Automating Discovery of Dominance in Synchronous Computer-Mediated Communication

With the advent of electronic interaction, dominance (or the assertion of control over others) has acquired new dimensions. This study investigates the dynamics and characteristics of dominance in virtual interaction by analyzing electronic chat transcripts of groups solving a hidden profile task. We investigate computer-mediated communication behavior patterns that demonstrate dominance and identify a number of relevant variables. These indicators are calculated with automatic and manual coding of text transcripts. A comparison of both sets of variables indicates that automatic text analysis methods yield similar conclusions than manual coding. These findings are encouraging to advance research in text analysis methods in general, and in the study of virtual team dominance in particular.