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This research studies participants' self-repair practices in instant messaging (IM) interactions. IM is an online forum that allows two people to converse with each other through the exchange of text messages. Same turn, self-repair practices in IM are particularly interesting because here the message composition experience is uniquely poised between the written and oral contexts of communication. The composition is private and textual yet it is for an immediate audience. Drawing on the comparative approach used by Drew, Walker and Ogden (2013), the analysis compares the initial and final versions of participants' messages and observes the repair operations they perform (Schegloff, 2013), the technology used to effect the repair and the actions thereby achieved. The data used for this research comprise 15 chats between 30 participants. The initial versions of the messages were recorded using a key logging software and these were compared with the final versions retrieved from the chat logs. A total of 671 messages were analyzed to study the ways in which participants self-repair their messages to design turns that are best suited for particular interactional needs. The analysis suggests that the repair operations that IM participants perform are not very different from their oral counterparts and include replacing, inserting, adding, deleting, aborting, searching and sequence jumping. IM participants engage in such repair to achieve significant actions such as upgrading or downgrading their claims, displaying sensitivity to epistemic authority, searching for the right referent amongst others. Besides issues related to turn design, self-repair in IM is used for another crucial function: to address trouble arising out of sequential placement of messages and to construct messages that are most appropriate for an ever-changing semantic environment.

PurposeThis paper aims to develop a research model that explains how instant messaging (IM) technologies enable employees to be empowered.Design/methodology/approachThe paper uses survey of 253 Chinese work professionals with respect to their use of IM tools at work.FindingsIM does empower work teams via shaping the social networks and facilitating knowledge sharing in the workplace, resulting in heightened team performance.Research limitations/implicationsThe survey was conducted in China so generalization to other national contexts is tentative. It focuses on the bright side of IM, but neglects the dark side, e.g. security concerns and work interruptions.Practical implicationsIM is not only a social tool, it also has the potential to contribute to work teams. However, IM cannot achieve better work performance alone. Its contribution to strengthen the social networks at work is also critical. These social networks at work can enable employees to overcome psychological barriers to knowledge sharing.Originality/valueStudies of IM in the workplace have not previously considered social network perspectives, nor the value of such IM‐facilitated social networks for work performance. This large scale survey of work professionals across four locations in China provides evidence for the considerable positive impacts of IM on work.

This paper discusses the challenges and opportunities of using instant messaging (IM) technologies for diary studies. The discussion shows that IM as well as diary methods are both highly adaptable and flexible tools for qualitative data collection. In combination, they allow for innovative designs that might overcome limitations of more widely used data collection methods. The paper presents in detail and reflects upon a mixed online and offline design of an audio diary method with 'hard-to-reach' research participants in Burkina Faso. It ends with discussing further methodological and ethical aspects such as reach, temporalities, media formats, conversation styles, confidentiality/anonymity, technical aspects, as well as interaction and power sharing between the researcher and participants in order to spark methodological reflections when designing an IM diary study.

PurposeThe authors investigate the relationship between instant messenger (IM) use and work performance, mediated by interruptions and two key indicators of the stress associated with technology use: overload and complexity.Design/methodology/approachThe authors validate this research model using partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) with data collected through a survey of 416 working professionals.FindingsThe data reveal that while IM use contributes minimally to work interruptions and to a greater extent to technological complexity, these two constructs fully mediate the direct influence of IM use at work on technology overload, and meanwhile significantly and directly contribute to work performance.Research limitations/implicationsThis research provides theoretical insights into the deployment of IM and its actual impacts in the workplace. To improve the generalisation of the findings, the authors call for more IM-related research in other countries, with more native theories and various methodologies in this domain.Practical implicationsThe level of stress generated through IM use is moderate, considering IM is not a significant contributor to work interruptions. Thus, despite the potential negative effects of IM communication, the positive effects of using IM at work prevail. As a result, the technology can be promoted as long as employees, their managers and the organisation as a whole are well prepared. Employees can transfer skills and behaviour from the personal setting to their work environment and thus may find an intrinsic motivation to make better use of the IM technology at work.Originality/valueThe authors argue that this research model is novel for its perspective on evaluating the actual impacts of IM use at work instead of the reasons of using it. The authors conceptualise the process to explain how IM contributes to interruptions and other technostress indicators in the working context, and the impact on performance. Contrary to some prior research, the authors find that overall IM applications do not have a negative impact on work performance, and instead may enhance it.

Abstract
The article uses the context of the Northeast Delhi riots in 2020 to examine how mobile instant messaging platforms have changed the nature of riot networks in India. What role does the state's partisan approach play in aiding the use of these platforms by the constituents of such networks? Does the lack of adequate mechanisms to hold technology companies accountable contribute to how their platforms are used to aid the circulation of extreme speech, misinformation, and violence? The article explores these questions and argues for a framework to govern mobile instant messaging platforms that goes beyond attempts at self-regulation as well as efforts by national governments to regulate them. The complications that arise when such platforms are used by networks that favour majoritarian rulers are analyzed to examine the need for placing issues related to the governance of platform ecosystems within the framework of the protection of human rights.

PurposePlatform‐independent low‐cost instant messaging (IM) may allow small businesses with limited financial and technical resources to communicate and collaborate internally and externally. Little research has been done investigating IM in the small business context. This study seeks to address this research gap and to investigate how small businesses respond to and actively exploit the opportunities brought by IM.Design/methodology/approachTwo comparative case studies were conducted with two US small businesses. The research sites were selected based on the companies' IM usage pattern. Multiple data collecting methods were used including observation, interview, and IM transcripts. Open coding and qualitative data analysis were employed to get rich descriptive findings about IM usage.FindingsIM was found beneficial to small businesses in several ways. The IM usage management is more a managerial issue than a technical one and a set of organizational and managerial factors were identified critical to the achievements of these benefits.Originality/valueThis paper addresses a research gap and investigates the under‐researched IM management issue. The study shows that creative and constructive usage of IM could bring a variety of organizational benefits to small businesses. The findings of this study provide guidance to IM researchers and small business practitioners as to how small businesses can manage IM to exploit its benefits. The comparative study method employed by this study also identifies situations where the utility of IM usage could be limited.

ABSTRACTOrganizational decision making is dominated by teams. When an important decision is required, a team is often formed to make it or to advise the individual decision maker, because a team has more resources, knowledge, and political insight than any one individual working alone. As teams have become geographically distributed, collaboration technology has come to play an important role in such collective decision making efforts. Instant messaging (IM) is an increasingly prevalent workplace collaboration technology that enables near‐synchronous text exchanges on a variety of devices. We examined the use of IM during face‐to‐face, telephone, and computer‐mediated team meetings, a practice we call "invisible whispering." We introduce Goffman's characterization of social interaction as dramatic performance, differentiable into "front stage" and "backstage" exchanges, to analyze how invisible whispering alters the socio‐spatial and temporal boundaries of team decision making. Using IM, workers were able to influence front stage decision making through backstage conversations, often participating in multiple backstage conversations simultaneously. This type of interaction would be either physically impossible or socially constrained without the use of IM. We examine how invisible whispering changes the processes of collaborative decision making and how these new processes may affect the efficiency and effectiveness of collaborative decision making, as well as participation, satisfaction, relationships among team members, and individual attention.

Despite its worldwide popularity, mobile instant messaging (MIM) as a new mode of interpersonal communication has received scant scholarly attention by far. Drawing upon the notion of "connected presence," this study extends related discussions by exploring the patterns of MIM interaction in the management of close relationships. Focusing on WeChat, the most popular MIM in China, this study presents findings based on interviews with young Chinese as WeChat users. This study finds that WeChat's wide functionality enabled multimodal communication in varying situations. Four modes of WeChat interaction were identified: General information exchange, experience articulation, technical support, and sympathetic companionship. The study also analyzes how user construction attaches social meaning to certain communicative practices on WeChat.

In this article, we analyse WhatsApp interactions in a youth care setting. In family-style group care, young people temporarily live in the family of professional foster parents (PFP), while they regularly visit their birth parents (BPs). Our data consist of instant messaging of 11 pairs of PFPs and BPs during 2 months. Using Conversation Analysis (CA), we focused on the social interaction between BPs and PFPs, achieved in and through multi-modally constructed sequences of updates—responses. First, updates are used by BPs in the context of the transfer from the child from/to the PFP marking the transfer of responsibility for the child. Second, PFPs use images as updates to provide BPs quasi-primary access to the experiences of the child. Third, updates are given or elicited in the context of prior problems. Across these functions, we observe that while BPs work to display responsibility, PFPs subtly empower BPs as parents.

AbstractThe use of mobile instant messaging services (MIMS) for the dissemination of electoral information has been increasing in recent years. Drawing on a novel dataset from a 2015 post-electoral survey in Spain, we focus on individuals' digital political behavior, both public and private. Our results show that, in a context of high electoral volatility and polarization, right-wing supporters are willing to engage in political persuasion activities using tools such as MIMS in the private digital arena but not publicly (e.g., on social media). In contrast, left-wing milieus develop mobilization efforts in both public and private settings. We argue that distinct political styles are key in accounting for the difference in channels of partisan persuasion, in which preference falsification mechanisms are involved in the public sphere. These results bear important implications for the understanding of false information exchanges in the private sphere, social media activism, and political participation. Additionally, they help us shed light on the recurring failure of polls in capturing electoral behavior among right-wing voters in polarized elections and referenda.

PurposeDuring the digital media era with an explosion of messages, the prevalence of what is known as "message fatigue" has grown. However, there is a lack of understanding toward message fatigue in using instant messengers. Based on the stressor-strain-outcome framework, this study provides a theoretical model to explore possible predictors and consequences of instant messaging fatigue.Design/methodology/approachThe hypothesized model includes communication overload, social overload, instant messaging fatigue, technology and behavioral intention to use instant messaging. Three hundred and eleven responses are collected using an online survey. The authors conduct structural equation modeling to evaluate the hypothesized model and test the hypotheses.FindingsThis study reveals that (1) communication overload and social overload are positively associated with instant messaging fatigue and technostress; (2) higher levels of instant messaging fatigue and technostress are also related to a higher level of intention to discontinue usage; (3) technostress significantly mediates the relationship between instant messaging fatigue and intention to discontinue usage of instant messaging.Research limitations/implicationsThis study is limited to collect data from one university in the United States with a cross-sectional design. Future research should include other countries, different age groups and longitudinal methods to examine instant messaging fatigue.Originality/valueThis study extends existing findings on fatigue in using mobile communication by applying the stressor-strain-outcome framework to IM fatigue and improves the understanding of the potential negative aspects of instant messaging.