The Structure of Consensus Building in Online Design Discussions

Zilouchian Moghaddam, Roshanak

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/27684 Copy

Description

Title

The Structure of Consensus Building in Online Design Discussions

Author(s)

Zilouchian Moghaddam, Roshanak

Contributor(s)

• Bailey, Brian P.
• Fu, Wai-Tat

Issue Date

2011-09-28

Keyword(s)

• Online design discussions
• CSCW
• Consensus building

Abstract

While consensus building is inherently complex, the remote and asynchronous nature of online discussions, coupled with the large number of participants further intensifies the complexity. To better understand the nature of online consensus building, we first interviewed designers and developers contributing to design discussions in open source projects to understand the key factors in online consensus building. We then collected a large data set from an online design Web site and used regression analysis to further test how these factors affected consensus building. Our analysis showed that participants who were more experienced in the community facilitated consensus building. In addition, participants who had previous social interactions with each other would more likely reach a consensus in future discussions. We also found that even though the number of participants in each discussion was often large, small-group personal interactions did emerge, which significantly predicted the likelihood of reaching a consensus. Implication to design of interfaces that facilitate online design discussions is discussed.

Type of Resource

text

Language

en

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http://hdl.handle.net/2142/27684

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