectional flow of messages.

Interpersonal Communication Systems

Interpersonal communication systems, on the other hand involve a relatively smaller number of participants who exchange messages designed for, and directed toward, particular others, and that implicate a particular self. Interpersonal systems are rule-governed forms of interaction (e.g., turn-taking, conversational norms, facework). Indeed, Goffman (1959, 1967) characterized interpersonal behavior as an interaction “ritual” involving mutual consideration by both participants of each other, and a highly strategic presentation of self. In other words, interpersonal communication systems are defined by participants’ mutual involvement, or “some kind of cognitive and affective engrossment in it” (Goffman, 1963, p. 36). For example, participants must constantly attend to both verbal and non-verbal cues, in addition to the content of the messages. Thus, interpersonal systems are fundamentally different from mass systems because the former involve messages designed for some particular other, rather than for a relatively general and anonymous mass audience, and participants in such systems are engaged in rule-governed, highly involved, reciprocal message processes. Note, however, that none of the features of interpersonal communication systems necessarily exclude message mediation or technology.
 

Indeed, both interpersonal and mass communication systems may be mediated, but this is not their defining feature. The fact that we tend to think of technology and mediation as falling within the purview of “mass” communication is an artifact of disciplinary categorizations rather than the phenomena at hand. Moreover, this point becomes especially relevant when we begin to ask questions about CMC.

The fact that communication (mass or interpersonal) is now being mediated by computers is interesting, but it does not necessarily challenge extant systems of communication, or warrant any bridging, blurring, or merging of the two systems. To some extent, the computer is just a technology that mediates both mass and interpersonal communication systems. Many examples of CMC simply represent new forms of mass communication systems (i.e., reading an book or newspaper online, listening on a radio station online) and some represent new forms of mediated interpersonal communication (i.e., sending an electronic mail message to my mother). That these communication behaviors happen to involve computers is, alone, not particularly challenging to our current theories of mass and interpersonal communication.

However, there are a growing number of CMC phenomena that do resist such classification, and thus challenge extant models. The next section identifies some examples of those CMC phenomena.

An Anomaly or Emerging System?

Some CMC phenomena can not be explained, described, or accounted for with extant theories of mass or interpersonal communication systems. For example, consider the following example: A real-time interactive chat room on the Internet displays mass-media advertisements moving along the bottom of the screen while individual participants “chat” in the remaining space on the screen. The chat room example illustrates an entirely new and different communication system. Although there are elements of interpersonal and mass communication systems here, the phenomenon can not be explained or understood by “merging” or “bridging” theories associated with the two systems. For example, in the above example, media organizations are sending impersonal advertisements designed for broad audiences along the bottom of the screen; some individuals are engaged in reciprocal dyadic personal conversations; at one time multiple conversations are taking place; conversational participants are not constrained by time (i.e., participants may get up and walk away for a few minutes, or on a LISTSERV, for an entire day or even week); there are no constraints due to physical space or distance in this sort of communication; participants in the chat-room are, at the same time, both mass communication sources and audiences (i.e., there may be an audience of 10,000 other people in the chat room reading what one individual types to one particular receiver); some people sporadically participate, or sometimes never participate, but simply still observe the activity without being bound by the rules and norms that govern interpersonal interaction; additionally, and quite often, it is common that conversational participants have no idea (in a personal sense) of who they are conversing with. The above example is just one of a rapidly growing number of communicative phenomena that take place online, that all have the same sorts of characteristics described above. Some examples include LISTSERVS, Multi-User Dungeons (MUDs), Multi-Object-Oriented Domains (MOOs), USENET newsgroups, BBS systems, and Internet Relay Chat (IRC) systems (for detailed descriptions and discussions of these technologies and virtual environments, see Curtis, 1997; Parks & Roberts, 1998; Turkle, 1994; Wallace, 1999; Werry, 1996).

Rather than struggling to explain such phenomena within our traditional mass-interpersonal distinction, perhaps it would be more useful to consider them as anomalies that resist classification into our current frame of understanding. These communicative phenomena might be better understood as examples of what Kuhn (1970) described as “anomalies” that challenge normal science. Kuhn argues that if such anomalies cannot be accommodated or accounted for (i.e., they do not seem to represent interpersonal or mass communication systems), “they help to permit the emergence of a new and different analysis of science within which they are no longer a source of trouble” (p. 78). The examples above do challenge us to reconsider whether they can be accommodated or accounted for by “blurring,” “merging,” or “bridging” mass and interpersonal systems, or whether we are witnessing the emergence of a radically different communication system. I suggest the latter is the case. Walther (1996, 1997) describes this new communication system as hyperpersonal, and characterizes it as radically and fundamentally different than either mass or interpersonal communication. The next section explicates the features of hyperpersonal communication.

Walther (1996) initially described hyperpersonal communication as a new “phenomenon” or “perspective.” I would go further to argue that it actually represents an entirely new and radically different communication system, in addition to extant mass and interpersonal systems. Walther’s (1996) presentation of the features of hyperpersonal communication (i.e., the characteristics of the receivers, senders, message processes) support the argument that it is fundamentally different from either mass or interpersonal systems. Consequently, it can not be explained or understood by “merging” or “bridging” mass and interpersonal systems. A closer look at the basic elements of the hyperpersonal communication system illustrates this point.

Hyperpersonal Receivers

The nature of the “receiver” in hyperpersonal communication is fundamentally different from the characterization of the receiver in either interpersonal (e.g., a mutual involved co-participant) or mass (e.g., a relatively unknown and unresponsive element of a larger audience) systems. In chat-rooms and newsgroups, for example, individuals have much less information about other participants (i.e., highly restricted verbal and nonverbal cues) with which they might make attributions or form impressions of the other. For example, in a chat room, the only information one has available about a conversational partner is information the partner chooses to make available (e.g., a screen name that may or may not be a useful cue, personal information that he or she chooses to disclose that may either be true or intentionally deceiving). Thus, hyperpersonal receivers are forced to rely on broad assumptions in order to make interpretations about the other, and consequently, that they tend to inflate their perceptions of the other based on the restricted cues that are available (Walther, 1996).

To further illustrate the uniqueness of the hyperpersonal receiver, consider a person in a chat-room that never utters a word—this person is still able to “listen” to other people’s conversations, read mass-media advertisements, and, if he or she chooses, can instantly become a participant. Thus the individual is, at one time, both an audience member and a potential receiver of a personal message, and is always capable of becoming a mutual participant or source of mass communication messages). Moreover, in a chat-room where someone directs messages toward a particular individual receiver (i.e., a message one sends to one’s friend), it is important to note that the individual is not the only receiver (i.e., there may be an audience of 1,000 other people witnessing this particular personal dyadic interaction, who, at any time, could also become participants). The hyperpersonal receiver in the chat room is unique in that he or she is one of many in a broad audience, can be an anonymous and unresponsive participant, can instantly become the target of highly personalized messages by anyone in the chat room, and always has limited cues available about other participants in the system.

Clearly, this characterization of hyperpersonal message receivers resists classification as an element in either a mass or interpersonal communication system. The hyperpersonal receiver is fundamentally different from receivers in mass (i.e., an unknown and unresponsive message target) or interpersonal systems (i.e., a co-participant in a rule governed and mutually involved negotiation of selves). The hyperpersonal receiver is, perhaps, an example of what McLuhan (1964) meant when he wrote that new media facilitate fundamentally new extensions of ourselves.

Hyperpersonal Senders

Walther (1996) also describes the nature of the message sender, or source, as another defining feature of hyperpersonal communication systems. Walther (1996) explains that he chose the term “hyperpersonal” because it suggests that such communication is “optimal” in many ways, especially for the sender. The hyperpersonal sender is able to strategically develop and edit self-presentation, enabling a selective and optimized presentation of one’s self to others (see Burgoon & Walther, 1990; Feenberg, 1989; Turkle, 1994, 1996; Walther, 1996; Walther & Burgoon, 1992). Walther (1996) explains that hyperpersonal communication senders are “unfettered by unwanted cues or multiple conversational demands [and] may engage in personal and relational optimization” (p. 23). Thus, hyperpersonal senders have greater freedom to carefully plan their self-presentations and have an enhanced ability for self-censorship in their communication with others.

Hyperpersonal communication allows participants to selectively control the quantity, quality, and even the validity of personal information available to other participants (e.g., age, race, physical appearance, sex). As a consequence, there are only highly restricted cues available to the recipients, as mentioned earlier. For example, in a text-based chat-room, one can choose any sort of screen-name to identify one’s self. These screen-names are forms of self-presentation, and are also often the only information available to others about the sender, at least within initial interaction. As Feenberg (1989, p. 21) explains, “the ‘I’ who presents you with the ‘me-as-text’ is not exactly the same ‘I’ who appears in face-to-face encounters,” and I would also add that, in some cases the “me-as-text” may be nothing at all like the “I” in face to face encounters.

Another newly emerging environment that illustrates hyperpersonal self-presentation is the graphically-based MOO (such as the “Palace” chat program; for an extensive discussion see Suler, 1996). Graphical MOOs are similar to older text-based chat environments, with multiple “rooms” and “objects” that users may interact with or in, yet, in these newer graphically-based environments, the interaction is visually depicted on the screen (i.e., graphics or pictures, rather than textual descriptions). These environments include visual representations of locations or “rooms,” participants, and of objects created by participants within this virtual space. In this sort of hyperpersonal context, participants choose (or create and edit) an “avatar” (a graphic icon that appears on the screen, along with the screen name that serves as a visual representation of one’s self to others) (see Kolko, 1999; for some actual examples of avatars see Suler, 1999). Thus, these avatars provide others with additional nonverbal cues (i.e., visual portrayals of the other participants), but these visual cues are still are entirely constructed by the individual.

The term avatar commonly refers to “an embodiment” or as “temporary manifestation or aspect of a continuing entity” (American Heritage Dictionary, 1996). With regard to hyperpersonal communication, then, avatars are highly dynamic and carefully constructed visual representations, embodiments, or manifestations of a particular hyperpersonal participant that constitute a form of self-presentation. Although one might choose a photograph of one’s self to use as an avatar, one could just as easily use any image (a monster, a picture of a celebrity, a flag, a cartoon character, a child, an animal, etc.), and users often have an collection of different avatars at their disposal that they may implement and choose from, in order to purposefully influence recipients’ perceptions of the sender (i.e., one may change from a “happy” or “pleasant” avatar to a “sad” or “threatening” one).

In addition to the unique nature of hyperpersonal self-presentation, the hyperpersonal sender defies categorization as a mass or interpersonal phenomenon. For example, a hyperpersonal sender can, at the same time, be a “source” of mass communication (i.e., a personal web-page, participating in a conversation that has an audience of millions) and a mutually inovolved partner in interpersonal communication (i.e., design and exchange messages for a particular other). In other words, hyperpersonal message sources, or senders, are fundamentally different than message sources in either mass or interpersonal systems.

Hyperpersonal Message Processes

Another defining feature of hyperpersonal communication systems is the process by which messages are exchanged, particularly with regard to the nature of both time and space in hyperpersonal communication. Walther (1996) employs McGrath and colleagues’ (e.g., McGrath, 1990, 1991; McGrath & Kelly, 1986) work on time and “entrainment” in communication systems to describe the nature of the hyperpersonal message processes. According to Walther (1996), normal interpersonal communication systems are entrained; that is, they are highly synchronized, coordinated, require adherence to turn-taking rules, and demand participants’ allocation of both time and attention. Yet, Walther (1996) argues that hyperpersonal communication is fundamentally different in the sense that it is often quite disentrained, or asynchronous.

Hyperpersonal message-exchange processes in an online chat-room clearly demonstrate the relative lack of entrainment: They do not require simultaneous attention by participants. Although a person may be present “on screen,” he or she may be physically away from the computer; a person who physically leaves the computer may return and pick up on the conversation again by simply scrolling back and reading what was said in his or her absence without any participants being aware that he or she had left and returned. Hyperpersonal communication processes among group members or between participants in a developing personal relationship are free from the constraints of normal interpersonal processes: They have a choice about when and how to participate and are not bound by the normal rules of the “interaction ritual.” Thus, with regard to time, hyperpersonal communication systems are disentrained: They have more relaxed time and attention constraints; there is less demand on participants’ personal resources (e.g., individual group members can engage in group discourse when it is convenient). Moreover, no hyperpersonal communication is constrained by physical distance or space (as long as participants are able to access their computer systems).

In sum, hyperpersonal communication represents a new and fundamentally different communication system by virtue of the unique characteristics of message receivers, message senders, and the message exchange processes. To classify hyperpersonal communicative phenomena as simply unusual examples of interpersonal or mass communication systems dilutes, and indeed, denies, the most interesting and important dimensions of the hyperpersonal system.

To summarize the argument advanced thus far, hyperpersonal communication systems have emerged as a product of computer-mediation communication. Currently, many forms of CMC still fall within the classification of interpersonal or mass communication systems. Yet, the emerging phenomena that seem to resist classification represent an entirely new system of communication, which might have significant implications for both the study of communication and our everyday lives. Thus, hyperpersonal communication systems present new challenges and areas of research for communication scholars.

Much of the concern regarding the potential benefits and dangers of social behaviors on the Internet centers on hyperpersonal phenomena. For example, Kraut and his colleagues’ (1998) study of online activity and psychosocial well-being described an apparent “Internet Paradox,” whereby a supposedly social technology (i.e., online communication) apparently reduced psychological well-being and social involvement. Along similar lines, a growing number of researchers have begun to ask why involvement with a social and communicative technology might instead facilitate negative psychosocial outcomes such as depression, isolation, and loneliness (e.g., Sanders, Field, Diego, & Kaplan, 2000; Young & Rogers, 1998). On the other hand, scholars have been surprised and intrigued by the fact that intimate or personal relationships (e.g., Baker, 2000; Lea & Spears, 1995) and social-support networks (e.g., Greer, 2000; Wright, 2000) are able to successfully develop on the Internet, without face-to-face interaction.

One reason why all of this might seem so confusing, and perhaps even paradoxical, is that we have not yet developed a well defined theoretical or methodological paradigm for understanding hyperpersonal communication systems. Indeed, if we use our traditional interpersonal or mass communication models to try to explain phenomena as as chat-rooms, LISTSERVs, MOOs, or USENET Newsgroups, we are bound be perplexed – these are not normal communication systems, and consequently, may not necessarily have the same sorts of outcomes that we might expect based on traditional theories.

For example, if we approach such phenomena as examples of mass communication, then we are forced to ignore the high degree of interactivity, the ability of all participants to, at once, be both senders and receivers of mass communication messages. Moreover, we would eventually need to address challenging questions, such as: (a) How would cultivation theory (e.g., Gerbner, Gross, Morgan, & Signorielli, 1994) account for audience members participating in and co-creating the mass messages that drive cultivation? (b) When does an individual stop becoming an audience member and start becoming a mass communication source? (c) Can an individual be both a mass communication source and audience member at the same time? The important point here is to consider whether such questions can be answered, and if so, to what extent can mass communication theories successfully answer them?

Similarly, if we approach hyperpersonal phenomena as examples of interpersonal communication, then we must account for the anonymity, the asynchrony, the optimization of self-presentation, and the lack of information about the other participants. Moreover, interpersonal theorists would be faced with the following sorts of challenging questions: (a) How would cognitive theories of message production, such as action-assembly theory (e.g., Greene, 1995) explain situations where participants can plan and edit their messages on the computer before sending them? (b) How would constructivist theorists (e.g., Delia, O’Keefe, & O’Keefe, 1982) explain communication where neither participant has enough information about the other to be highly “person-centered,” (c) How would uncertainty reduction theory (e.g., Berger, 1987) explain situations where uncertainty about others is constant, where cues are minimal, and where all available information is suspect? d) Why would participation in computer-mediated chat with other people increase feelings of isolation? Again, the point here is to consider whether such questions should, or could, be answered by interpersonal communication theory.

The argument advanced in the current paper suggests that hyperpersonal communication is a radically different and entirely new communicative phenomenon, and one that we have only begun to note. In other words, hyperpersonal communication is an example of what McLuhan (1964) described as the a radically new extension of humanity that accompanies new communication media. Moreover, he argued that such extensions are not simply cosmetic, instead he noted that “what we are considering here, however, are the psychic and social consequences of the designs or patterns as they amplify or accelerate existing processes . . . for the ‘message’ of any medium or technology is the change of scale or pace or pattern that it introduces into human affairs” (McLuhan, 1964, p. 25). Perhaps, then, the question we should be asking is not about the nature and consequences of CMC, but rather, what is the nature of hyperpersonal communication and how is it changing the nature of human affairs?

Once we begin to consider hyperpersonal communication as an alternative communication system, we might be able to begin resolving Kraut et al.’s (1998) “Internet Paradox.” Watzlawick, Bavelas, and Jackson (1967) suggest that paradoxes may be resolved by stepping outside of the frame in which they exist. In this case, stepping outside of the frame of the interpersonal- and mass-communication dichotomy entirely, rather than trying to blur, merge, or bridge it, affords us with a glimpse of what appears to be an entirely new communication system.

Recognizing or identifying a new phenomenon represents the very beginning of what will certainly be a long journey toward understanding it. Some aspects of interpersonal theory (e.g., Goffman’s theory of self-presentation, 1959) and mass communication theory (e.g., uses and gratifications theory; Rubin & Rubin, 1985) can certainly inform our early understanding of hyperpersonal phenomena. Additionally, we need to begin asking questions such as: How do relationships develop in a hyperpersonal context? What is the nature of those relationships? Why might hyperpersonal behavior promote or threaten psychosocial well-being? To what extent does hyperpersonal communication facilitate or inhibit group decision making or organizational productivity? Extant research and theories of mass and interpersonal communication may guide initial efforts to address these questions, but it is also important to keep them from constraining our ability to fully see and understand hyperpersonal systems. Acknowledging the presence of such a system, and developing theories and research to better understand it, might help resolve the apparent paradox, but more importantly, research endeavors in this area will also help ensure that communication scholarship keeps up with the evaluation of human communication.

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