Exploring bilingual, task-oriented, document-centric chat

ABSTRACT

We study a new type of workplace communication made possible by the recent advent of real-time bilingual chat tools. Because of the imperfect accuracy of real-time text translation services, this type of communication imposes extreme difficulties on user collaboration and task performance. The problems are compounded by the narrow task awareness and communication bandwidth afforded by standard chat. We report an exploratory study of users attempting to arrive at a joint understanding of a document using a bilingual chat tool. We observed many problems concerning the establishment of common ground and task coordination. We derive design implications for an improved chat tool that better supports the sharing of mental state and task coordination in this communication environment.

REFERENCES

• 1: Mark Handel , James D. Herbsleb, What is chat doing in the workplace?, Proceedings of the 2002 ACM conference on Computer supported cooperative work, November 16-20, 2002, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA [doi>10.1145/587078.587080]
• 2: Ellen Isaacs , Alan Walendowski , Steve Whittaker , Diane J. Schiano , Candace Kamm, The character, functions, and styles of instant messaging in the workplace, Proceedings of the 2002 ACM conference on Computer supported cooperative work, November 16-20, 2002, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA [doi>10.1145/587078.587081]
• 3: Monk, A. (2003). Common Ground in Electronically Mediated Communication. In Carroll, J.M. (Ed.), HCI Models, Theories and Frameworks. San Francisco, Morgan Kaufmann: 265--289.
• 4: Steve Whittaker, Things to talk about when talking about things, Human-Computer Interaction, v.18 n.1, p.149-170, June 2003 [doi>10.1207/S15327051HCI1812_6]
• 5: Kevin Singley , Jennifer Lai , Lei Kuang , Jung-Mu Tang, Bluereach: harnessing synchronous chat to support expertise sharing in a large organization, CHI '08 extended abstracts on Human factors in computing systems, April 05-10, 2008, Florence, Italy [doi>10.1145/1358628.1358630]

INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.5 INFORMATION INTERFACES AND PRESENTATION (I.7)
      H.5.3 Group and Organization Interfaces
          Subjects: Computer-supported cooperative work

General Terms:
Design, Human Factors

Keywords:
instant messaging, workplace collaboration