Reevaluating media richness: cues, feedback, and task

Media richness theory argues that performance on high equivocality tasks improves when people use richer rather than leaner media. Previous studies of media richness theory have almost exclusively examined managers´ perceptions, rather than using objective performance measures. This experiment, which studied the effects of media richness on objective decision-making criteria in two-person groups for a higher and a lower equivocality task, found no support for media richness theory. Media richness varied based on multiplicity of cues (face-to-face, audio-video, computer-mediated communication) and immediacy of feedback (immediate vs. delayed). Subjects perceived differences in media richness due to cues and feedback and in social presence due to cues. Varying cues and feedback, however, had no effect on decision quality, consensus change or communication satisfaction. Richer media led to faster decisions regardless of task equivocality. In short, the results showed no support for the main proposition of media richness theory; matching media richness to task equivocality did not improve performance.<>