UNIVERSITY OF HERTFORDSHIRE
		 COMPUTER SCIENCE RESEARCH COLLOQUIUM


             "(Mis)Communication: Repair Driven Co-ordination 
                       in Human Communication"

                           Dr. Pat Healey
                  (Interaction, Media and Communication,
                     Queen Mary, University of London)

        	       1 March 2006 (Wednesday) 

                          Lecture Theatre E350
		       Hatfield, College Lane Campus
			       3 - 4 pm

       	       Coffee/tea and biscuits will be available.
			 [Catering Permitting]

		    Everyone is Welcome to Attend
			  [Space Permitting]



Abstract:



   Consider the standard (Shannon and Weaver) model of machine
communication.  As a model of human communication it incorporates three
important assumptions: a) Miscommunication is modelled as 'noise' or 
uncertainty about what signal was sent. b) Linguistic Homogeneity: the source 
and the receiver have identical copies of the code.  c) Semantic Transparency:
successful communication is analysed as a situation in which the source and
receiver arrive at the same message or `ideas'.  These assumptions are
incorporated -explicitly and implicitly- in some contemporary models of
communication.  I will argue on empirical grounds that the assumptions a) 
and b) are incorrect: miscommunication is ubiquitous and no two people ever 
speak the same dialect of the same language.  I will present experimental 
evidence  -from tasks involving exclusively verbal, textual and graphical 
communication which shows that languages (including their semantics) evolve 
during interaction and that, arguably, miscommunication plays an essential 
role in this process.   This leads to the conclusion that communication is 
a special case of misunderstanding - successful communication consists in 
establishing co-ordination sufficient for current purposes. Time permitting 
I will explore the implications of this view for the design of augmented 
human interactions.


About the Speaker:

Pat Healey is Reader in Cognitive Science and Director of Postgraduate Studies
with the Interaction, Media and Communication Group at the Department of 
Computer Science at Queen Mary University of London.
http://www.dcs.qmul.ac.uk/~ph/

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Hertfordshire Computer Science Research Colloquium
http://homepages.feis.herts.ac.uk/~nehaniv/colloq