convergence communication essay

The convergence model of communication

Contributor, interviewer, journal title, journal issn, volume title, number/issue, starting page, ending page, alternative title, description, geographic location, time period, table of contents, rights holder, local contexts, collections.

Communication Accommodation Theory – Explained for Students

Communication accommodation theory (CAT) is a communication theory that provides a framework for explaining and predicting how individuals change the ways they communicate to create, maintain, or decrease social distance (Dragojevic et al., 2015).

Communication accommodation theory, as the name suggests, explores how we accommodate our communication (Giles & Ogay, 2007, p. 293).

As a theoretical approach, it has several strengths. These include:

The explanatory power of communication accommodation theory,
The fact that its four main assumptions are fairly plausible, and
Its many practical applications.

Communication accommodation theory also has several critics. These critics often point out the reductionistic nature of the theory, its incompleteness, its fixation on rational communication, and so on.

In this article, we will first define what communication accommodation theory is and then discuss its strengths and criticisms.

Definition of Communication Accommodation Theory

Communication accommodation theory is a theory of communication that attempts to explain and predict how people adjust (accommodate) their style of verbal and non-verbal communication in relation to one another (Gudykunst, 2005, pp. 121-148).

The theory was first developed by British-American social psychologist Howard Giles.

Here are two ways it explains communication:

Divergence: Attuning one’s speech style to that of others helps the communicator gain approval from the receiver(s) and improves the effectiveness of communication for both parties (Infante et al., 2009).
Convergence : Conversely, deliberately adopting a contrasting communication style can create distance between the senders and the receivers.

The main focus of communication accommodation theorists is the “patterns of convergence and divergence of communication behaviors, particularly as they relate to people’s goals for social approval, communication efficiency, and identity” (Gallois & Giles, 2015). So what do “convergence” and “divergence” mean?

1. Convergence

Convergence refers to how individuals attune their style of communication to reduce differences between them and the people they’re communicating with (Giles et al., 1991, pp. 1-68).

For example, I might try to attune my speech patterns and use the words my friends often use when I speak with them.

(Not to be confused with sensory convergence in psychology ).

2. Divergence

Divergence is the opposite of convergence. It refers to how individuals change their style of communication to heighten the differences between themselves and the people they’re communicating with (Giles et al., 1991, pp. 1-68).

As we will see later, this division of communication style shifts into two categories that can be criticized as reductionist.

Four Principles of Communication Accommodation Theory

According to Howard Giles and Tania Ogay (2007, p. 294), communication accommodation theory has four basic principles:

The importance of the socio-historical context,
Negotiation of social category memberships,
Expectations regarding levels of accommodation, and
The use of specific communication strategies to signal attitudes.

Below is a definition of each of these principles in turn.

1. First Principle

The first principle states that not only are the features of the situation important for the accommodation of communication styles but that the socio-historical context in which communication takes place is also important.

Giles and Ogay (2007, p. 294) give the following example:

“an isolated encounter between any particular police officer and citizen could be marred by alleged and past hostile relations between other members of these two groups in the neighborhood…”

2. Second Principle

The second principle states that social category memberships can be negotiated during the communication process.

For example, when being asked about some aspects of American entertainment and media,

“[Howard Giles’] shift from a British into a more American dialect is meant to be far more telling than the overt answer provided. Being conveyed here is the feeling that he is no longer a recent immigrant to the United States, but now a fully fledged American citizen who has embraced many American ideals” (Giles & Ogay, 2007, p. 294).

3. Third Principle

The third principle states that message senders and receivers have expectations about the optimal levels of accommodation in a given interaction (Giles & Ogay, 2007, p. 294).

Stereotypes and social or situational norms usually dictate what is considered optimal.

4. Fourth Principle

The fourth and last principle states that people use specific communication strategies (for example, convergence or divergence) to signal their attitudes.

Social interactions thereby function as platforms for expressing the need for social inclusiveness on the one hand and the need for differentiation on the other.

According to Giles and Ogay, this was the principle that spawned the original empirical studies about communication accommodation theory.

Summary of the Four Principles

The principles above seem plausible, and they are backed by a large amount of empirical research. As a theoretical approach, communication accommodation theory attracts a lot of scholarly attention (Zhang & Giles, 2018).

From 1973 to 2010, Soliz and Giles (2014) examined 149 articles with quantitative data that used this theoretical framework. This alone is proof that CAT is a theoretically useful approach to understanding human communication, but there are many other strengths that this theory has.

Strengths of Communication Accommodation Theory

Besides being well-supported by empirical evidence , communication accommodation has several other important strengths in terms of both theory and practice.

In terms of explanatory power , CAT is useful for understanding the motivations behind people’s actions and how people change their verbal and non-verbal communication patterns.
In terms of predictive power , CAT can predict how people will change their communication styles based on what they want out of social interaction. It can also predict how people will try to lower or heighten the differences between them and those they’re communicating with.
In terms of practice , CAT has been successfully applied in many disciplines, including medical and clinical fields, media studies, jobs and employment, and language learning (Giles et al., 1991, pp. 1-68).

Another important strength of CAT is that its assumptions are fairly plausible. According to Richard West and Lynn H. Turner (2013), CAT has four main assumptions:

There are speech and behavioral similarities and dissimilarities in all conversations.
The way we perceive the speech and behaviors of another determines our evaluation of the conversation.
Language and behaviors can communicate social status and group belonging between people in a conversation.
Norms guide the accommodation process, which varies in its degree of appropriateness.

These assumptions and the explanations given by CAT are hardly counter-intuitive, so the usual criticisms focus on other aspects of the theory.

Criticisms of Communication Accommodation Theory

Several criticisms can be leveled against CAT. The most obvious of these is the idea that conversations are far more complex than the simple binary of convergence/divergence would suggest.

How would CAT explain an instance where, for example, the communicators use both strategies simultaneously? In essence, this line of criticism accuses CAT of both reductionism and theoretical incompleteness.

Another criticism focuses on the idea that CAT assumes that all communication is rational.

The original theory views every message sender and receiver as a rational agent who calculates the costs and benefits of using convergence and divergence strategies in a conversation. In reality, however, not all conversations are like this.

These criticisms don’t give us sufficient reason to reject CAT in total. Rather, they may be essential for further developing the theory.

Communication accommodation theory is concerned with how we try to accommodate or distance our verbal or non-verbal communication styles when we interact with others. The theory concerns two components of communication: “(1) the behavioral changes that people make to attune their communication to their partner, (2) the extent to which people perceive their partner as appropriately attuning to them” (Shehan, 2016). Despite the criticisms leveled against it, communication accommodation theory still provides a promising and useful framework for explaining and predicting some aspects of communication.

Next: Learn about more communication models here

Dragojevic, M., Gasiorek, J., & Giles, H. (2015). Communication Accommodation Theory. In The International Encyclopedia of Interpersonal Communication (pp. 1–21). John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118540190.wbeic006

Gallois, C., & Giles, H. (2015). Communication Accommodation Theory. In The International Encyclopedia of Language and Social Interaction (pp. 1–18). John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118611463.wbielsi066

Giles, H. & Ogay, T. (2007). Communication Accommodation Theory. In Whaley, B. B. & Samter, W. (Eds.). Explaining communication: Contemporary theories and exemplars (pp. 293-310). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Giles, P. H., Giles, H., Coupland, J., Coupland, N., Oatley, K., l’homme, É. de la M. des sciences de, & Press, C. U. (1991). Contexts of Accommodation: Developments in Applied Sociolinguistics . Cambridge University Press.

Gudykunst, W. B. (2005). Theorizing About Intercultural Communication . SAGE.

Infante, D. A., Avtgis, T. A., & Rancer, A. S. (2009). Contemporary Communication Theory . Kendall Hunt Publishing Company.

Shehan, C. L. (2016). The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Family Studies, 4 Volume Set . John Wiley & Sons.

Soliz, G., & Giles, H. (2014). Relational and identity processes in communication: A contextual and meta-analytical review of Communication Accommodation Theory. In E. Cohen (Ed.), Communication yearbook 38 (pp. 106–143). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.

West, R., & Turner, L. (2013). Introducing Communication Theory: Analysis and Application (2013 Ed.). Books by Marquette University Faculty . https://epublications.marquette.edu/marq_fac-book/215 Zhang, Y. B., & Giles, H. (2018). Communication accommodation theory. In Y. Y. Kim (Ed.), The International Encyclopedia of Intercultural Communication (pp. 95-108). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118783665.ieicc0156

Tio Gabunia (B.Arch, M.Arch)

Tio Gabunia is an academic writer and architect based in Tbilisi. He has studied architecture, design, and urban planning at the Georgian Technical University and the University of Lisbon. He has worked in these fields in Georgia, Portugal, and France. Most of Tio’s writings concern philosophy. Other writings include architecture, sociology, urban planning, and economics.

Tio Gabunia (B.Arch, M.Arch) #molongui-disabled-link 6 Types of Societies (With 21 Examples)
Tio Gabunia (B.Arch, M.Arch) #molongui-disabled-link 25 Public Health Policy Examples
Tio Gabunia (B.Arch, M.Arch) #molongui-disabled-link 15 Cultural Differences Examples
Tio Gabunia (B.Arch, M.Arch) #molongui-disabled-link Social Interaction Types & Examples (Sociology)

Chris Drew (PhD)

This article was peer-reviewed and edited by Chris Drew (PhD). The review process on Helpful Professor involves having a PhD level expert fact check, edit, and contribute to articles. Reviewers ensure all content reflects expert academic consensus and is backed up with reference to academic studies. Dr. Drew has published over 20 academic articles in scholarly journals. He is the former editor of the Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education and holds a PhD in Education from ACU.

Chris Drew (PhD) #molongui-disabled-link 25 Positive Punishment Examples
Chris Drew (PhD) #molongui-disabled-link 25 Dissociation Examples (Psychology)
Chris Drew (PhD) #molongui-disabled-link 15 Zone of Proximal Development Examples
Chris Drew (PhD) #molongui-disabled-link Perception Checking: 15 Examples and Definition

The Convergence Communication Scale (CCS): Development and evaluation of an interpersonal submission assessment.

Related Papers

Priscilla De Netto

Journal of Child and Family Studies

Katelyn Affleck

Brian Baucom

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

Garth Fletcher

The American Journal of Family Therapy

Michelle Miller-Day

A recent national survey of 2,753 6-12th grade students revealed that an adolescent's " sense of self " plays a significant role in feeling stressed and depressed, and was also a significant predictor of alcohol or other drug use and abuse (Teens Today, 2003). This survey report indicated that drug use — especially abuse of " harder " drugs " — was linked to youth's low sense of self and parent-child communication patterns that cultivated a low sense of self in offspring. Conversely, a highly developed sense of self was significantly related to teens' relationships with their parents. In research for a recent book, Communication among Grandmothers, Mothers, and Adult Daughters: A Qualitative Study of Maternal Relationships, I studied grandmother-mother-daughter relationships over the course of eight months. The study compared women's interactions in relationships where adult daughters had a documented history of alcohol and other drug abuse, with women's interactions in relationships where daughters had no history of use or abuse. The results revealed a relational communication pattern that might function to increase women's risky behaviors, such as drug use. Necessary Convergence of Meaning (NCM) is a theoretical model that illustrates a dominant/submissive relational communication pattern that appears to affect the submissive partner's sense of self and-in this study-was linked with participant's drug use and other self-harming behaviors. The mother-daughter relationship and sense of self Sense of self refers to who I perceive " I " am and how I identify myself; it is really the unfolding of the self in the midst of retaining relational ties. Personal selves are constituted and managed through relationships, not to their exclusion (Adams & Marshall, 1996). From this perspective, the self is conceptualized as inseparable from dynamic interaction in relationships, with each transaction contributing to both self-and relational knowledge. Early work by Mead (1934) identified the importance of message exchange in personal identity management. Yet, more recent work in relational communication points out that both personal and relational identities are co-created communicatively within the context of a relationship. As we broach the 21st century, identity theorists are moving away from the paradigm in which individuals are cast as islands loosely connected by relational threads toward a paradigm of the embedded self, or self in relation (Wilmot, 1995). Embedded selves are co-created within the context of relationships. This is critical to understanding the development of " sense of self, " especially among women. Recent feminist psychologists have argued that instead of viewing separation from mother as a daughter's fundamental developmental goal, we must begin to view separation and connection as both basic to the mother-daughter relationship across the lifespan (Cooley, 2000). The goal in growing up and developing a sense of self is not to achieve total separation, but instead to manage the dynamic tension of toward an autonomous self while remaining connected to the relational partner. In that connection, we influence each other's sense of self. It is this powerful influence in mother-daughter relationships that is at the heart of the theoretical model of necessary convergence. Necessary Convergence of Meaning The NCM model addresses dominance and submission in relational communication interactions whereby there is a pattern where a dominant communicator (in this case, the parent) " hijacks " interpersonal meaning in his or her relationship with a submissive communicator (the child), ultimately dictating the submissive partner's sense of self.1 In the Miller-Day (2004) study, maternal communicators were dominant or considered high-status within the family system and adult daughters (whether they were 20 or 60 years of age) were submissive or considered low-status communicators within the family system. Dominance refers to the degree to which a person can influence and impose their will on the other; its counter term, submission, refers to the degree to which a person gives up influence or yields to the wishes of the other. When necessary convergence occurred in these relationships, the dominant communicator tended to dictate not only what meanings the submissive communicator should assign to events in any given situation, but dictated the personal identity the submissive partner should embrace as her own.

Mieczyslaw Plopa

Psychological Reports

Charles R Figley

Southern Communication Journal

Journal of Marital and Family Therapy

Donald Baucom

Couples&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;#39; cognitions about marriage and their communication patterns have both been found to be highly associated with marital distress. To examine the relationships among marital cognitions, communication, and marital adjustment, we had a sample of 387 community couples complete three self-report measures: the Dyadic Adjustment Scale, the Inventory of Specific Relationship Standards, and the Communication Patterns Questionnaire. Results indicated that the correlation of communication with marital adjustment is higher for women with more relationship-focused standards than for women with less relationship-focused standards; this interaction does not occur for men. The implications of the interaction and the gender difference as well as the importance of teaching communication skills, and working with associated cognitions are discussed.

RELATED PAPERS

Innovation in Aging

Linda Isherwood

JURNAL PENDIDIKAN EKONOMI: Jurnal Ilmiah Ilmu Pendidikan, Ilmu Ekonomi dan Ilmu Sosial

Dimas Angga

Journal of Paleolimnology

Roger Flower

Síntese: Revista de Filosofia

Massimiliano Marianelli

Anglisticum Journal

Akmal Yuldashev

Caminhos de Geografia

Arlete De Almeida

Problems of Education

Svitlana Podplota

Geburtshilfe und Frauenheilkunde

Uwe Kullmer

Airton Perussatto

Swara Bhumi

Bambang Sigit Widodo Widodo

international journal of chemical sciences

vishal pathak

Ricardo Terán

The Lancet. Oncology

Jürg Bernhard

Editora Curitiba

Elzahrã Osman

Aulia Atma handayani

Edwin Canda

Journal of Hazardous Materials

Jose valdecir Alves

IEEE Access

Rania Ahmed Abul Seoud

Advances in Space Research

Granthaalayah Publications and Printers

Juan Pablo Torres Morimitsu

Congress on"Science and technology for the safeguard of Cultural Heritage in the Mediterranean basin, Athens

Slovník vybraných pojmov z mediálnych štúdií

Lenka Rusňáková

Biomicrofluidics

Dhirendra Tiwari

Journal of Magnetic Resonance Imaging

Adam Feldmann

See More Documents Like This

Patients’ Convergence of Mass and Interpersonal Communication on an Online Forum: Hybrid Methods Analysis

Remco sanders.

1 Department of Communication Science, Amsterdam School of Communication Research, Univeristy of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Theo B Araujo

Rens vliegenthart, mies c van eenbergen.

2 Department of Research, Netherlands Comprehensive Cancer Organisation, Utrecht, Netherlands

Julia C M van Weert

Annemiek j linn, associated data.

Details of the supervised machine learning (SML) process.

Confusion matrix classifiers per category.

Patients are increasingly taking an active role in their health. In doing so, they combine both mass and interpersonal media to gratify their cognitive and affective needs (ie, convergence). Owing to methodological challenges when studying convergence, a detailed view of how patients are using different types of media for needs fulfillment is lacking.

The aim of this study was to obtain insight into the frequency of reported convergence, how convergence affects what posters write online, motives for posting, and the needs posters are trying to fulfill.

Using a hybrid method of content analysis and supervised machine learning, this study used naturally available data to fill this research gap. We analyzed opening posts (N=1708) of an online forum targeting cancer patients and their relatives (Kanker.nl).

Nearly one-third of the forum opening posts contained signs of convergence in mass or interpersonal media. Posts containing mass media references disclosed less personal information and were more geared toward community enhancement and sharing experiences compared to posts without convergence. Furthermore, compared to posts without signs of convergence, posts that included interpersonal media references disclosed more personal information, and posters were more likely to ask for the experiences of fellow users to fulfill their needs. Within posts containing signs of convergence, posts including interpersonal media references reported fewer shortages of information, disclosed more information about the disease, and were more active in seeking other posters’ experiences compared to posts containing mass media references.

Conclusions

The current study highlights the intertwining of media platforms for patients. The insights of this study can be used to adapt the health care system toward a new type of health information–seeking behavior in which one medium is not trusted to fulfill all needs. Instead, providers should incorporate the intertwinement of sources by providing patients with reliable websites and forums through which they can fulfill their needs.

Introduction

Patients have the need to know and understand (ie, cognitive needs) and the need to feel acknowledged and understood (ie, affective needs) [ 1 ]. Currently, patients take an active role in the management of their health, and in doing so they combine mass and interpersonal communication to gratify their cognitive and affective needs (hereafter referred to collectively as “needs”) [ 2 ]. By using mass and interpersonal communication, patients engage in a process that is called “convergence” [ 3 - 5 ]. According to Kreps [ 3 ], convergence can be defined as “the sequence of impersonal to interpersonal interactions” (p. 519; type 1 convergence) or the “conduct of interpersonal and peer discussions about health-related issues in virtual discussion spaces of various kinds” (p. 521; type 2 convergence). We adapted and broadened this definition to include convergence between and within mass or interpersonal communication for the current study. That is, we consider convergence as a process in which either one mass communication source and one interpersonal communication source (intermedium convergence) or two mass communication sources (intramedium convergence) are being used to fulfill the user’s needs. For example, patients learn about their disease through a consultation with a medical expert (interpersonal communication) and then validate the advice of the medical expert by visiting a website (mass communication; intermedium convergence) [ 6 - 8 ]. An example of intramedium convergence is the use of treatment experience from a fellow patient’s blog post in one’s own blog post.

These examples show how patients use mass and interpersonal communication to fulfill their needs. However, research into this topic often focuses on one singled-out communication source. As a consequence, current research does not provide insights into how communication sources affect each other and how needs differ depending on the sources used. Answering these questions is important since patients have different communication sources at their disposal. In particular, when it comes to online health information, patients often struggle to understand the complex information online, have difficulties in assessing whether the information is reliable, and might feel overwhelmed or experience information overload [ 9 , 10 ]. Therefore, patients and medical experts should work together in providing, validating, and discussing information. To determine which (online) source fits best, insights are needed on how patients combine sources and how the combination of sources affects needs. Ultimately, part of the costly and limited time of the medical expert could be used for referring to sources that can reliably fulfill part of the patients’ needs.

One explanation for the research gap on how patients combine multiple sources to fulfill their needs can be found in the methodological challenges faced when studying this process. The scarce research in health communication in which both mass and interpersonal communication are taken into account tends to rely on more traditional research methods such as surveys [ 11 , 12 ], interviews [ 13 ], and focus groups [ 14 ].These methods can be affected by selection bias, recall bias, and social desirability [ 11 ]. By using a hybrid method consisting of content analysis and supervised machine learning (SML), the limitations of these traditional methods can be surmounted [ 15 ]. The hybrid method combines a content analysis of real-life communication and SML. We use natural unsolicited data (ie, data that are not obtained as part of research but are instead compiled by the user writing at the time their needs arose). The benefit of this method is that large amounts of already existing natural data can be used to study the current topic.

A good starting point is the analysis of data from online health forums targeting patients. Forums provide a natural database of people’s online activities. In forum opening posts, posters often provide information about their situation at the time of writing, which often includes previously used communication (ie, signs of convergence), the outcome of this communication effort (ie, motives to start the forum post), and the needs they are trying to fulfill. Additionally, background information about the poster is often included (eg, stage and type of the disease, and whether the poster him/herself or a family member has been diagnosed with the disease) [ 3 , 16 ]. Thus, by using this hybrid method, we are able to gain more insight into how often patients combine mass and interpersonal communication, the reason as to why they engage in convergence, which need they are trying to fulfill, and whether the content of forum posts differs based on the communication sources they used prior to writing the post. The following research aim was central in the present study: What signs of convergence can be detected in forum opening posts, how frequently does convergence occur, what kinds of needs are patients trying to fulfill by engaging in convergence, and how do forum post characteristics (ie, motives, information about the poster, and needs) differ for different kinds of convergence?

In this study, we used forums in the context of cancer. Cancer patients are confronted with many questions and uncertainties during their illness [ 17 , 18 ]. Furthermore, online platforms such as forums and interpersonal communication with a health care provider are the two most important sources of information for cancer patients [ 19 ].

Interpersonal Communication

In general, most patients consider medical experts to be the most trusted source of information [ 20 ]. In a review, Shea-Budgell and colleagues [ 20 ] highlighted that patients place a high level of trust in medical experts owing to their expertise on topics that patients find most important, including treatment, screening, testing, and detection. Furthermore, their medical and informational training and, to a lesser degree, the emotional support they provide during a consultation are mentioned as factors that instill confidence [ 21 - 23 ]. Nevertheless, between 40% and 90% of patients report unmet needs after their consultation with a medical expert [ 24 , 25 ]. Multiple reasons can be given for these unmet needs. Patient-related reasons include unmentioned concerns, a lack of trust in a particular medical expert, and information overload [ 26 ]. Examples of medical expert–related concerns are time constraints and a lack of experience [ 27 ]. Therefore, patients also rely on other sources for needs fulfillment, such as online forums. Patients expect their medical experts to discuss the content they found via other sources and to offer their professional take on it [ 28 ]. By discussing online health information with their provider, patients engage in intramedium convergence.

Online Forums

Online forums are often used by patients and their relatives and can be considered as virtual communities. Virtual communities exist in many different areas, cover many topics, and connect groups with a variety of shared characteristics. In this study, we adopt the definition of Rheingold [ 29 ], who states that virtual communities are “social aggregations that emerge from the Net when enough people carry on those public discussions long enough, with sufficient human feeling, to form webs of personal relationships in cyberspace.” Many patients encounter various needs and use multiple communication sources to fulfill these needs. As a result, these patients are active in online forums while also often having contact with other sources such as medical experts [ 30 ]. Patients use these platforms to gain understanding about their disease but also to connect and exchange experiences and support with others in comparable situations [ 7 , 8 , 31 ]. By encouraging and enabling active participation (eg, by opening a thread on a topic that is personally relevant), forums have the potential to provide different types of support to the user, such as to receive the support of their peers, to feel empowered through information provision, and to recognize themselves in stories from peers and thereby feel less isolated [ 11 , 32 ]. The malleability of forums in addressing patients’ needs and the ability to do this at any time might be a key reason why patients turn to these forums.

Convergence and Underlying Motives

Many patients decide to combine multiple sources to fulfill their needs. Generally, 25% to 83% of patients search for online health information before or after a consultation with their medical expert [ 33 - 36 ]. Patients seem to use online health information in addition to a consultation to prepare themselves [ 13 ], to complement the information given by the medical expert [ 13 , 24 , 25 ], as well as to validate or challenge the information given by the medical expert [ 13 ].

To understand why patients use multiple sources, the optimal matching model can be used [ 37 , 38 ]. This model states that to fulfill patients’ needs, these needs should be matched with the right type of support. For example, if the patient feels the need to prepare for a consultation or wants to complement, validate, or challenge the information that is given by the medical expert, this need can be fulfilled by gathering factual information from other sources. By contrast, if the patient feels lost and alone, this need might not be fulfilled by receiving information about the upcoming treatment but rather by receiving emotional support that helps with the emotional aspects of being sick. According to the optimal matching model, patients actively choose the communication channel that they believe has the highest potential to fulfill their current needs. A patient who feels that they should prepare for the consultation is more likely to choose online medical libraries to fulfill these needs, whereas a patient who feels lost will more likely turn to online health forums and blogs, on which interaction with fellow patients is possible [ 3 , 31 , 39 - 41 ]. This exploratory research contributes to the optimal matching theory by identifying whether and how patients fulfill their needs by using multiple sources at their disposal and how these sources are intertwined.

Research Questions

In summary, we believe that forum posts provide a natural database of peoples’ communication activities, and these forum posts can offer an opportunity to gain a better understanding of the interplay between communication channels. Therefore, our first research question (RQ1) is proposed as follows: What is the frequency of signs of convergence in forum opening posts? Furthermore, these forum posts can provide a natural registration of the motives for using different media (eg, after seeing a doctor or reading online health information) to fulfill specific needs. Therefore, research question 2 (RQ2) is proposed as follows: What needs are patients trying to fulfill by opening a forum post? By using a hybrid method to analyze these forums, we are able to also capture other relevant information such as the disclosure of information about the poster and the motive for posting [ 3 , 16 ]. These aspects are important for providing insight into how users in different situations gratify their needs or the needs of relatives by using multiple sources. Therefore, we propose research question 3 (RQ3) as follows: How do motives (3a), information about the poster (3b), and the needs (3c) differ for different types of convergence?

Study Design

We used a hybrid method consisting of a classic social science method (ie, the framework method [ 42 ]) and a newer computational social science method (ie, SML). The benefit of this approach is two-fold. First, this method allows us to combine unique features from both approaches. On the one hand, the framework method starts from a theory-based codebook (ie, the use of sensitizing concepts) and is then further developed through an iterative process of (open) coding on a subsample of the data. On the other hand, the coded subsample can then be used to label the whole sample with codes and categories using SML, thereby allowing us to move from open-coded data on a subsample to data that are suitable for quantitative analysis based on the complete dataset, allowing researchers to analyze sample sizes that were impossible to code manually. Second, SML allows us, as well as other researchers and practitioners, to (re)use the trained model on a different dataset or for practical applications. The reuse of the algorithms makes cost-efficient longitudinal research into convergence possible since the models can automatically and consciously be applied to new data.

We used data retrieved from cancer patients and relatives on the online forum Kanker.nl [ 43 ] in the Netherlands. Cancer is the most common disease, with a yearly incidence rate of 439.2 per 100,000 men and women (18,078,567 in 2018) and a yearly rate of 163.5 per 100,000 people dying from cancer (9,555,027 in 2018) [ 44 ]. Furthermore, cancer patients and their relatives experience multiple visits with a medical expert and face many questions and uncertainties. In the Netherlands, Kanker.nl is one of the largest and best-known Dutch websites for cancer-related information within an online community [ 43 ].

Users are required to register and must provide their name and a valid email address. Participants of all platforms within Kanker.nl give (standard) consent for using their data for research when they register. Ethical approval for the current study was provided by the ethical committee of University of Amsterdam (2016-PC-7547).

For the complete dataset, first, all forum entries (N=9573) were extracted. Second, only the opening posts of the threads were selected (n=1708). The opening posts were chosen because they are most likely to contain a description of the situation and the need the user wants to fulfill. The median number of words for each thread opening was 608.05 (range 3-20,649). The threads were created between April 2013 and November 2016.

Phase 1: Framework Method

Of all 1708 thread openings, a random sample of 306 posts (17.92%) was manually coded by the first author (RS) in multiple iterations. First, using two sensitizing concepts derived from the literature (ie, information sources and motives for searching health information), 100 posts were open-coded on signs of convergence (RQ1), motives for opening a forum thread (RQ2), sought-after need (RQ3), and personal characteristics (RQ3); in total, 583 different codes were used for the constructs needed to answer RQ2 and RQ3. Second, these open codes were merged into overarching, latent categories. For example, the distinctions between different medical experts such as general practitioners, oncologists, and nurses were merged into a medical expert category. Third, the codebook and categories were evaluated on completeness during research meetings with the coauthors (AL, RV, JvW). As a result, several categories were merged again, and more specific categories were added. This process resulted in the following categories: convergence, motive for posting, information on poster, and needs (see Table 1 for the codebook). Fourth, the updated codebook was evaluated by the first author and a trained coder (RS and MB) who double-coded 20% of the sample. The intercoder reliability was good (Lotus range 0.98-1.00); Lotus and standardized Lotus scores are displayed per category in Table 2 . Fifth, all 306 exported thread openings were manually coded by the first author (MB) using the codebook. Finally, the manually coded posts were transformed by the first author (MB) into binary variables to be used in the second phase.

Overview of categories and codes analyzed.

Intercoder reliability using Lotus and standardized Lotus (S-Lotus) coefficients per variable.

Table 1 contains the categories and codes that were coded during the SML phase. These variables were coded as 0 (not present) or 1 (present). Figure 1 shows a fictitious example of the extracted concepts from the forum opening posts.

An external file that holds a picture, illustration, etc.
Object name is jmir_v22i10e18303_fig1.jpg

Example of extraction of concepts from forum posts.

Phase 2: SML

We used SML to train classifiers for the references to mass or interpersonal communication (see Multimedia Appendix 1 for a detailed description of the SML phase). A sample of 685 manually coded opening posts (in two rounds) was used as input for SML. This sample was split into a training set (n=548) and a test set (n=137) using an 80-20 split. Using Scikit-Learn [ 45 ], the data were preprocessed (see Multimedia Appendix 1 for a detailed overview), and the classifiers were trained using different algorithms such as support vector classification, stochastic gradient descent, multinomial naïve Bayes, gradient boosting, and passive aggressive classifier. This was done to evaluate which algorithm would have the best performance for each concept it was trained to predict. In this process, we adopted a grid search strategy, which tests different combinations of parameters for each algorithm as well as different options for preprocessing the data.

The quality of the classifiers was assessed based on precision, recall, and F1 scores for their predictions of cases in which the category was present (ie, for cases in which the reference to mass or interpersonal communication was 1). Precision gives the proportion of the automatically assigned labels that correspond with the human-labeled data. Recall gives the proportion of the true labels that are found automatically. This often results in a tradeoff between the scores of precision and recall; for example, in cases of higher recall, the chance that some of the recalled data are false positives grows, and the precision score consequently goes down. F1 scores are the harmonic mean of the recall and precision. Stochastic gradient descent proved to have the best performance in predicting the classifiers convergence mass media and convergence interpersonal media (recall interpersonal =0.76, precision interpersonal =0.96, F1=0.85; recall massmedia =0.86, precision massmedia =0.92, F1=0.89). See Multimedia Appendix 2 for the complete confusion matrix. These classifiers were applied to the complete dataset of opening posts (N=1708) to create a subsample of opening posts that were likely to contain signs of convergence (n=771, 45.14%).

Phase 3: Manual Coding Convergence Posts

To ensure the validity of the automatically assigned classifiers, the created subsample of posts was checked for correctness. Of the automatically labeled posts containing signs of convergence (n=771), 245 posts (31.78%) did not contain signs of convergence after manually checking, and were coded as “no media.” Next, the subsample of posts was manually coded by the first author (MB) using the codebook for the remaining categories (see Table 1 ).

Before running the analysis, all independent variables were tested on possible issues due to multicollinearity. Only issues concerning time since diagnosis, stage of the disease, and type of disease (r time-stage =0.82, r time-type =0.92) were found; thus, these items were taken together as “disclosure of information about the disease” (eigenvalue=2.71; R 2 =0.90; α=.95).

RQ1 and RQ2 were answered using descriptive analyses. To compare the outcomes on the dependent variables between posts containing different signs of convergence (RQ3), two multinomial logistic regression analyses were conducted. In these two analyses, the referenced communication channels were the dependent variables (ie, no media, mass communication, or interpersonal communication). The first regression used no media as the reference category with information on poster and needs as the independent variables. Since the category “motive” was not applicable to the “no mass” or “interpersonal media” category, motive was omitted from this analysis. However, to pinpoint the differences between posts containing signs of convergence, motive, information on poster, and needs were included in the second regression analysis, in which mass communication was used as the reference category. The outcomes of these analyses are displayed as the odds ratios (OR). An R value of 1 indicates no differences in probability between the groups compared, whereas a value >1 represents an increased probability and a value <1 represents a decreased probability [ 46 ].

Signs of Convergence in Forum Posts

The results showed that 30.80% of the complete sample of forum opening posts (n=526) contained signs of convergence. These were divided into mass communication (324/526, 61.6%) and interpersonal communication (202/526, 38.4%). In the following sections, these categories will be described in more depth.

Of all mass communication references (n=324), 274 (84.6%) referred to online sources (eg, other members’ profiles or blogs, news media articles concerning cancer [patients], and health information websites). Of all posts with mass communication references, 214/324 (66.1%) posts contained references to a website. Offline mass communication was referenced 49 (15.1%) times, which included references to printed newspapers, books, and television.

Of all interpersonal communication posts (n=202), 162 references (80.2%) were made to medical experts (eg, oncologists, nurses, and general practitioners) and 14 references (6.9%) were made to family members. These include family members who either had personal experiences with the disease or provided information they received via other sources. Fellow patients who provided information offline were referenced 3 times (1.5%) and 22 references (10.9%) were made to communication events with other people. Often, these events consisted of work-related relationships (eg, employers, insurers, and rehabilitation agents).

With respect to RQ1, almost one-third of all forum opening posts contained signs of convergence and thus included references to either mass or interpersonal communication. When referencing mass communication, mainly online sources were mentioned, whereas for interpersonal communication, medical experts were most often mentioned.

Posters’ Needs

Of all 771 opening posts containing signs of convergence, 344 posts (44.6%) represented the need of asking for experiences regarding a specific treatment (eg, medicine, procedure) or experiences regarding (dealing with) the (emotional) effects of living with cancer (ie, dealing with side effects, reintegration into society, and body image). This was followed by forum opening posts related to community building (266/771, 34.5%). In these cases, the poster started a discussion about a particular topic such as developments in the medical sector, with or without a URL to a news story (online). The third-largest need to open a forum thread was to share one’s personal experience. Overall, 143/771 (18.6%) of the posts featured this need. Finally, in 72 of the 771 opening posts (9.3%), the poster directly asked for sources to find more factual information on a particular topic such as (alternative) treatment options. Therefore, to answer RQ2, the main need for patients to be fulfilled, as reflected in forum openings post, is that of asking for information related to experiences. This need is followed by that of enhancing the community, sharing one’s experiences, and asking for factual information.

Differences in Posts for Different Kinds of Convergence

The first multinomial logistic regression model contained the variables from the categories information on poster and needs (adjusted R 2 =0.30, χ 2 12 = –563.27, P <.001; Table 3 ). In posts referencing mass communication, the disclosure of disease-related information was 89% less likely to occur compared to posts that did not include a reference to mass communication. In contrast, posts including references to interpersonal communication had a 156% higher likelihood of featuring the disclosure of disease-related information ( Table 3 ) compared to posts containing no references to media. These outcomes mean that the chance of disclosing disease-related information in forum posts in which interpersonal communication is mentioned is higher compared to that of forum posts with no signs of convergence and is lower for posts that include references to mass communication.

Differences between posts containing signs of convergence and posts without (reference category=no media).

a OR: odds ratio.

When considering the needs posters might have for opening a forum thread, differences in needs within different types of convergence were found. Higher likelihoods were found for posts including references to mass communication compared to posts containing no signs of convergence for the needs: community building, sharing experiences, and asking for information. This means that after mass communication exposure, posts have a 373% higher likelihood of containing the need to share the post for community building, a 291% higher likelihood of containing the need to share one’s experience with others, and a 188% higher likelihood of asking for more information compared to no exposure to mass or interpersonal communication. Posts containing references to interpersonal communication had a 268% higher likelihood of displaying the need to ask fellow patients for their experiences compared to posts containing no signs of convergence.

The second multinomial logistic regression models contained the variables from the categories motive, information on poster, and needs (adjusted R 2 =0.77, χ 2 20 = –185.40, P <.001; Table 4 ). Within the category motive, in posts referencing interpersonal communication, a shortage of information was 81% less likely to be the reported outcome of the communication effort compared to posts referencing mass communication. Furthermore, within the category information on poster, posts referencing interpersonal communication were 2015% more likely to disclose information about the disease compared to posts referencing mass communication. Within the category needs, posts containing interpersonal communication were 93% less likely to display community building as a need of the post compared to posts referencing mass communication. Furthermore, posts referencing interpersonal communication had a 227% higher likelihood of asking for other posters’ experiences compared to posts referencing mass communication (OR 3.27, P =.04).

Differences between posts containing signs of interpersonal convergence (reference category=mass communication).

To answer RQ3, compared to intramedium convergence, intermedium convergence posts are less likely to be motivated by a shortage of information and are more likely to contain information about the poster’s condition. Furthermore, again compared to intramedium convergence, intermedium convergence is more likely to display the need for experiences and is less likely to exhibit a need for community building.

Principal Findings

This study provides more insight into (the occurrence of) convergence using natural unsolicited data. Overall, intramedium and intermedium convergence resulted in posts containing different content and aiming to fulfill different needs. We found that nearly one-third of all forum opening posts in our sample contained signs of convergence by referencing either mass or interpersonal communication in the post. For intramedium convergence, online sources such as websites, forums, and online news articles were most often mentioned, frequently accompanied by a link to that source. In this way, posters seem to fulfill their need to help build the online community and initiate a discussion or to share experiences. Posts containing intermedium convergence often included references to a consultation with a medical expert. In these posts, users reported less shortage of information, disclosed more about themselves, and asked for more experiences from other users compared to posts containing intramedium convergence.

Our findings further emphasize the frequency of reported convergence and how intertwined these sources are. The main interpersonal communication source that was mentioned in the posts was that of a medical expert. This outcome is in line with previous research in which the medical expert, together with the internet, is named as the most important source of information for patients [ 19 , 23 , 47 ]. We found that one-third of the posts contained signs of convergence. The number of patients who use more than one medium is likely to be higher for two reasons. First, we only looked at specific types of convergence occurring in forum posts; however, based on previous research (eg, [ 35 ]), we know that signs of convergence also occur at the medical encounter and that different types of convergence exist. For example, during medical encounters, patients could discuss a forum they have read before the consultation and thus engage in intermedium convergence (online forum-medical expert) or engage in intramedium convergence (ie, medical expert-medical expert) by referencing a medical expert during the consultation who provided a second opinion.

Second, we only coded explicit signs of convergences, whereas previous research also shows that patients implicitly mention different sources [ 48 ]. One aspect that is unique to this study is that although previous studies often examined both sources independently, the current results show how interdependent these sources are and how they are likely to continue to merge in the future. For example, a poster who recently had an appointment with a medical expert may have received a lot of information (convergence). After interpersonal communication, there is a lower likelihood that the patient experienced a shortage of information (motive). However, the patient might have missed information about how other patients experienced the situation, which motivates the patient to go online, write about their situation, and ask fellow patients for their experiences (need). According to the optimal matching theory [ 38 ], patients actively choose a medium that likely fulfills their needs.

In the context of support, some patients actively start participating in forums to find information that only fellow patients can provide—their experiences [ 14 , 49 , 50 ]. Our results also highlight the importance and added value of studying information sources in an interdependent context instead of independently. In light of the increased availability of different types of information on platforms, the internet seems to be a promising venue to fulfill needs that are not fulfilled during a consultation. Taking the notion of the optimal matching theory further, one could argue that it should not be a problem if patients report unmet needs based on their exposure to one medium, as another medium might be better able to fulfill these unmet needs. However, the medical expert and patient should work together to make sure credible sources of information are known and available to the patient to fulfill their needs.

Based on our results, posters seem to require information provided by other patients combined with the information provided by the medical experts. Forums can be used to gain access to the experiences of fellow patients without the medical expert being an intermediary in this process. Users thereby benefit from both the expertise garnered during consultations with the medical expert and the experiences of fellow patients [ 51 ]. Eysenbach and colleagues [ 50 ] already highlighted that providing, receiving, and reading experiences from fellow patients is one of the main functions of social support communities. The current study shows how patients use health forums in a broader context of multiple available sources.

Because websites are easily shared and embedded in online tools such as online forums, the current study found many references to mass communication in general and online sources in particular. Mass communication is likely to be shared with members of the community to sustain and to inform the community through what is called “community building.” Community building creates a feeling of being part of a community and therefore fights the feeling of being alone, which in turn can emotionally support the patient [ 52 ].

Limitations and Future Research

We posited that using a hybrid method on natural data could be a useful tool in meeting the challenges faced in studying convergence (ie, circular process, biased data when trusted on solicited recall data). Although we successfully analyzed indicators for convergence using forum data, some shortcomings must be acknowledged to advance future research. Despite the merits in using unsolicited data, not all aspects of convergence could be studied. First, we could only detect explicit signs of convergence. It would be a safe assumption to imagine convergence occurring in implicit ways as well, such as by simply posting a question without stating the events leading up to the post. Furthermore, convergence could only be measured when mass or interpersonal communication led to posting on a forum. However, posting online or reading posts and responding to these posts could lead to convergence elsewhere. By only studying online forum posts on one particular website, these types of convergence could not be measured. Although this would result in an underestimation of convergence instead of an overestimation, future research could address these types of convergence. Content analysis (on videotaped consultations) can, for instance, be combined with surveys to investigate patients’ (unmet) needs when they communicate and to gain insight into how patients use communication sources to cope with their needs. The online environment would be a logical place to administer these surveys since this environment does not require actual tracking; instead, log data and prompted surveys could minimize intrusion and reliance on recall. Finally, using natural data restricted the possibility to control for differences in personal characteristics of the poster because these variables are not known. Based on previous studies, we know that the way patients use online forums changes over time [ 53 ]. We did not account for these individual differences. Future studies could gather data from multiple forum messages and profiles to extract information on the time of diagnosis, number of posts by the user, and type of disease to gain insight into these concepts.

SML was applied to create a subsample of posts containing signs of convergence. This approach resulted in a significantly smaller sample that had to be manually coded. If studies are interested in latent communication concepts such as the needs or motives of patients, researchers should take into account the time and effort needed to code a substantial part of their data as input for the SML, still without a guarantee that these latent construct can be reliably predicted. In an early phase of their study, researchers should decide on the role of SML in their project based on the number of positive cases per classifier and the initial SML results. Instead of coding a large portion of their data in the hope to obtain reliable classifiers for all constructs, reliable classifiers can be used in an early phase as a filter on the complete dataset to create a small subdataset that can be coded by hand.

The current study introduced two possible forms of biases. First, our sample consisted of posts from one forum on a highly trusted Dutch cancer website. Users on this forum might differ from the general cancer population in that they must have the skills to go online and register before using this forum. Furthermore, the fact that these patients opened a forum post could be an indication that they experienced a problem during a previous communication (eg, a shortage of information or conflicting information during the consultation with their medical expert). Therefore, the results might not be representative of all cancer patients, and the needs and motives found could be an overestimation of the unmet needs in this population. However, a complete export of all of the content of a platform with the informed consent of all users is still difficult to obtain, thus illustrating the uniqueness of our study. While the reported unmet needs might be an overestimation, these unmet needs still exist and will likely continue to exist. Therefore, scholars, medical experts, and (cancer) patient associations should work together to make convergence as easy as possible and try to incorporate alternative sources of information into the medical trajectory. For example, a leaflet or a website hosted by the hospital can provide patients with reliable sources but also well-known forums in which patients can exchange experiences and find support.

The second possible bias could have been created during the SML process. The SML algorithm that was used to create a sample of the posts used for the analysis might have caused a bias in the reference category. We manually created the reference category in which no signs of convergence were present. However, it is possible that the original algorithm marked these posts as false positives based on some shared content characteristics. This process might have led to differences between these false positives and the posts without signs of convergence in the corpus (ie, dataset) that were left out of the analysis. As a result, the reference sample might not completely be representative of the posts without signs of convergence. However, most of the main results are from a comparison between mass and interpersonal communication. These two samples were created by a combination of SML and manual checking; therefore, the above-described bias does not play a role. To overcome this possible bias, future research could either randomly create a sample as the reference category or possibly compare the reference category that was created through machine learning to a random sample before running the analysis.

To conclude, convergence is an important concept that represents the natural flow of patients’ information-seeking behavior between and within interpersonal and mass communication. Understanding how patients use different communication channels is essential to improving health care by providing guidance to patients who are trying to fulfill their needs. A better understanding of the conditions (ie, whether the information is discussed and in which way) under which the convergence of interpersonal and mass media results in positive patient outcomes might be the key to enhancing information provision to patients and in turn increasing patients’ wellbeing. In doing so, providers should take a proactive role in discussing online information-seeking with patients and referring patients to the right sources that best meet their needs.

Acknowledgments

We thank Mieke Burger, Integraal Kankercentrum Nederland (IKNL).

Abbreviations

Multimedia appendix 1, multimedia appendix 2.

Conflicts of Interest: None declared.

Media Convergence and the Development Strategies of Radio and Television in China pp 1–47 Cite as

The Rise, Concept and Manifestations of Media Convergence

Peng Duan 2
First Online: 01 December 2020

414 Accesses

Media underwent major changes in the twenty-first century compared to the previous century and drew the attention of scholars from home and abroad alike. The exploration of media convergence abroad dated back to the publication of the book Technologies of Freedom by Ithiel de Sola Pool in 1983, in which Pool pointed out that an established physical network could provide any type of media facilities, whereas media facilities that were once limited to a certain technology could be sent to any physically separated network.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution .

Buying options

Available as PDF
Read on any device
Instant download
Own it forever
Available as EPUB and PDF
Compact, lightweight edition
Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
Free shipping worldwide - see info
Durable hardcover edition

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Guo, Y., & Yu, C. (2013). Summary of foreign concepts of media convergence and related issues. Modern Press, 2013 (1).

Google Scholar

Duan, P. (2015). Challenges, transformation and improvement: A study of the ability of Chinese radio and television to sway public opinion against the background of media convergence . Beijing: China Renmin University Press.

Huang, E., et al. (2006). Facing the challenges of convergence: Media professionals’ concerns of working across media platforms. Convergence, 2006, 12.

Cui, B. (1999). Technological innovation and media transformation. Contemporary Communication, 1999 (6), 23–25.

Cai, W. (2005). What convergence did change in news communication lead to? A look at the changes in news communication in the U.S. Chinese Journalist, 2005 (9), 57–59.

Duan, P. (2018). A study of the development strategies of radio and television in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei province against the background of media convergence. China Television, 2018 (1), 72–77.

Huang, F. (2010). A tentative discussion of the perception and misunderstanding of media convergence. Shanghai Journalism Review, 2010 (8), 33–36.

Huang, D., & Li, X. (2019). From business formats to social forms: Re-understanding media convergence. Modern Communication, 2016 (1), 13–20.

Liu, H. (2019). Convergence of media features: A new perspective. People’s Tribune Frontiers, 2019 (2), 54–59.

Qian, G., & Lu, K. (2015). Different interpretations, the economic nature and research-paradigm deviations of media convergence. Modern Communication, 2015 (6).

Liu, Y., & Wang, L. (2012). Defining the concept and interpreting the content of media convergence. Media, 2012 (1), 73–75.

Chen, Y. (2014). Analysis and levels of the concept of media convergence. Journal of Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications (Social Sciences Edition), 2014 (16), 1–7.

Wei, L. (2019). Definitions, aspects and research topics of media convergence. Shanghai Journalism Review, 2019 (3), 32–38.

Meng, J., & Zhao, Y. (2006). Media convergence: Bringing together and creating a new mediatised society. Chinese Journal of Journalism and Communication, 2006 (7), 24–27.

Chen, G. (2016). Digital logic and media convergence. Journalism Bimonthly, 2016 (2), 100–106.

Jiang, X. (2019). Adapting to social changes, adjusting three-fold benefits: Keys to in-depth media convergence. Press Circles, 2019 (1), 44–51.

Peng, L. (2010). “Enclosure”—“Product revolution”—“Keystone setting up”: A trilogy of media convergence. News and Writing, 2010 (2).

Dang, D. (2015). Internet evolution and changes in media-convergence models. Editorial Friend, 2015 (11), 72–76.

Lu, D., & Gao, F. (2019). Models and trends of media convergence. China Radio & TV Academic Journal, 2019 (7), 14–17.

Liang, X., & Ouyang, H. (2015). On the innovation models of “radio +” in the Internet age. Journal of Social Science of Hunan Normal University, 2016 (4), 149–154.

Duan, P., & Kong, L. (2017). Publishing convergence and institutional innovation. Modern Publishing, 2017 (1), 5–7.

Cai, X. (2019). Convergence and development of conventional publishing: processes, patterns, models and paths. Publishing Journal, 2019 (2), 5–14.

Qian, X. (2018). Features, pros and cons and revelations of media convergence and transformation as business-model innovation. Journal of Shanghai Normal University (Philosophy & Social Sciences Edition), 2018 (6), 108–120.

Zou, J. (2010). Media convergence and regulatory changes in China’s communications industry. Yuejiang Academic Journal, 2010 (3), 37–41.

Cai, W., & Huang, J. (2007). Regulatory changes: A necessary prerequisite for media convergence—Comparison of and thoughts on the status quo of media management around the world. Chinese Journal of Journalism & Communication, 2007 (3), 60–63.

Duan, P. (2015). Strategic analysis of the ability of china’s radio and television to sway public opinion against the background of media convergence. China Radio & TV Academic Journal, 2015 (4), 33–36.

Xiao, Z. (2014). Four types of regulatory issues caused by media convergence. Contemporary Communications, 2014 (1), 60–65.

Yu, G., & Su, L. (2009). The development, issues and future direction of China’s media regulation. Journal of Shanxi University (Philosophy and Social Science Edition), 2009 (6), 101–107.

Li, J. (2013). Compound regulation: An exploration of regulatory models in the age of media convergence. Chinese Journal of Journalism & Communication, 2013 (35), 126–133.

Lin, L. (2015). About the legislation models for media convergence. Contemporary Communication, 2015 (1), 65–67.

Zou, J. (2010). China’s media convergence and the changing trend of media-industry regulation. News Research, 2010 (11), 13–15.

Yin, L. (2019). Annual report on cultural development of media convergence in China (2018). China Radio & TV Academic Journal, 2019 (2), 13–17.

Sun, H. (2019). Media convergence enters the 3.0 age. Young Journalist, 2019 (2), 4.

Zhong, X. (2019). A comparative study of the media-convergence strategies of three European countries—A case study of the British BBC, Norwegian NRK and Belgian VRT. China Radio & TV Academic Journal, 2019 (1), 74–76.

Gao, X. (2015). Predicaments and solutions of conventional media in swaying public opinion as media convergence becomes the new normal. Social Science, 2015 (9).

Yan, S. (2018). Status quo, issues and innovative paths of the convergence of conventional and emerging media in China. Journal of East China Normal University (Humanities and Social Sciences), 2018, 89–101.

Hu, Z., & Li, Q. (2020). Driving media convergence, building smart omnimedia and improving international communications. Media, 2020 (3), 9–11 + 13.

Xie, X., & Huang, Y. (2018). When ideals meet reality—A study of the issues, causes and paths of media convergence. Publishing Research, 2018 (4), 12–16.

Yang, C. (2016). Ethical issues concerning media in the context of media convergence. China Radio & TV Academic Journal, 2016 (3), 73–76.

Zhu, H. (2016). Copyright issues: Bottlenecks restricting media convergence. Publishing Research, 2016 (10), 80–82.

People’s Daily. (2016). Converging coordinates—Annual report on cultural development of media convergence in China. People’s Daily .

Sun, L. (2017). Issues concerning the convergence of conventional radio and television and new media. China Publishing Journal, 2017 (1), 35–38.

Zeng, X. (2019). Guiding media convergence towards deeper reforms—Lessons from President Xi Jinping “25 January” Understanding the Essence of the Key Addresses, 2019 (10), 66–68.

Shen, F. (2016). Development strategies of radio and television groups against the background of media convergence. Youth Journalist, 2016 (4), 91–92.

Duan, P., & Zhang, Y. (2019). Directions and breakthrough points of digital transformation of conventional publishers. China Publishing Journal, 2019 (8), 33–37.

Yu, G., & Liu, Y. (2015). Iteration and efficiency change of media convergence under the “Internet +” model. Journalism Bimonthly, 2015 (4), 1–6.

Wang, W. (2019). Profit models of media-convergence transformation. Media, 2019 (3), 62–64.

Lenin, V. (1988). The complete works of Lenin (p. 224). Beijing: People’s Publishing House (49).

Fidler, R. (Ming, A., Trans.). (2000). Mediamorphosis: Understanding new media (p. 94). Beijing: Huaxia Publishing House.

Bao, L. (2013). The history and future of media convergence from a technological perspective . Wuhan: Huazhong University of Science & Technology Press (6).

Bao, L. (2010). The development of digital communication technology and the evolution of media convergence . Wuhan: Huazhong University of Science and Technology.

Liu, C., et al. (2019). How 5G will change the media industry. Media, 2019 (6).

China Internet Network Information Center. (2018). The 41st statistical report on China’s Internet development . China Internet Network Information Center (1).

Zhang, J. (2006). The crisis and transformation of the newspaper industry. Journalism Lover, 2006 (2), 8–9.

Duan, P. (2006). Communications foundation: History, framework and extension (p. 203). Beijing: Communication University of China Press.

Shi, L. (2010). Regulatory status quo and development trend of the triple play abroad. Communications Management and Technology, 2010 (4).

Institute of Journalism of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. (1988). China journalism yearbook 1988 (p. 36). Beijing: China Social Sciences Press.

Zhan, J. (1997). What did the Telecommunications Act of 1996 bring the U.S.? Chinese Journal of Journalism & Communication, 1997 (4).

Wei, J. (2007). An initial exploration of the issues and countermeasures concerning the convergence of China’s media industry chain. Shaanxi Synthetic Economy, 2007 (4).

Cai, W., & Guo, C. (2007). The strategies and means of media convergence at the Tampa News Center in the U.S. Chinese Journalist, 2007 (9).

Xiao, Y., & Liu, X. (2015). Media and regulation convergences. Modern Media, 2015 (3).

Nicholas Negroponte (Hu, Y., & Fan, H., Trans.). (1996). Being digital (p. 225). Haikou: Hainan Publishing House Co. Ltd.

Dong, B. (2006). Let every society member share the results of a media-based society. News and Writing, 2006 (1).

Download references

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

Communication University of China, Beijing, China

You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Peng Duan .

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

About this chapter

Cite this chapter.

Duan, P. (2020). The Rise, Concept and Manifestations of Media Convergence. In: Media Convergence and the Development Strategies of Radio and Television in China. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-33-4149-4_1

Download citation

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-33-4149-4_1

Published : 01 December 2020

Publisher Name : Springer, Singapore

Print ISBN : 978-981-33-4148-7

Online ISBN : 978-981-33-4149-4

eBook Packages : Literature, Cultural and Media Studies Literature, Cultural and Media Studies (R0)

Share this chapter

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Find a journal
Track your research

Search Menu
Browse content in Arts and Humanities
Browse content in Archaeology
Anglo-Saxon and Medieval Archaeology
Archaeological Methodology and Techniques
Archaeology by Region
Archaeology of Religion
Archaeology of Trade and Exchange
Biblical Archaeology
Contemporary and Public Archaeology
Environmental Archaeology
Historical Archaeology
History and Theory of Archaeology
Industrial Archaeology
Landscape Archaeology
Mortuary Archaeology
Prehistoric Archaeology
Underwater Archaeology
Urban Archaeology
Zooarchaeology
Browse content in Architecture
Architectural Structure and Design
History of Architecture
Residential and Domestic Buildings
Theory of Architecture
Browse content in Art
Art Subjects and Themes
History of Art
Industrial and Commercial Art
Theory of Art
Biographical Studies
Byzantine Studies
Browse content in Classical Studies
Classical History
Classical Philosophy
Classical Mythology
Classical Literature
Classical Reception
Classical Art and Architecture
Classical Oratory and Rhetoric
Greek and Roman Epigraphy
Greek and Roman Law
Greek and Roman Archaeology
Greek and Roman Papyrology
Late Antiquity
Religion in the Ancient World
Digital Humanities
Browse content in History
Colonialism and Imperialism
Diplomatic History
Environmental History
Genealogy, Heraldry, Names, and Honours
Genocide and Ethnic Cleansing
Historical Geography
History by Period
History of Agriculture
History of Education
History of Emotions
History of Gender and Sexuality
Industrial History
Intellectual History
International History
Labour History
Legal and Constitutional History
Local and Family History
Maritime History
Military History
National Liberation and Post-Colonialism
Oral History
Political History
Public History
Regional and National History
Revolutions and Rebellions
Slavery and Abolition of Slavery
Social and Cultural History
Theory, Methods, and Historiography
Urban History
World History
Browse content in Language Teaching and Learning
Language Learning (Specific Skills)
Language Teaching Theory and Methods
Browse content in Linguistics
Applied Linguistics
Cognitive Linguistics
Computational Linguistics
Forensic Linguistics
Grammar, Syntax and Morphology
Historical and Diachronic Linguistics
History of English
Language Acquisition
Language Variation
Language Families
Language Evolution
Language Reference
Lexicography
Linguistic Theories
Linguistic Typology
Linguistic Anthropology
Phonetics and Phonology
Psycholinguistics
Sociolinguistics
Translation and Interpretation
Writing Systems
Browse content in Literature
Bibliography
Children's Literature Studies
Literary Studies (Asian)
Literary Studies (European)
Literary Studies (Eco-criticism)
Literary Studies (Modernism)
Literary Studies (Romanticism)
Literary Studies (American)
Literary Studies - World
Literary Studies (1500 to 1800)
Literary Studies (19th Century)
Literary Studies (20th Century onwards)
Literary Studies (African American Literature)
Literary Studies (British and Irish)
Literary Studies (Early and Medieval)
Literary Studies (Fiction, Novelists, and Prose Writers)
Literary Studies (Gender Studies)
Literary Studies (Graphic Novels)
Literary Studies (History of the Book)
Literary Studies (Plays and Playwrights)
Literary Studies (Poetry and Poets)
Literary Studies (Postcolonial Literature)
Literary Studies (Queer Studies)
Literary Studies (Science Fiction)
Literary Studies (Travel Literature)
Literary Studies (War Literature)
Literary Studies (Women's Writing)
Literary Theory and Cultural Studies
Mythology and Folklore
Shakespeare Studies and Criticism
Browse content in Media Studies
Browse content in Music
Applied Music
Dance and Music
Ethics in Music
Ethnomusicology
Gender and Sexuality in Music
Medicine and Music
Music Cultures
Music and Religion
Music and Culture
Music and Media
Music Education and Pedagogy
Music Theory and Analysis
Musical Scores, Lyrics, and Libretti
Musical Structures, Styles, and Techniques
Musicology and Music History
Performance Practice and Studies
Race and Ethnicity in Music
Sound Studies
Browse content in Performing Arts
Browse content in Philosophy
Aesthetics and Philosophy of Art
Epistemology
Feminist Philosophy
History of Western Philosophy
Metaphysics
Moral Philosophy
Non-Western Philosophy
Philosophy of Science
Philosophy of Action
Philosophy of Law
Philosophy of Religion
Philosophy of Language
Philosophy of Mind
Philosophy of Perception
Philosophy of Mathematics and Logic
Practical Ethics
Social and Political Philosophy
Browse content in Religion
Biblical Studies
Christianity
East Asian Religions
History of Religion
Judaism and Jewish Studies
Qumran Studies
Religion and Education
Religion and Health
Religion and Politics
Religion and Science
Religion and Law
Religion and Art, Literature, and Music
Religious Studies
Browse content in Society and Culture
Cookery, Food, and Drink
Cultural Studies
Customs and Traditions
Ethical Issues and Debates
Hobbies, Games, Arts and Crafts
Lifestyle, Home, and Garden
Natural world, Country Life, and Pets
Popular Beliefs and Controversial Knowledge
Sports and Outdoor Recreation
Technology and Society
Travel and Holiday
Visual Culture
Browse content in Law
Arbitration
Browse content in Company and Commercial Law
Commercial Law
Company Law
Browse content in Comparative Law
Systems of Law
Competition Law
Browse content in Constitutional and Administrative Law
Government Powers
Judicial Review
Local Government Law
Military and Defence Law
Parliamentary and Legislative Practice
Construction Law
Contract Law
Browse content in Criminal Law
Criminal Procedure
Criminal Evidence Law
Sentencing and Punishment
Employment and Labour Law
Environment and Energy Law
Browse content in Financial Law
Banking Law
Insolvency Law
History of Law
Human Rights and Immigration
Intellectual Property Law
Browse content in International Law
Private International Law and Conflict of Laws
Public International Law
IT and Communications Law
Jurisprudence and Philosophy of Law
Law and Politics
Law and Society
Browse content in Legal System and Practice
Courts and Procedure
Legal Skills and Practice
Primary Sources of Law
Regulation of Legal Profession
Medical and Healthcare Law
Browse content in Policing
Criminal Investigation and Detection
Police and Security Services
Police Procedure and Law
Police Regional Planning
Browse content in Property Law
Personal Property Law
Study and Revision
Terrorism and National Security Law
Browse content in Trusts Law
Wills and Probate or Succession
Browse content in Medicine and Health
Browse content in Allied Health Professions
Arts Therapies
Clinical Science
Dietetics and Nutrition
Occupational Therapy
Operating Department Practice
Physiotherapy
Radiography
Speech and Language Therapy
Browse content in Anaesthetics
General Anaesthesia
Neuroanaesthesia
Browse content in Clinical Medicine
Acute Medicine
Cardiovascular Medicine
Clinical Genetics
Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics
Dermatology
Endocrinology and Diabetes
Gastroenterology
Genito-urinary Medicine
Geriatric Medicine
Infectious Diseases
Medical Oncology
Medical Toxicology
Pain Medicine
Palliative Medicine
Rehabilitation Medicine
Respiratory Medicine and Pulmonology
Rheumatology
Sleep Medicine
Sports and Exercise Medicine
Clinical Neuroscience
Community Medical Services
Critical Care
Emergency Medicine
Forensic Medicine
Haematology
History of Medicine
Browse content in Medical Dentistry
Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery
Paediatric Dentistry
Restorative Dentistry and Orthodontics
Surgical Dentistry
Medical Ethics
Browse content in Medical Skills
Clinical Skills
Communication Skills
Nursing Skills
Surgical Skills
Medical Statistics and Methodology
Browse content in Neurology
Clinical Neurophysiology
Neuropathology
Nursing Studies
Browse content in Obstetrics and Gynaecology
Gynaecology
Occupational Medicine
Ophthalmology
Otolaryngology (ENT)
Browse content in Paediatrics
Neonatology
Browse content in Pathology
Chemical Pathology
Clinical Cytogenetics and Molecular Genetics
Histopathology
Medical Microbiology and Virology
Patient Education and Information
Browse content in Pharmacology
Psychopharmacology
Browse content in Popular Health
Caring for Others
Complementary and Alternative Medicine
Self-help and Personal Development
Browse content in Preclinical Medicine
Cell Biology
Molecular Biology and Genetics
Reproduction, Growth and Development
Primary Care
Professional Development in Medicine
Browse content in Psychiatry
Addiction Medicine
Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
Forensic Psychiatry
Learning Disabilities
Old Age Psychiatry
Psychotherapy
Browse content in Public Health and Epidemiology
Epidemiology
Public Health
Browse content in Radiology
Clinical Radiology
Interventional Radiology
Nuclear Medicine
Radiation Oncology
Reproductive Medicine
Browse content in Surgery
Cardiothoracic Surgery
Gastro-intestinal and Colorectal Surgery
General Surgery
Neurosurgery
Paediatric Surgery
Peri-operative Care
Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery
Surgical Oncology
Transplant Surgery
Trauma and Orthopaedic Surgery
Vascular Surgery
Browse content in Science and Mathematics
Browse content in Biological Sciences
Aquatic Biology
Biochemistry
Bioinformatics and Computational Biology
Developmental Biology
Ecology and Conservation
Evolutionary Biology
Genetics and Genomics
Microbiology
Molecular and Cell Biology
Natural History
Plant Sciences and Forestry
Research Methods in Life Sciences
Structural Biology
Systems Biology
Zoology and Animal Sciences
Browse content in Chemistry
Analytical Chemistry
Computational Chemistry
Crystallography
Environmental Chemistry
Industrial Chemistry
Inorganic Chemistry
Materials Chemistry
Medicinal Chemistry
Mineralogy and Gems
Organic Chemistry
Physical Chemistry
Polymer Chemistry
Study and Communication Skills in Chemistry
Theoretical Chemistry
Browse content in Computer Science
Artificial Intelligence
Computer Architecture and Logic Design
Game Studies
Human-Computer Interaction
Mathematical Theory of Computation
Programming Languages
Software Engineering
Systems Analysis and Design
Virtual Reality
Browse content in Computing
Business Applications
Computer Security
Computer Games
Computer Networking and Communications
Digital Lifestyle
Graphical and Digital Media Applications
Operating Systems
Browse content in Earth Sciences and Geography
Atmospheric Sciences
Environmental Geography
Geology and the Lithosphere
Maps and Map-making
Meteorology and Climatology
Oceanography and Hydrology
Palaeontology
Physical Geography and Topography
Regional Geography
Soil Science
Urban Geography
Browse content in Engineering and Technology
Agriculture and Farming
Biological Engineering
Civil Engineering, Surveying, and Building
Electronics and Communications Engineering
Energy Technology
Engineering (General)
Environmental Science, Engineering, and Technology
History of Engineering and Technology
Mechanical Engineering and Materials
Technology of Industrial Chemistry
Transport Technology and Trades
Browse content in Environmental Science
Applied Ecology (Environmental Science)
Conservation of the Environment (Environmental Science)
Environmental Sustainability
Environmentalist Thought and Ideology (Environmental Science)
Management of Land and Natural Resources (Environmental Science)
Natural Disasters (Environmental Science)
Nuclear Issues (Environmental Science)
Pollution and Threats to the Environment (Environmental Science)
Social Impact of Environmental Issues (Environmental Science)
History of Science and Technology
Browse content in Materials Science
Ceramics and Glasses
Composite Materials
Metals, Alloying, and Corrosion
Nanotechnology
Browse content in Mathematics
Applied Mathematics
Biomathematics and Statistics
History of Mathematics
Mathematical Education
Mathematical Finance
Mathematical Analysis
Numerical and Computational Mathematics
Probability and Statistics
Pure Mathematics
Browse content in Neuroscience
Cognition and Behavioural Neuroscience
Development of the Nervous System
Disorders of the Nervous System
History of Neuroscience
Invertebrate Neurobiology
Molecular and Cellular Systems
Neuroendocrinology and Autonomic Nervous System
Neuroscientific Techniques
Sensory and Motor Systems
Browse content in Physics
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Atomic, Molecular, and Optical Physics
Biological and Medical Physics
Classical Mechanics
Computational Physics
Condensed Matter Physics
Electromagnetism, Optics, and Acoustics
History of Physics
Mathematical and Statistical Physics
Measurement Science
Nuclear Physics
Particles and Fields
Plasma Physics
Quantum Physics
Relativity and Gravitation
Semiconductor and Mesoscopic Physics
Browse content in Psychology
Affective Sciences
Clinical Psychology
Cognitive Neuroscience
Cognitive Psychology
Criminal and Forensic Psychology
Developmental Psychology
Educational Psychology
Evolutionary Psychology
Health Psychology
History and Systems in Psychology
Music Psychology
Neuropsychology
Organizational Psychology
Psychological Assessment and Testing
Psychology of Human-Technology Interaction
Psychology Professional Development and Training
Research Methods in Psychology
Social Psychology
Browse content in Social Sciences
Browse content in Anthropology
Anthropology of Religion
Human Evolution
Medical Anthropology
Physical Anthropology
Regional Anthropology
Social and Cultural Anthropology
Theory and Practice of Anthropology
Browse content in Business and Management
Business Strategy
Business History
Business Ethics
Business and Government
Business and Technology
Business and the Environment
Comparative Management
Corporate Governance
Corporate Social Responsibility
Entrepreneurship
Health Management
Human Resource Management
Industrial and Employment Relations
Industry Studies
Information and Communication Technologies
International Business
Knowledge Management
Management and Management Techniques
Operations Management
Organizational Theory and Behaviour
Pensions and Pension Management
Public and Nonprofit Management
Strategic Management
Supply Chain Management
Browse content in Criminology and Criminal Justice
Criminal Justice
Criminology
Forms of Crime
International and Comparative Criminology
Youth Violence and Juvenile Justice
Development Studies
Browse content in Economics
Agricultural, Environmental, and Natural Resource Economics
Asian Economics
Behavioural Finance
Behavioural Economics and Neuroeconomics
Econometrics and Mathematical Economics
Economic Systems
Economic Methodology
Economic History
Economic Development and Growth
Financial Markets
Financial Institutions and Services
General Economics and Teaching
Health, Education, and Welfare
History of Economic Thought
International Economics
Labour and Demographic Economics
Law and Economics
Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics
Microeconomics
Public Economics
Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics
Welfare Economics
Browse content in Education
Adult Education and Continuous Learning
Care and Counselling of Students
Early Childhood and Elementary Education
Educational Equipment and Technology
Educational Strategies and Policy
Higher and Further Education
Organization and Management of Education
Philosophy and Theory of Education
Schools Studies
Secondary Education
Teaching of a Specific Subject
Teaching of Specific Groups and Special Educational Needs
Teaching Skills and Techniques
Browse content in Environment
Applied Ecology (Social Science)
Climate Change
Conservation of the Environment (Social Science)
Environmentalist Thought and Ideology (Social Science)
Natural Disasters (Environment)
Social Impact of Environmental Issues (Social Science)
Browse content in Human Geography
Cultural Geography
Economic Geography
Political Geography
Browse content in Interdisciplinary Studies
Communication Studies
Museums, Libraries, and Information Sciences
Browse content in Politics
African Politics
Asian Politics
Chinese Politics
Comparative Politics
Conflict Politics
Elections and Electoral Studies
Environmental Politics
European Union
Foreign Policy
Gender and Politics
Human Rights and Politics
Indian Politics
International Relations
International Organization (Politics)
International Political Economy
Irish Politics
Latin American Politics
Middle Eastern Politics
Political Methodology
Political Communication
Political Philosophy
Political Sociology
Political Theory
Political Behaviour
Political Economy
Political Institutions
Politics and Law
Public Administration
Public Policy
Quantitative Political Methodology
Regional Political Studies
Russian Politics
Security Studies
State and Local Government
UK Politics
US Politics
Browse content in Regional and Area Studies
African Studies
Asian Studies
East Asian Studies
Japanese Studies
Latin American Studies
Middle Eastern Studies
Native American Studies
Scottish Studies
Browse content in Research and Information
Research Methods
Browse content in Social Work
Addictions and Substance Misuse
Adoption and Fostering
Care of the Elderly
Child and Adolescent Social Work
Couple and Family Social Work
Developmental and Physical Disabilities Social Work
Direct Practice and Clinical Social Work
Emergency Services
Human Behaviour and the Social Environment
International and Global Issues in Social Work
Mental and Behavioural Health
Social Justice and Human Rights
Social Policy and Advocacy
Social Work and Crime and Justice
Social Work Macro Practice
Social Work Practice Settings
Social Work Research and Evidence-based Practice
Welfare and Benefit Systems
Browse content in Sociology
Childhood Studies
Community Development
Comparative and Historical Sociology
Economic Sociology
Gender and Sexuality
Gerontology and Ageing
Health, Illness, and Medicine
Marriage and the Family
Migration Studies
Occupations, Professions, and Work
Organizations
Population and Demography
Race and Ethnicity
Social Theory
Social Movements and Social Change
Social Research and Statistics
Social Stratification, Inequality, and Mobility
Sociology of Religion
Sociology of Education
Sport and Leisure
Urban and Rural Studies
Browse content in Warfare and Defence
Defence Strategy, Planning, and Research
Land Forces and Warfare
Military Administration
Military Life and Institutions
Naval Forces and Warfare
Other Warfare and Defence Issues
Peace Studies and Conflict Resolution
Weapons and Equipment

The Oxford Handbook of Mobile Communication and Society

< Previous chapter
Next chapter >

2.6 Mobile Convergence

Leopoldina Fortunati teaches Sociology of Communication and Sociology of Cultural Processes at the Faculty of Education of the University of Udine, Italy. She has conducted extensive research in the field of gender studies, cultural processes and communication and information technologies.

Maria Bakardjieva is professor and chair in communication and media studies at the University of Calgary, Canada. She is the author of Internet Society: The Internet in Everyday Life (2005, Sage) and co-editor of three collections, most recently, Socialbots and Their Friends: Digital Media and the Automation of Sociality (2017, Routledge) with Robert Gehl. She has numerous peer-reviewed publications in leading journals and influential anthologies in the area of communication and media studies with a focus on the internet and digital media use in various social contexts. Between 2010 and 2013, she served as the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, published by the International Communication Association. Her current projects investigate the roles digital media play in citizen engagement and democratic participation.

Published: 02 April 2020
Cite Icon Cite
Permissions Icon Permissions

This chapter aims to construct a line of inquiry on mobile convergence, a notion that has evolved since the end of the twentieth century, and to highlight the most promising directions of research. The authors apply the notion of mobile convergence not only to the convergence between the mobile phone and other communication media but also to the convergence of the smartphone with different families of objects. After a critical review of the most important studies that have been carried out on this topic, the authors advance the theoretical reflection on convergence in an attempt to capture the driving forces behind this phenomenon. To do so, they explore convergence from a sociological perspective and through the lens of political economy. Finally, they offer a projection regarding the new directions in which mobile convergence processes are headed and the new assemblages of devices and practices this convergence could bring about in the context of the Internet of things and QR codes.

Introduction: Convergence in the Media Landscape

Convergence has been a continuing, even though uneven, trend in the development of information and communication media in their capacity as technologies, social institutions, and cultural forms and practices (Grant & Wilkinson, 2009 ; Lugmayr & Dal Zotto, 2016 ). Various definitions of media convergence have emphasized one of these dimensions or attempted to hold them in a balance (e.g., Bohlin, Brodin, Lundgren, & Thorngren, 2002 ; Jenkins, 2008 ; Meikle & Young, 2012 ; Murdock, 2000 ). Each dimension is an abstract and complex category that itself can be broken down into more concrete entities and manifestations. Technology, for example, comprises communication devices, channels, networks, platforms, and software. Social institutions include media industries, organizations, services, and regulatory regimes. Finally, cultural forms can be subdivided into media modalities, content, genres, aesthetics, and use practices. Accordingly, processes of media convergence can be examined at many different levels and degrees of concretization.

A great upsurge in technological convergence driven by governments, research centers, innovators, and corporations brought about the marriage of computer and telecommunication systems initially captured by the word telematics (Nora & Minc, 1980 ). Visionaries like Nicolas Negroponte and Ithel de Sola Pool saw different communication technologies as “suffering a joint metamorphosis” (cited in Meikle & Young, 2012 , p. 7) and producing a “convergence of modes” (Pool, 1983 , p. 23) that blurs the lines between media of point-to-point communication and those of mass communication. Pool attributed these developments to the “ability of digital electronics” to bring all modes of communication into “one grand system.” Negroponte, for his part, anticipated the convergence of media industries to go hand in hand with this technological change. He is said to have drawn circles in his presentations illustrating how the “broadcast and motion picture industry,” “computer industry,” and “print and publishing industry” would overlap almost totally by 2000 (Gordon, 2003 ).

Convergence: Rooting the Concept in a New Materiality

Since the mid-1990s, media convergence has become a widely used concept and an object of numerous definitional attempts on the part of industry players, academics, and political bodies.

The EU green paper on convergence, for example, defined convergence as “the ability of different network platforms to carry essentially similar kinds of services, or the coming together of consumer devices such as the telephone, television and personal computer” (European Commission, 1997 , p. 623). On the academic side, the editorial published in the inaugural issue of the new scholarly journal titled Convergence argued:

One word describes the current developments in broadcasting, multimedia, programme-making, virtual reality, entertainment and telecommunications “convergence.” 1 The term is most frequently used to signal the convergence of once-discrete technologies such as the arcade game and the personal computer. But, of course, the range of developments is much greater and other factors are involved—social, cultural and economic as well as technological. (Knight & Weedon, 1995 , p. 5)

Convergence has often been seen as a top-down, industrial process. At the economic level, it is defined commonly as the merging of previously separated markets and the redefinition of boundaries across four sectors: information technology, telecoms, media, and consumer electronics. Lind ( 2004 ) outlines its recent history, which shows two peaks, in 1994 and in 1999–2001, and not a few failures. He notes that the green paper on convergence (European Commission, 1997 ) conceptualizes convergence as constituted by four levels: technology and the network platforms, industry alliances and mergers, services and markets, and policy and regulation.

Jenkins ( 2001 , 2008 ) has insisted that convergence can be properly understood only in terms of an open and ongoing process occurring at several intersections of information and communication technologies and media, industries, content, genres, and audiences’ roles. These intersecting developments for Jenkins constitute a sweeping “convergence culture” that transforms the entire media landscape. As an open process, convergence is dialectically intertwined with its opposite: divergence. The relationship between these two processes can occur in the same technological artifact. We talk, for example, about mobile television as a case of convergence between two media—the mobile phone and television—but television has not only migrated toward the mobile phone (and the internet). At the same time, it is undergoing a process of divergence, becoming digital terrestrial television, satellite TV, cable TV, internet protocol TV, and web/net TV.

Recently, Balbi ( 2017 ) has pointed out that during the last decades four different discourses on media convergence have developed. The first has focused on the technological coming together and integration of different devices in the so-called überbox. Jenkins has argued (2001) that it brought about a new language that put together words, images, and sounds inside the same digital signal: digitalization. The second discourse strand has considered the economic/market dimension, often analyzed through synergies, acquisitions, and mergers among telecommunications and media groups in different sectors: film, television, book, radio, games, the Web, music, and so on. The third has assumed the political/regulatory perspective to examine the policies aiming to regulate, manage, and respond to market convergence in different countries and institutions. Finally, the fourth type of discourse takes the cultural perspective, which has explored new coproduction and codistribution of content by prod-users and by a myriad of different actors as the key driver in media convergence. These four discourses can be expanded further to include a Foucauldian perspective that looks at convergence as a mode of administering populations, as a mechanism of power, and as a strategy of resistance against this control by users and audiences.

These discourses so far have neglected the materiality of the processes of convergence and divergence and the analysis of the labor forces involved, namely, the division and cooperation of labor. We argue that convergence and divergence are processes connected profoundly with these forces. The development of the division of labor in organizations leads to the parcelization and specialization of single tasks and skills and thus tends to drive the technological sector toward the divergence of technologies. The development of the cooperation of labor works in the opposite direction: It encourages the integration of different tasks and skills and thus pushes the technological sector toward convergence. These two natural forces of social labor show how much convergence and divergence processes are based on the materiality of labor organization in the spheres of production and re-production and in workers’ agency. They show that convergence and divergence, far from being only a technological matter, are in reality profoundly influenced by the economic system and its logics and dynamics.

In this chapter, we set our focus on one particular direction of media convergence—mobile convergence—and examine it in its technological, institutional, and sociocultural aspects. We ask the following questions: What macro-sociological factors drive mobile convergence? Who are the main actors in its social construction? What new social and cultural practices does it engender? And what are the broader implications of the resultant changes in interpersonal and public communication?

Mobile Convergence: A Concept That Is Still Open and Dynamic

Due to its ability to facilitate the mobility of both information and physical bodies at the same time, wireless technology has been a desired convergence partner to a wide range of specialized technological systems, with applications spanning the epic and the banal, from space exploration to warehouse radio frequency identification tags. The mobile phone brings this feat to fruition—it allows information to move to and from moving human bodies. As a union between wireless and computer network technologies, it binds the human body to cyberspace, a convergence process with significant social and cultural implications. Among the various trajectories of research and reflection focusing on these implications, we can highlight those looking at the convergence between the mobile phone and photography (e.g., Hjorth, 2008 ; Koskinen, 2017 ; Chapter 7.3 ) and between mobile communication and writing (see Chapter 7.4 ), fashion (e.g., Katz & Sugiyama, 2006 ), and social networks (Lenhart, Purcell, Smith, & Zickuhr, 2010 ). However, the topics that have attracted most scholarly attention are news media convergence, especially with news production and consumption (Dimmick, Feaster, & Hoplamazian, 2011 ; Erdal, 2007 ; Spyridou and Veglis, 2016 ), television (Kim, 2017 ), and mobile sociality (de Souza e Silva, 2006 ; Fortunati and Taipale, 2017a , 2017b ).

Three Theoretical Approaches to Understanding Mobile Convergence

From a theoretical perspective, the concepts of assemblage, remediation, and bricolage have been used by analysts to capture the contingency and unpredictability that have marked the advance of mobile convergence. Nail ( 2017 ), for example, employs Deleuze’s and Guattari’s term agencement (translated in English as “assemblage”) to construe convergence as “the rejection of unity in favor of multiplicity, and the rejection of essence in favor of events” (p. 22). Nail stresses that for the two French philosophers the assemblage implicates the construction not of a new organic whole whose parts work together but of a multiplicity always free to recombine again and change its nature. Furthermore, the assemblage provides a valid alternative to the search for the essence of things (p. 23). Deleuze and Guattari do not ask what a thing is, but they approach its essence as if it was an accident, an event, contingent features produced and observed in a network of processes that shape a specific set of relations. Nail’s reading of Deleuze and Guattari explains the reasons for the failure of several convergence processes. For example, the convergence between the mobile and television failed because television was incorporated into the mobile not as “TV for the mobile” but as “TV in the mobile” (Kim, 2017 ). They remained two different artifacts that were not able to recombine and integrate. By contrast, the convergence between the mobile phone and the video has been more successful because their respective languages were more compatible.

The second theoretical perspective on convergence proposes to conceptualize convergence as producing a unit, a new whole. It has been outlined by Deuze ( 2006 ) and further elaborated by Schmidt and de Kloet’s work ( 2017 ) centering on the contribution of users and audiences and the notion of bricolage. Bricolage, or mash-up or remix, occurs when media elements that were separated are put together in order to form a new whole that carries different meanings from those conveyed by the original elements. Deuze uses the concept of bricolage to depict “the remixing, reconstructing and re-using of separate artifacts, actions, ideas, signs, symbols and styles in order to create new insights and meanings” (2006, p. 70). Drawing on Lévi-Strauss’ ( 1962 ) and Derrida’s ( 1978 ) discourses on bricolage, Schmidt and de Kloet elaborate the idea of a bricolage as a cheap way of producing media content and creating new meanings by recycling available fragments. The most powerful example of mobile bricolage is the convergence between the mobile phone and photography. The fusion of these two artifacts has brought about mobile photography, in which the mobile and the camera work as a unit to capture from a close distance the subtle images of everyday life (Hjorth, 2008 ; Koskinen, 2017 ; Chapter 7.3 ).

The third theoretical perspective on convergence is represented by the work of Bolter and Grusin ( 1999 ) who, drawing on McLuhan’s concept of “mediation,” introduce the notion of “remediation” to describe “the representation of one medium in another” (p. 45). Bolter and Grusin offer systematic analysis of processes such as digitalization and its consequences for analog media, re- and trans-codification, and competition between old and new media. Remediation, they propose, is a practice typical of both new and old media forms that continually inform and shape one another. The media landscape is made of media that resonate with, compete with, and reshape other media. Media evolution does not follow a linear trajectory, but it is rather based on a genealogy of affiliations, whereby older media can remediate newer ones. An example of remediation in this context has been realized by an older medium (the mobile phone) toward a newer one, the internet (Fortunati & Contarello, 2002 ). The mobile phone, incorporating the new medium, the internet, has allowed it to reach and connect every corner of the world. The extraordinary diffusion of the mobile phone has served to popularize the internet and facilitate access to it.

In the next section we focus on the convergence of the mobile phone with other communication technologies and its social implications from a theoretical point of view.

Expanding Further the Concept of Mobile Convergence

The scope of the concept of mobile convergence should be expanded further. Convergence, as Jenkins ( 2001 ) writes, tends to remain focused on the same product category: digital communication technology and its various features such as languages, genres, and use practices. In contrast, it is important to consider the convergence of the mobile phone with objects belonging to different categories, such as music, news, and fashion. Here, we will focus on two examples: the human body and the family of “essential objects” (Fortunati, 2008 ). The most important trend of mobile convergence is the bringing back of the body into the virtual world—a marriage of embodiment and digital virtuality. The rhythms and dynamics of the human body, the personal space where the mobile phone is located, become the points of convergence with this device. The mobile phone is shaped by the human body, and in turn it shapes the body and its gestures as well as its postures, adornment, and attire. This convergence with the human body goes beyond the skin to include fitness and health. There are many works on the convergence of the mobile phone, especially apps, with technologies and practices of diagnostics and treatment. Research has been conducted on mobile apps for diabetes management (Boyle, Grainger, Hall, & Krebs, 2017 ; Brzan, Rotman, Pajnkihar, & Klanjsek, 2016 ) for the monitoring of rheumatoid arthritis (Grainger, Townsley, White, Langlotz, & Taylor, 2017 ), depression (BinDhim et al., 2016 ), multiple sclerosis (Winberg et al., 2017 ), and cancer (Kessel et al., 2017 ). The numerous apps for measuring and managing physical activity and fitness exercise have created user cultures of their own as well as a sizable body of academic literature (Direito, Jiang, Whittaker, & Maddison, 2015 ). Despite the evident difficulties of the convergence between the mobile phone and medical technologies, the efforts in that direction can be read as an even more advanced form of reaching into the body beyond the surface (as happens in fashion).

The second example of mobile convergence is with the family of essential objects. As Flügel ( 1969 ) has pointed out, the small essential objects, such as the wallet, keys, handkerchief, and glasses, are carried in pockets or in handbags and have not yet found an ideal place. It has always been an unresolved problem where to put all these objects. New portable technologies (mobiles, Walkman players, laptops) have enriched the family of essential objects and deepened the problem in terms of fashion. These objects have a spatial contiguity with the mobile phone and share with it the affordances of portability and wearability. Thus, they are good candidates for converging with this device. This type of convergence has generated some attention by mobile communication scholars, especially those studying the diffusion and adoption of the mobile phone in developing countries where users pioneered the definition of the mobile phone as a purse. In these countries, micropayments and money transfers (through services such as M-pesa, EasyPaisa, WeChat) became widespread practices of mobile owners and users (Donner, 2008 ). This particular form of convergence of the mobile phone with the wallet has been shown to be extremely successful over time. In China, for example, now the mobile phone is increasingly replacing cash and credit cards as a tool for payments. Thanks to the application for reading the QR codes, the mobile has become a tool for immediate payments of anything, even for small purchases such as a bottle of water.

The sociological meaning of the concept of mobile convergence should also be expanded by including the category of space in the framework. Mobile convergence, like general convergence, means space-saving, a concept that resonates with economic saving thanks to the effects of scale and scope economies and the resultant competitive advantages. For example, a fusion between two different devices like the mobile and television not only occurs at a technological level but also implies the concentration of these two different objects in a single point. The mobile phone in the ongoing process of convergence has incorporated a plethora of devices and objects such as the address book, the notepad, the camera, the calendar, the watch, the alarm clock, the recorder, the calculator, and the flashlight, objects that were previously scattered across individuals’ personal and work spaces. However, what might appear at first glance as a good thing, that is, a rationalization of space, reduction of complexity, and the consequent simplification of the grammar of the actions/tasks accomplished in different spaces (Fagerjord & Storsul, 2007 ; Noll, 2002 ; Silverstone, 1995 ), may present other less positive consequences. Among these problematic consequences is the loss of effectiveness in functionality and the emerging of a new model of control. Smartphone users recognize that its new multifunctionality happens at the expense of the quality of many of the services packed into it. Furthermore, mobile convergence has consequences also for the structure of control. When the management of multiple activities has converged into one central device, this produces multiple vulnerabilities. On the one hand, any dysfunction in this control center could take control out of users’ hands and result in the simultaneous breakdown of numerous processes essential to their life and well-being. On the other hand, the increase in the number of streams of information about users’ activities passing through one and the same gateway—due to convergence processes—concentrates the multifarious traces of their daily life and makes them available for monitoring, storage, and mining by external agencies beyond the knowledge and awareness of users themselves (e.g., Facebook and the Cambridge Analytica case). It is true that users and scholars can also benefit from such convergence practices, but in the majority of cases their capacity to process and interpret the data is not comparable to that of specialized firms such as Cambridge Analytica.

Notably, this kind of centralization of control functions into one node runs opposite to the initial logic of internet architecture, which sought to multiply control centers so that the loss of one did not lead to the collapse of the whole network. It is safer if social, economic, and political control is diversified since each point of control in case of emergency can support and be subsidiary to another point of control. For example, when the mobile is a different tool from the wallet, if one loses the mobile, at least she or he has the wallet with the identification and credit cards or money. But if the smartphone has blended with the wallet, if she or he loses the mobile, she or he loses everything. Mobile convergence integrates and rationalizes space and functionality, but it can also create points of extraordinary vulnerability for human agents.

Open Issues and Future Trends

The first open issue is that in a globalization framework convergence acquires more merits than divergence (Jenkins, 2001 ). Its economic and political driving force is the fusion of processes that were so far distinct. The merging of work, organization, and information/communication processes implicates the transformation of professional roles, the disappearance of old jobs and the emerging of new jobs, the acquisition of different types of skills, and the merging of industrial groups inside the same sectors and in different sectors. In this metaprocess, globalization is supported by digitalization and by a series of innovations that work in the direction of convergence.

To understand future trends, we need to distinguish between short-range and long-range trends. Considering short-range trends, we should look at mobile convergence not through the smartphone as the main locus where this will happen but through the technological infrastructure that serves and surrounds the smartphone as well as the other information and communication technologies. Shifting the locus to the technological infrastructure implies that it does not make sense to continue to speak about a convergence regarding one or more devices but regarding the whole network of personal technologies (Fortunati & Taipale, 2017a ).

The second open issue is the networks’ convergence, that is, the integration between fixed and mobile networks, made possible by the optical access network systems, which are changing from the fiber-to-the-home/fiber-to-the-building infrastructure to a common access platform. This new architecture supports both the fixed and mobile broadband services. Thanks to the advent of 5G, this convergence represents a great challenge for carriers, but it offers a more efficient use of network resources, whether fixed, mobile, or Wi-Fi (Gosselin et al., 2015 ; Ruffini, 2017 ). If this fixed–mobile convergence offers savings for customers and not only for carriers, this could lead many people to decide to reintegrate the fixed telephone in their network of personal technologies. The fixed line in fact was eliminated by many people not because it was useless but because, after the mobile phone adoption, it represented an additional cost for families: They had to pay the bill for the fixed and for the mobile. If for the same price people can have both the fixed and the mobile line, it is likely that many will reintroduce the fixed line at home because it still offers benefits such as more privacy and control.

The third open issue is the necessary harmonization of all devices and networks with other convergence processes that are taking place at the level of general infrastructure with the purpose to grow service revenues and minimize actual capital and operating costs. Inside this new framework, a crucial point to monitor will be the impact of next-generation mobile technologies on the internet of things and cloud computing convergence that will allow any single device to deliver a higher volume of data and services via heterogeneous access networks (Hossain et al., 2017 , p. 18). The smartphone, as Bunz and Meikle ( 2018 ) argue, represents a leading exemplar of the looming internet of things. The expanding functionalities of this networked device equipped with many sensors demonstrate what transformations can be expected when things become networked and learn to generate and share information about the world around them. Fitting the smartphone with sensors for the recognition of voice, light, retina, fingerprint, direction and pace of movement, etc. pushes ahead its convergence with countless networked objects. It makes it a prime connection hub and control interface on that network.

The fourth open issue is the convergence of mobile technologies with computerization, automation, and robotization processes in many everyday life technologies (see Chapter 12.2 ).

The fifth open issue is cultural influence. Let us be prepared for the fact that different cultures will interpret differently and domesticate differently convergence processes. The mobile in China, Japan, and Korea has been used more as a computer than in Europe from the early stages of its adoption. The practices of use that read the technological artifact in one way rather than the other affect the convergence process.

In the short-range trends, it seems that we are going toward a technological deterministic period in which the most relevant initiatives will be taken by carriers, operators, and technological enterprises coming from different sectors such as telecommunications, computing, networks, artificial intelligence, and robotics. The heterogeneity of these highly competitive industrial actors may create some difficulty in the process in addition to great opportunities.

In the long-range trends, smartphone users will be able to decide whether to adopt and domesticate the new functions and services that will follow from this convergent infrastructure pushed by the industry and eventually to domesticate them. The sensitive issues at stake are two: (1) the danger of an increased complexity that will discourage some social groups from adopting the new devices and/or services and functions and (2) the question whether customers will agree to pay the increasing costs of this new infrastructural convergence or if this new convergence level will reduce the cost of services.

By tracing the long history of technological convergence and focusing on one of its latest peaks, mobile convergence, we have charted a steady trend in the development of communication technology that is expected to continue unabated into the future. Mobile convergence is shown to create new affordances within the framework of existing devices, thus fundamentally changing their identity. Converging infrastructures, industries, and cultural practices furnish its steady advancement. Mobility and ubiquity are the leading goals that bring together functional features and data streams, allowing the interweaving of symbolic, digital, and physical artifacts into a unified system. Mobile convergence explosively extends the reach of the user into informational, relational, and physical spaces all through a single entry point. At the same time, it puts unobstructed access to the user’s physical and symbolic world in the hands of the operator of her or his mobile device. With vertical integration and convergence of industries and infrastructures, multistranded data sets about users converge into databases controlled by a few such operators. These growing trends in the political economy and sociology of mobile convergence should be placed at the center of future investigations.

In the citation we deleted the asterix after the word “telecommunications” because its meaning is not clear.

Balbi, G. ( 2017 ). Deconstructing “media convergence”: A cultural history of the buzzword, 1980s–2010s. In S. Sparviero , C. Peil , & G. Balbi (Eds.), Media convergence and deconvergence. Global transformations in media and communication research — A Palgrave and IAMCR Series (pp. 31–51). Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan.

BinDhim, N. F. , Alanazi, E. M. , Aljadhey, H. , Basyouni, M. H. , Kowalski, S. R. , Pont, L. G. , … Alhawassi, T. M. ( 2016 ). Does a mobile phone depression-screening app motivate mobile phone users with high depressive symptoms to seek a health care professional’s help? Journal of Medical Internet Research , 18 (6), e156.

Google Scholar

Bohlin, E. , Brodin, K. , Lundgren, A. , & Thorngren, B. ( 2002 ). Convergence in communications and beyond . Amsterdam, The Netherlands: Emerald Group.

Google Preview

Bolter, J. D. , & Grusin, R. ( 1999 ). Remediation: Understanding new media . Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Boyle, L. , Grainger, R. , Hall, R. M. , & Krebs, J. D. ( 2017 ). Use of and beliefs about mobile phone apps for diabetes self-management: Surveys of people in a hospital diabetes clinic and diabetes health professionals in New Zealand. Journal of Medical Internet Research Mhealth and Uhealth , 5 (6), e85.

Brzan, P. P. , Rotman, E. , Pajnkihar, M. , & Klanjsek, P. ( 2016 ). Mobile applications for control and self management of diabetes: A systematic review. Journal of Medical Systems , 40 (9), 210.

Bunz, M. , & Meikle, G. ( 2018 ). The Internet of things . Cambridge, MA: Polity Press.

Derrida, J. ( 1978 ). Structure, sign, and play in the discourse of the human sciences. In A. Bass (Trans.), Writing and difference (pp. 278–294). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

De Souza e Silva, A. ( 2006 ). Re-conceptualizing the mobile phone—From telephone to collective interfaces. Australian Journal of Emerging Technologies and Society , 4(2), 108–127.

Deuze, M. ( 2006 ). Participation, remediation, bricolage: Considering principal components of a digital culture. The Information Society , 22 (2), 63–75.

Direito, A. , Jiang, Y. , Whittaker, R. , & Maddison, R. ( 2015 ). Apps for improving fitness and increasing physical activity among young people: The AIMFIT pragmatic randomized controlled trial. Journal of Medical Internet Research , 17 (8), e210.

Dimmick, J. , Feaster, J. C. , & Hoplamazian, G. I. ( 2011 ). News in the interstices: The niches of mobile media in space and time. New Media & Society , 13 (1), 23–39.

Donner, J. ( 2008 ). Research approaches to mobile use in the developing world. A review of the literature. The Information Society , 24 (3), 140–159.

Erdal, I. J. ( 2007 ). Researching media convergence and crossmedia news production. Nordicom Review , 28 (2), 51–61.

European Commission. (1997). Green paper on the convergence of the telecommunications, media and information technology sectors, and the implications for regulation—Towards an information society approach. Retrieved from https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/news/green-paper-convergence-telecommunications-media-and-information-technology-sectors-and

Fagerjord, A. , & Storsul, T. ( 2007 ). Questioning convergence. In T. Storsul & D. Stuedahl (Eds.), Ambivalence towards convergence: Digitalization and media change (pp. 19–31). Göteborg, Sweden: Nordicom, Göteborgs Universitet.

Flügel, J. C. ( 1969 ). The psychology of clothes . New York, NY: International University Press. (Original work published 1930).

Fortunati, L. ( 2008 ). Mobile convergence. In K. Nyiri (Ed.), Integration and ubiquity. Towards a philosophy of telecommunications convergence (pp. 221–228). Vienna, Austria: Passagen Verlag.

Fortunati, L. , & Contarello, A. ( 2002 ). Internet–mobile convergence: Via similarity or complementarity? Trends in Communication , 9 , 81–98.

Fortunati, L. , & Taipale, S. ( 2017 a). Mobilities and the network of personal technologies: Refining the understanding of mobility structure. Telematics & Informatics , 34 (2), 560–568.

Fortunati, L. , & Taipale, S. ( 2017 b). A different glimpse into mobilities: On the interrelations between daily spatial mobility and social mobility. The Information Society , 33 (5), 261–270.

Gordon, R. ( 2003 ). The meanings and implications of convergence. In K. Kawamoto (Ed.), Digital journalism: Emerging media and the changing horizons of journalism (pp. 57–73). Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield.

Gosselin, S. , Pizzinat, A. , Grall, X. , Breuer, D. , Bogenfeld, E. , Krauß, S. , … Skubic, B. ( 2015 ). Fixed and mobile convergence: Which role for optical networks? Journal of Optical Communications and Networking , 7 (11), 1075–1083.

Grainger, R. , Townsley, H. , White, B. , Langlotz, T. , Taylor, WJ. ( 2017 ). “ Apps for People With Rheumatoid Arthritis to Monitor Their Disease Activity: A Review of Apps for Best Practice and Quality. ” Journal of Medical Internet Research , Mhealth and Uhealth 5(2):e7.

Grant, A. E. , & Wilkinson, J. ( 2009 ). Understanding media convergence: The state of the field . New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Hjorth, L. ( 2008 ). Being real in the mobile reel. A case study on convergent mobile media as domesticated new media in Seoul, South Korea. Convergence , 1 , 91–104.

Hossain, M. S. , Xu, C. , Li, Y. , Pathan, A. K. , Bilbao, J. , Zeng, W. , & El Saddik, A. ( 2017 ). Impact of next-generation mobile technologies on IoT–cloud convergence. IEEE Communications Magazine , 55 (1), 18–19.

Jenkins, H. ( 2001 ). Convergence? I diverge. MIT Technology Review , 93 . Retrieved from https://www.technologyreview.com/s/401042/convergence-i-diverge/

Jenkins, H. ( 2008 ). Convergence culture—Where old and new media collide . New York, NY: New York University Press.

Katz, J. E. , & Sugiyama, S. ( 2006 ). Mobile phones as fashion statements: Evidence from student surveys in the US and Japan. New Media & Society , 8 , 321–337.

Kessel, K. A. , Vogel, M. M. , Kessel, C. , Bier, H. , Biedermann, T. , Friess, H. , … Combs, S. E. ( 2017 ). Mobile health in oncology: A patient survey about app-assisted cancer care. Journal of Medical Internet Research Mhealth and Uhealth , 5 (6), e81.

Kim, P. ( 2017 ). Contextualizing the failure of mobile TV service in Korea. The Information Society , 33 (1), 43–48.

Knight, J. , & Weedon, A. ( 1995 ). Editorial. Convergence , 1 (1), 5–8.

Koskinen, I. ( 2017 ). Mobile multimedia in action . New York, NY: Routledge.

Lenhart, A. , Purcell, K. , Smith, A. , & Zickuhr, K. ( 2010 ). Social media & mobile Internet use among teens and young adults . Washington, DC: Pew Research Center. Retrieved from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED525056.pdf

Lévi-Strauss, C. ( 1962 ). La pensée sauvage . Paris: Plon.

Lind, J. (2004, September). Convergence: History of term usage and lessons for firm strategists. Paper presented at the International Telecommunications Society’s 15th Biennial Conference, Berlin, Germany. Retrieved from http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:b_8qiIkBBbQJ:userpage.fu-berlin.de/~jmueller/its/conf/berlin04/Papers/1_LIND.doc+&cd=1&hl=it&ct=clnk&gl=it

Lugmayr, A. , & Dal Zotto, C. (Eds.). ( 2016 ). Media convergence handbook. Firms and user perspectives (Vol. 2). Berlin, Germany: Springer.

Meikle, G. , & Young, S. ( 2012 ). Media convergence: Networked digital media in everyday life . Houndmills, England, and New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.

Murdock, N. ( 2000 ). Digital futures: European television in the age of convergence. In J. Wieten , G. Murdock , & P. Dahlgren (Eds.), Television across Europe (pp. 35–57). London, England: Sage.

Nail, T. ( 2017 ). What is assemblage? SubStance , 46 (1), 21–37.

Noll, M. ( 2002 ). The myth of convergence. International Journal on Media Management , 1 (5), 12–13.

Nora, S. , & Minc, A. ( 1980 ). The computerization of society: A report to the president of France. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1980. (Original work published in French 1978).

Pool, I. S. ( 1983 ). Technologies of freedom . Cambridge, MA, and London, England: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.

Ruffini, M. ( 2017 ). Multidimensional convergence in future 5G networks. Journal of Lightwave Technology , 35 (3), 535–549.

Schmidt, L. , & de Kloet, J. ( 2017 ). Bricolage: Role of media. In P. Roessler (Ed.), The international encyclopedia of media effects (Vol. 2, pp. 1–9). New York, NY: Wiley-ICA.

Silverstone, R. ( 1995 ). Convergence is a dangerous word. Convergence , 1 (1), 11–13.

Spyridou, L.-P. , & Veglis, A. ( 2016 ). Convergence and the changing labor of journalism: Towards the “superjournalist” paradigm. In A. Lugmayr & C. Dal Zotto (Eds.), Media convergence handbook. Journalism, broadcasting, and social media aspects of convergence (Vol. 1, pp. 99–116). Berlin, Germany: Springer.

Winberg, C. , Kylberg, M. , Pettersson, C. , Harnett, T. , Hedvall, P. O. , Mattsson, T. , & Månsson Lexell, E. ( 2017 ). The use of apps for health in persons with multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease and stroke—Barriers and facilitators. Studies in Health Technology Information , 242 , 638–641.

About Oxford Academic
Publish journals with us
University press partners
What we publish
New features
Open access
Institutional account management
Rights and permissions
Get help with access
Accessibility
Advertising
Media enquiries
Oxford University Press
Oxford Languages
University of Oxford

Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University's objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide

Cookie settings
Cookie policy
Privacy policy
Legal notice

This Feature Is Available To Subscribers Only

This PDF is available to Subscribers Only

For full access to this pdf, sign in to an existing account, or purchase an annual subscription.

Home — Essay Samples — Information Science and Technology — Impact of Technology — How Technology and Convergence Has Changed the Face of Mass Communication

How Technology and Convergence Has Changed The Face of Mass Communication

Categories: Impact of Technology Mass Communication

About this sample

Words: 1310 |

Published: Apr 11, 2019

Words: 1310 | Pages: 3 | 7 min read

Cite this Essay

Let us write you an essay from scratch

450+ experts on 30 subjects ready to help
Custom essay delivered in as few as 3 hours

Get high-quality help

Dr. Heisenberg

Verified writer

Expert in: Information Science and Technology Sociology

+ 120 experts online

By clicking “Check Writers’ Offers”, you agree to our terms of service and privacy policy . We’ll occasionally send you promo and account related email

No need to pay just yet!

Related Essays

6 pages / 2691 words

3 pages / 1205 words

3 pages / 1233 words

2 pages / 854 words

Remember! This is just a sample.

You can get your custom paper by one of our expert writers.

121 writers online

Still can’t find what you need?

Browse our vast selection of original essay samples, each expertly formatted and styled

Related Essays on Impact of Technology

Technology undoubtedly enriches our lives, offering endless opportunities for learning, connection, and convenience. However, as the dependence on technology among teenagers continues to rise, it's crucial to recognize both [...]

The evolution of drone technology has sparked remarkable innovations across industries, transforming the way we perceive tasks, collect data, and interact with our environment. This essay delves into the multifaceted realm of [...]

The impact of technology on teenage life today is vast and diverse. The benefits of connectivity, learning, and self-expression are counterbalanced by challenges related to mental health, physical well-being, and privacy. [...]

The impact of technology on daily life is multifaceted, touching upon communication, work, education, entertainment, health, and more. As we navigate the digital landscape, it is imperative to recognize the opportunities and [...]

The influence of media and technology pervades every corner of society, captivating individuals worldwide. From children to adults, the consumption of media and technology is ubiquitous, shaping daily routines and perceptions. [...]

The author's passion for technology and the impact of technology on the world Interest in problem-solving and its connection to technology Pursuing a diploma course in technology after secondary school Work [...]

Get Your Personalized Essay in 3 Hours or Less!

We use cookies to personalyze your web-site experience. By continuing we’ll assume you board with our cookie policy .

Instructions Followed To The Letter
Deadlines Met At Every Stage
Unique And Plagiarism Free

Communications. Monitor and Television Convergence Essay

Introduction.

The monitor and the television were in the past, viewing devices that accept signals and display them on the screens. Computer monitors accepted signals from the Central Processing Unit of the computer with the help of connectors which do not have audio circuits like the television but are controlled by specialized adaptors like the monochrome or the graphic adaptors. Televisions traditionally have data processing systems known as the MINI SUB D15Connectors. Until the recent past, media and communication systems have been separate and distinct aspects, with the television being associated with broadcasting television programs while the monitor is associated with the display of content on the computer.

However, in recent times, separate functions have begun to merge and the boundaries of these separate entities have become broader and more encompassing. In today’s times, it is a common phenomenon to watch TV on the Pc monitor and more and more desktops and notebooks are developed and manufactured with in-built TV tuners. It would not be surprising to find a 42-inch PC-TV combo in the technological market and this process which enables such “the collapse of disparate technology, equipment and services into a set of common and ubiquitous technology, equipment and services” (Internet Industry Association, 2002) is called convergence.

This paper attempts to analyze the convergence between the television and the monitor.

Television was traditionally a medium of broadcasting programs produced by television channels but is developing into an interactive medium of communication. The monitor, which was initially a simple device for the display of contents from the Central Processing Unit of the computer has now evolved into a multitasking device that allows consumers to not only use it as a monitor screen but also double up as a television. The recent innovations of high-definition plasma monitors have changed the face of television and the technology used in it.

The convergence between the television and the computer industry has enabled some of the most mind-blowing innovations in the field of technology. The latest is the merger of the large screen high-resolution television which is powered by a Pentium processor and doubles up as a multimedia computer monitor too. The new Personal Computer is converged with a Television monitor and this has resulted in a unique monitor with optimal features of a high-resolution monitor in combination with the convenience of a “high-quality television” (Business Wire, Oct 1, 1996). This new monitor allows the dual functions of watching the television without actually switching on their computer. These modern-day monitors are converged with the television enhancing technology of “built-in cable ready” tuners and can function as Personal Computers as well as television sets (Business Wire, Oct 1, 1996). Additionally, the monitors also include sound features with built-in speakers, which solves the problems of installing extra speakers at the desired place saving on time, energy, and financial resources. What is extremely pleasing is the fact that monitors are now geared with multimedia entertainment through CD-ROMS (Business Wire, 1996).

Thus we see that televisions and monitors are converging with the help of latest technological innovations which have enabled the two to function in unison with one another so that the individual features are enhanced and provide greater advantages to the users.

Internet Industry Association. (2002) IIA Convergence Virtual Taskforce.

Business Wire, (1996). Leading Convergence Company Ships New PC+TV Monitor Multimedia Options Without Disrupting TV Viewing Habits.

Chicago (A-D)
Chicago (N-B)

IvyPanda. (2021, October 5). Communications. Monitor and Television Convergence. https://ivypanda.com/essays/communications-monitor-and-television-convergence/

"Communications. Monitor and Television Convergence." IvyPanda , 5 Oct. 2021, ivypanda.com/essays/communications-monitor-and-television-convergence/.

IvyPanda . (2021) 'Communications. Monitor and Television Convergence'. 5 October.

IvyPanda . 2021. "Communications. Monitor and Television Convergence." October 5, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/communications-monitor-and-television-convergence/.

1. IvyPanda . "Communications. Monitor and Television Convergence." October 5, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/communications-monitor-and-television-convergence/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "Communications. Monitor and Television Convergence." October 5, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/communications-monitor-and-television-convergence/.

The Monitor Convergence and the Television Consumption
Converged Media: Legal, Economic, and Behavioural Impact
A High-Resolution Thin-Film Probe: Development and Application
Convergence in the Television Stations
Plate Tectonics Theory and Features
Major Crimes Committed by Women
Web and Networking: Trends in the convergence of wireless networks
Multimedia Technology for Teaching and Learning
321 Water as a Bottle With a Built-in Filter
Convergence of World Economies
Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry
The Effect of Knowledge Advances on the Use of Wireless
Why Is the High Tech Architecture Becoming So Popular between the Architects Now Days?
Thomas Edison's Study of Electricity
The Origin of QWERTY Keyboard

Two Exceptional Journalism Students to Share 2024 Gridiron Scholarship Award

You are here: american university school of communication news two exceptional journalism students share 2024 gridiron scholarship award.

(202) 885-2058

McKinley Building on a map

Two Exceptional Journalism Students Share 2024 Gridiron Scholarship Award

The Gridiron Club and Foundation of D.C. has been a long-standing financial supporter of American University School of Communication (AU SOC) journalism students.

Our latest scholarship applications asked students to articulate the role of journalism in democracy while identifying two challenges facing the industry and their plans to tackle those issues.

A judging panel made up of professional journalists was impressed with the thoughtful, passionate responses. The competition was intense, with a significant number of excellent entries.

We’re thrilled to announce our two winners for 2024. The $5,000 scholarship pool was split between one highly qualified undergraduate journalism major and one graduate student in the Journalism and Digital Storytelling (JRDS) program.

"The Journalism and Digital Storytelling graduate program has allowed me to exercise my creativity while learning new skills that will prepare me for success in a modern journalism field. I have always been passionate about increasing voter education and participation," said Ansbacher. "I look forward to entering the field of journalism to achieve my goal of providing the public with straightforward, concise, and truthful information with which they can form views of the world around them and engage with society. The Gridiron Club’s support of the next generation of journalists is pivotal to the continuation and success of the profession, and I am grateful for their generosity and investment in my education. "

Partouche said, "I'm honored to have been recognized by the Gridiron Club and Foundation, and I'm excited to continue my journey in journalism with the support of the club while I pursue new opportunities in the field."

*WAMU is licensed by American University.

Share full article

Supported by

Is It a Blizzard? A Nor’easter? And What’s the Difference?

How to stay safe when the snow is coming down.

A 19th-century photograph shows a young man standing on a sidewalk that is piled far above his head with snow.

By Camille Baker

On March 1, 1888, a buyer for the department store Edward Ridley & Sons in New York City made an error. For $1,200, the buyer, John J. Meisinger, bought a carload of unclaimed wooden snow shovels — 3,000 of them — to sell at the store, the story goes. It was a “ridiculous low price,” Mr. Meisinger later wrote, but strangely timed. “Many of the buyers laughed at the idea of me buying snow shovels at the end of the season,” he said.

Days later, a blizzard of epic proportions had descended on the east of the country. “THE WORST STORM THE CITY HAS EVER KNOWN. BUSINESS AND TRAVEL COMPLETELY SUSPENDED,” read a headline in The New York Times on March 13. Great drifts of snow, in some places 15 feet high, accumulated across the region.

In the end, nearly 400 people died during the Great Blizzard of 1888, including 200 in New York City. Communications, commerce and travel were interrupted for days.

The story ended well for Mr. Meisinger, however, who turned a late-winter profit on his snow shovels. “Ridley’s was the only store that had a large stock of snow shovels and sold every one the first day,” he wrote. “Had the laugh on the other fellows,” he added.

Look Up How Much Snow You Might Get

How much snow to expect, blizzard. snowstorm. nor’easter. what’s the difference.

The storm of 1888 was definitively a blizzard. But what about others? Several criteria must be satisfied for the National Weather Service to use the word “blizzard,” said Eric Guillot, a winter program coordinator for the service.

The term applies only when, for at least three consecutive hours, snow is blowing or falling, winds are at least 35 miles per hour and visibility is a quarter mile or less.

True blizzards are “kind of uncommon,” Mr. Guillot said.

Canada defines a blizzard by slightly different standards, said David Phillips, a senior climatologist at Environment and Climate Change Canada. Below the tree line, where the tundra meets the forest, the criteria for visibility and wind speed are almost the same as the United States’, but the conditions must persist for four consecutive hours to constitute a blizzard there. Above the tree line, “four hours is just not going to do it, but six hours or longer would qualify,” Mr. Phillips said.

Snow doesn’t have to be falling from the sky for a blizzard to occur, Mr. Phillips emphasized. Snow from a previous storm can be picked up by the wind to form a type of blizzard referred to as a “ground blizzard,” he said.

Nor’easters are storm systems that form along the country’s East Coast and whose winds blow from the northeast. Nor’easters tend to be wet, Mr. Phillips said, and therefore less prone to generating the dry kind of snow that reduces visibility, but they can sometimes lead to blizzard conditions. The Great Blizzard of 1888, for example, began as a nor’easter.

How does a blizzard form?

Nor’easters can bring about blizzard conditions, but in the United States, blizzards are most common in the Upper Midwest and the Great Plains, according to the Weather Service.

In these areas, Mr. Phillips said, blizzards can result from weather phenomena known as “ Colorado Lows ” or, farther north, “ Alberta Clippers .” Such storm systems originate east of the Rocky Mountains and move very quickly — like a clipper ship — toward the Plains or the Midwest, he said.

Typically, Mr. Phillips said, the storms also bring “a lot of light, fluffy, dry snow that can get above the ground” and reduce visibility. When they collide with a blast of Arctic air, a blizzard can occur, blowing fiercely over the flat topography of the region, he said.

Where does the word ‘blizzard’ come from?

It depends who you ask. A week after the March 1888 blizzard, The Times was already writing about the word’s etymology. “Blizzard was first used by those who first experienced it while settling in the Western plains,” one article read. “Until bereft of our own or better authority the American theory of the American term for an American storm will hold its own,” it added.

Some believe the term was borrowed from military vocabulary, Mr. Phillips said. “The interpretation that I thought was kind of neat was that it was actually used in the United States back in the 1800s,” he said. “And it referred to a severe blow, like a cannon shot or a volley from a musket.”

The word “blizzard” could also be the result of the convergence of “ blister, bluster and blitz ,” a lexicographer told The Times in 2023.

How do I keep safe during a blizzard?

Much has changed since 1888, but blizzards can still be deadly.

In December 2022, for example, a blizzard in Buffalo killed 31 people. A team of researchers at New York University subsequently found that emergency warnings from city officials did not adequately convey how life-threatening the storm would be.

The best way to keep safe during a blizzard is to stay indoors, said Mr. Guillot of the Weather Service. Households should prepare to hunker down if necessary and should have an emergency kit with clothing, blankets, enough food and water for three days (along with a can opener), first-aid supplies, batteries, a flashlight, a phone charger and medications, he added.

“Having a NOAA weather radio so you can get the latest updates” can also help, he said, particularly if your cell service dwindles.

If you are at home during a blizzard and lose power and heat, close your blinds or curtains and any interior doors to conserve warmth, Mr. Guillot said. And don’t forget to eat and drink. “That’s the thing I feel like people don’t do, but if you drink, that provides your energy, and keeps you warmer, actually, as you’re digesting,” he said.

If you find yourself trapped in your car during a storm, Mr. Phillips said, “don’t venture out, because you’re going to get disoriented very, very quickly.” Indicate to other drivers and rescuers that you are in your car by switching the vehicle’s dome light on. If your car is buried in a drift, raise a flag or another bright material outside to mark your location, he said.

Trapped drivers should also be mindful of the danger of carbon monoxide poisoning from a blocked tailpipe, Mr. Phillips said. Avoid “running the engine for more than 10 minutes at a time, and make sure there’s a window slightly open,” he said.

Above all, Mr. Phillips said, pay close attention to meteorologists’ warnings. “You can get a forecast on the internet, on your cellphone, on the radio, newspapers, television,” he said. “The availability of the warning is there, as long as they heed it.”

Kirsten Noyes and Jeff Roth contributed research.

Camille Baker is a news assistant working for The Times’s Data team, which analyzes important data related to weather and elections. More about Camille Baker

Explore Our Weather Coverage

Extreme Weather Maps: Track the possibility of extreme weather in the places that are important to you .

Blizzard or Nor’easter?: What’s the difference between these storms? How do you stay safe in either? Here’s what to know .

Tornado Alerts: A tornado warning demands instant action. Here’s what to do if one comes your way .

On the Road: Safety experts shared some advice on how snow-stranded drivers caught in a snowstorm can keep warm and collected. Their top tip? Be prepared.

Climate Change: What’s causing global warming? How can we fix it? Our F.A.Q. tackles your climate questions big and small .

Evacuating Pets: When disaster strikes, household pets’ lives are among the most vulnerable. You can avoid the worst by planning ahead .

IMAGES

Symbolic Convergence Theory: A Communication Formulation
Importance of Communication Personal Essay Example
Write an essay on Communication
Media Communication, Convergence and Literacy
Convergence And Divergence Of Communication Definition Example
Achieving the fundamental convergence-communication tradeoff with

VIDEO

APCT LU 1 Communication Models Convergence Models
Stylish Action Platformer Starring Ekko!
Lesson 6.2; Written communication in essay frame
40 Convergence Convergency Part 2
Convergence Communication. # Bengal art gallery. #Blog #explore
Problem = Solution

COMMENTS

The convergence model of communication
Communication Institute. Papers. The convergence model of communication. This paper develops a general model of the communication process based upon the principle of convergence as derived from basic information theory and cybernetics. The author is critical of the linear, one-way models of communication which have dominated past research.
Communication Accommodation Theory
The main focus of communication accommodation theorists is the "patterns of convergence and divergence of communication behaviors, particularly as they relate to people's goals for social approval, communication efficiency, and identity" (Gallois & Giles, 2015). ... Cite this Article in your Essay (APA Style) Drew, C. (December 21, 2022 ...
Convergence Theory
Convergence is movement toward one point, toward another communicator, toward a common interest, and toward greater uniformity, never quite reaching that point. It is assumed, for example, that no two people can ever reach the same meaning for information, only a greater degree of similarity. In communication, the goal of this feedback process ...
PDF COMMUNICATION ACCOMMODATION IN CONTEXT: AN ANALYSIS OF A Paper
the field of communication. This essay steps into the English as a Second Language (ESL) ... Officials failed to provide an opportunity for communication convergence while managing risk through the implementation of public policy. Conceptual Framework To confront and understand risk communication, Sellnow (2009) recommends that ...
Full article: RETHINKING CONVERGENCE/CULTURE
That essay explicitly rationalized a theory and analysis of media messages and media power as an alternative to 'mass-communication research', though the essay was not primarily an intervention into that paradigm of research, and the essay's attention to 'decoding' was understood by many as a rejection (rather than a complication) of ...
(PDF) The Convergence Communication Scale (CCS): Development and
Academia.edu is a platform for academics to share research papers. The Convergence Communication Scale (CCS): Development and evaluation of an interpersonal submission assessment. ... Convergence communication was positively associated with perceptions of the target other's dominance (r ¼ .276, p < .01) and others' dominance was correlated ...
ERIC
Expressing the need for a description of communication that is equally applicable to all the social sciences, this report develops a general model of the communication process based upon the principle of convergence as derived from basic information theory and cybernetics. It criticizes the linear, one-way models of communication that have dominated past research for failing to represent the ...
Patients' Convergence of Mass and Interpersonal Communication on an
Convergence: Mass communication (1) online and (2) offline media. Mass communication was coded as such when communication channels such as internet sources (ie, online) and television and newspapers (ie, offline) were mentioned. "[…] on a website I read that […]"; "This article in today's newspaper […]" Interpersonal communication
The Rise, Concept and Manifestations of Media Convergence
Finally, the convergence of communication ideas and thinking is also key to media convergence . ... For instance, a newspaper group has a number of papers that are subordinate to the main paper, while a radio and television group comprises a series of channels and frequencies with clear work division. Business expansion at different media ...
The convergence model of communication
ArXiv. 2022. TLDR. The conceptual framework proposed is aimed to help scholars theorizing and doing research in a scenario of continuous real-time connection between AI measurement of people's responses to media, and the AI creation of content, with the objective of optimizing and maximizing the processes of influence.
Convergence in Media: Understanding its cause and effect
of convergence. Communication technology expansion, progress in digital technology, and Internet h as . given a spur to convergence. ... The Panama papers scandal in 2016, which involved 11.6 ...
Convergence and Divergence of Communication
Convergence is the process of adapting ones speech style to match others they want to identify and divergence is the use of linguistic mannerisms that emphasizes a person's differences from others. A person would be able to understand these two concepts through personal examples by comparing and contrasting the differences in each term ...
Mobile Convergence
Convergence has been a continuing, even though uneven, trend in the development of information and communication media in their capacity as technologies, social institutions, and cultural forms and practices (Grant & Wilkinson, 2009; Lugmayr & Dal Zotto, 2016).Various definitions of media convergence have emphasized one of these dimensions or attempted to hold them in a balance (e.g., Bohlin ...
The Convergence Years
Essay The Convergence Years Janet Kolodzy1, August E. Grant2, Tony R. DeMars3, and Jeffrey S. Wilkinson4 Abstract The emergence of the Internet, social media, and digital technologies in the twenty-first century accelerated an evolution in journalism and communication that fit under the broad term of convergence.
Media convergence
media convergence, phenomenon involving the interconnection of information and communications technologies, computer networks, and media content.It brings together the "three C's"—computing, communication, and content—and is a direct consequence of the digitization of media content and the popularization of the Internet.Media convergence transforms established industries, services ...
How Technology and Convergence Has Changed The Face of Mass Communication
Mass communication is the process of dissemination of information on a one-to-many model through using a technological channel. The technology used to... read full [Essay Sample] for free
Communication and Its Importance in Everyday Life Essay
We will write a custom essay on your topic a custom Essay on Communication and Its Importance in Everyday Life. ... Online social influence and the convergence of mass and interpersonal communication. Human Communication Research, 43(4), 450-463. Web. 1 hour! The minimum time our certified writers need to deliver a 100% original paper. Learn More .
Intercultural Communication Essay Example
What is the importance of intercultural communication? 🔎 Check our intercultural communication essay example where we analyze the differences in cultural, religious, and ethnic backgrounds. Writing Help Login Writing Tools. ... One of these theories is the theory of effective outcomes and an example of this theory is cultural convergence. 1 ...
Free Essay: Necessary Convergence Communication: a Theory ...
This essay provides a description of necessary convergence communication and identifies specific features that may be empirically tested. An Introduction to Necessary Convergence Communication Miller-Day (2004) argued that necessary convergence is a form of intersubjectivity that occurs during a pattern of interactivity when one communicator is ...
Coming to Terms with Convergence Journalism: Cross-Media as a
The article argues that in order to be more precise for theoretical and analytical purposes we have to distinguish between cross-media communication, and cross-media production processes. The article concludes by outlining a model that integrates the perspectives of news work and news texts in convergence journalism.
Symbolic Convergence Theory Of Communication
Communication is an essential part of mankind and the American Culture. Understanding theories will help individuals to further their knowledge of communication with individuals in their life. This paper explores the definition of symbolic convergence theory, the aspects that make up the theory, and how this theory relates to the everyday life.
(PDF) ASEAN CONVERGENCE. Towards an ASEAN Identity ...
ASEAN CONVERGENCE. Towards an ASEAN Identity: Discourses on Communication and Culture. Edition: First. Publisher: University of the Philippines Open University - Faculty of Information and ...
Communications. Monitor and Television Convergence Essay
These modern-day monitors are converged with the television enhancing technology of "built-in cable ready" tuners and can function as Personal Computers as well as television sets (Business Wire, Oct 1, 1996). Additionally, the monitors also include sound features with built-in speakers, which solves the problems of installing extra ...
Two Exceptional Journalism Students Share 2024 Gridiron Scholarship
The Gridiron Club and Foundation of D.C. has been a long-standing financial supporter of American University School of Communication (AU SOC) journalism students. ... Her essay examined the recent layoffs at NPR affiliate WAMU 88.5* and analyzed how an "us versus them" mentality shapes media narratives. Partouche is the staff editor for ...
Supreme Court Scoffs at Flimsy Abortion Pill Argument
4:57. Abortion is back at the Supreme Court. The case contests decisions by the Food and Drug Administration to make the drug mifepristone available by mail and via telemedicine. But at oral ...
Is It a Blizzard? A Nor'easter? And What's the Difference?
Nor'easters can bring about blizzard conditions, but in the United States, blizzards are most common in the Upper Midwest and the Great Plains, according to the Weather Service. In these areas ...
US Seeks Forfeiture of Luxury Apartment in Trump Hotel and Tower
The Trump International Hotel and Tower in New York. The US is trying to seize a luxury apartment in Manhattan allegedly bought with money looted from the government of Congo for the daughter of ...
World Health Day 2024
World Health Day 2024 is 'My health, my right'. This year's theme was chosen to champion the right of everyone, everywhere to have access to quality health services, education, and information, as well as safe drinking water, clean air, good nutrition, quality housing, decent working and environmental conditions, and freedom from discrimination.
Walmart Refiles Papers for US Antitrust Review of Vizio Deal
2:02. Walmart Inc. will withdraw and refile the paperwork associated with its deal to buy smart-TV maker Vizio Holding Corp. a routine step designed to give federal authorities more time to decide ...