The Psychology of Email

[Jason Dunn]

http://tastyresearch.wordpress.com/2006/08/29/when-can-i-expect-an-email-response/

"No new messages. Why is it taking so long? Did they receive it? Did it get put in the junk mail folder? How long should you wait before emailing again? You don’t want to seem desperate…Waiting for an email reply seems to be a common occurance in this day and age of email reliance. We look for contextual clues to why a response may be taking longer than usual, and decide when we should follow up the email. A paper by Tyler & Tang looks at the the email-replying habits of a group of corporate users in this 2003 paper."

Since we all do email to one degree or another, I thought this article was worth posting on. Some of the findings include that most users surveyed claimed their checked their email "constantly", people would leave a voice-mail message to bring attention to their email, and users would reciprocate email behaviours - taking longer to write back to people that took longer to reply back, and responding quickly to email from people that were known to respond quicker to their email. Mind games and human communication always seem to go together. ;-) You can dig into the paper itself for a deeper look. I noticed that the surveys were done in 2003 - email and always-on connectivity has only increased in the past three years, so I wonder if any of the responses would be different today?

[Jason Dunn]

http://tastyresearch.wordpress.com/2006/08/29/when-can-i-expect-an-email-response/

"No new messages. Why is it taking so long? Did they receive it? Did it get put in the junk mail folder? How long should you wait before emailing again? You don’t want to seem desperate…Waiting for an email reply seems to be a common occurance in this day and age of email reliance. We look for contextual clues to why a response may be taking longer than usual, and decide when we should follow up the email. A paper by Tyler & Tang looks at the the email-replying habits of a group of corporate users in this 2003 paper."

Since we all do email to one degree or another, I thought this article was worth posting on. Some of the findings include that most users surveyed claimed their checked their email "constantly", people would leave a voice-mail message to bring attention to their email, and users would reciprocate email behaviours - taking longer to write back to people that took longer to reply back, and responding quickly to email from people that were known to respond quicker to their email. Mind games and human communication always seem to go together. ;-) You can dig into the paper itself for a deeper look. I noticed that the surveys were done in 2003 - email and always-on connectivity has only increased in the past three years, so I wonder if any of the responses would be different today?

[Vincent Ferrari]

Off the top of my head I can't remember where I read it, but there was a guy who was sitting in an airport, and he actually heard someone on the phone say something to the effect of, "Don't worry... I'll call you when I e-mail you so you can look out for it."

Why bother?

I think we're so used to instant gratification that when we don't get it, we assume a nuclear bomb dropped on the person we're waiting for the e-mail from. It cracks me up regularly when I get an IM or voicemail saying, "I just e-mailed you."

Then again, I've done it.

Maybe I'm part of the problem!!! :?

[Jason Dunn]

Originally Posted by vincenzosi

It cracks me up regularly when I get an IM or voicemail saying, "I just e-mailed you."

That's one of my pet peeves - when people IM me to say "I've just emailed you". :evil: It's so utterly stupid.