Susan T. Kinney and Richard T. Watson “The effect of medium and task on dyadic communication”

Media choice is an important topic in the field of organizational communication. With a plethora of media choices (e.g., letter, e-mail, voice mail, telephone, face-to-face meetings), the question of how and why individuals choose which medium to use in what situation takes on additional importance. This concern is also shared in professional communication. I present a summary of a paper (Kinney and Watson) that tests the applicability of a prominent theory of media choice, media richness theory (MRT), to both traditional and new electronic forms of communication. I summarize the findings and present some implications for professional communication