The purpose of this paper is to suggest a relationship between exposure to the Internet and changes in a person's "context." Communicator context is best thought of as an aspect of a person's communication style. As explained by Edward T. Hall, in his book Beyond Culture, context refers to the situational as well as the informational aspect of message sharing. In other words, context not only includes what is being said but when, where and how. Hall concludes that this process is composed of five distinct sets of categories including the subject or activity, the situation, one's status in a social system, past experiences and culture. The sum influences of these five categories on a message comprise its content and its context. This context can either be high (HC), more dependent on the five criteria, or low (LC), less dependant on the five criteria. Hall asserts that these tendencies can be placed on a continuum upon which a person varies dependent upon the five factors mentioned above.

For example, those who communicate in a particularly HC manner might, rely heavily on insinuation, analogy, and their environment to convey their meaning. Often times they assume that one ought to simply "know what they mean" without having explicit explanation. As a result LC observers who place a higher importance on the informational content of a message often misunderstand HC communicators. The LC communicator is more concerned with "just the information" and less with the situation. i.e., what is actually said rather than what is inferred. This paper relies on the premise that the Internet exists as a lower-context mode of communication. This claim is supported by the fact that at this stage in its development there are fewer situational aspects available to the online communicator than in a real life (RL) exchange

The relationship between context and Internet exposure is not necessarily causal. However, the idea that it might be led me to propose two questions. Q1- Do urban individuals who have more exposure to the Internet exhibit lower context communication patterns? Q2- Do rural individuals who have less exposure to the Internet exhibit higher context communication patterns?

These questions constitute the poles of the Rurality / Net Exposure / Context continuum, depicted in Figure 1 below.

Does exposure to the Internet change the context of rural communicators? This process was asserted but not tested by Raymond Gozzi Jr. In his piece "Mass Media Effects in High- and Low-Context Cultures" Gozzi states that:

Media lower context through relativizing the local culture, changing the focus of the people's attention from each other to the media, separating the sign from its referent, turning participatory art forms into performances, and imposing a monochromic sense of time. (58)

It seems that Gozzi would agree that as technologically mediated communication continues to replaces some of the more established modes of interpersonal communication consideration should be given to the behavioral consequences. But clearly, mediated communication is not a new phenomenon? The telegraph and telephone have been around for over a century so why study this now? Only within the last thirty-five years was the conclusion reached that technology carries with it, and imposes upon its users the culture of its creators. Casmir and Asuncion-Lande state:

It is little wonder that in the Western world, in recent decades, proposed solutions to our dilemmas were not the result of cultural definition and redefinition of our survival by participating human beings, rather, it was assumed that survival of the human race would be based on an evolutionary process of science and technology. . . . Only later did it become clear that technological systems included value systems that required cultural adaptation and change, and that these often resulted in cultural domination. That had not even been considered by those who believed that technology and science were objective. (292)

Given the expansive nature of the Internet this ought to pose concerns on a global level regarding how cultures may be changed by communication in cyberspace. In determining these potential changes one must scrutinize the type of cultural traits inherent in the Internet, such as low context communication styles, and how they may differ from the cultural norms of its users. Since "rurality" is one of the factors I have chosen to look at, the definite existence of a rural culture is a point that is central to this observation. It is popular belief, aided by the movie and television portrayal of the "country bumpkin", that rural society is somehow different and distinguishable from that of urban life. It is supposed that these differences extend to the social, moral and cultural. Do you believe this? It can be easily tested. Mentally, put a farmer from Nebraska and an investment banker from New York in the same room. Next ask them to "explain what they do on the weekend." What do they say?

Despite my lack of confidence in the "Hollywoodization" of the rural lifestyle the suggestion that there are distinct contextual frames of reference between urban and rural individuals isn't totally false. Clearly some differences do exist. In a 1991 study by Laurence Hilton and Karen Mumma the researchers asked 4-7 year olds from geographically urban and rural homes "What do you do when you cross the street?" The urban children tended to recognize this situation as a clear danger to their health and the majority appropriately responded that they would "look both ways." Rural children, who have a different concept of "street", often live in areas where a car is not seen for an entire day and thus did not associate the act of crossing the street with the danger of getting hit.

It should be noted here that even with different worldviews, one couldn't automatically assume the difference in communicative styles. In fact, it could be argued that as communication technology continues to reach out to geographically rural areas, the rural context as a separate phenomenon, is no more. However, my mother used to tell me "You can take the boy out of the city but you cannot take the city out of the boy". I assume this works both ways.

As much as I want you all to just "take mom's word for it", to be sure, perhaps we should look at some of the empirical evidence. Gudykunst et al. lay much of the framework for determining high- and low- context traits in their 1996 study entitled "The Influence of Individualism-Collectivism, Self Construals and Individual Values on Communication Styles Across Cultures." These researchers found that individualism and collectivism had both a direct and indirect effect on the self-reported communication styles of survey respondents. Individualism and collectivism were defined from the point of view of group goals and number of in-group / out-groups. In collectivist cultures the goals of the group are emphasized over the goals of the individual. In Individualistic groups the opposite is true. Fewer "in-groups" (those with whom you share some degree of loyalty and about whose welfare you are concerned) exist in a collectivist culture, which makes their influence much stronger. In the individualist society the vast number of in-groups weakens the influence of any one by itself. The urban lifestyle provides frequent contact with a vast array of people, which lends itself more to the individualist. Conversely one who leads the geographically rural lifestyle may have fewer contacts, a routine more suited to the collectivist. If we merely substitute the words rural and urban for collectivist and individualist in this study the results are telling.

THE INTERNET AND THE SELF

The second factor of the study, self-construal, was briefly defined as the view of one by oneself. Thus an independent self-construal includes a view of oneself as unique and independent from the whole. In this group the self-actualizing process is derived from ones own thought, feelings and views of the world. In contrast the interdependent self-construal involves one seeing oneself as part of a larger group. Whether it is a greater responsibility to society as a whole or to a tight-knit group of friends and family, the interdependent self-construal relies on others to help identify the self.

These factors all effect the communication behavior of an individual. This relationship forms the basis for Gudykunst et al.'s study, and is clearly expressed in their four major hypotheses.

H1- Members of individualistic cultures use low-context communication more than do members of collectivist cultures.

H2- Members of collectivist cultures use high-context communication more than do members of individualistic cultures.

H3- The more individualistic values individuals hold and the more independent their self-construals, the more they use low-context communication.

H4- The more collectivist values individuals hold, and the more interdependent their self- construals, the more they use high-context communication.

Figure 2 below illustrates the processes described.

FINDINGS

The results uncovered by this study lent at least partial support to all four hypotheses. Gudykunst et al. note, however, that it is difficult to gauge such phenomena as self-construal because it is situation dependent. One may use a more interdependent view of oneself when in the company of friends and family. In contrast the individual may also use an independent view of her/himself when in the company of strangers or mere acquaintances. People do not live their lives in singular situations and static environments, thus studies such as this one can only provide snapshots of certain behaviors at certain times. In order to develop a tool for measuring the communication behavior of people that considers situational factors the situation must be identifiable. Using communication via the Internet as a situational factor, the model might look something more like what is depicted in Figure 3.

Thus, we return to the questions presented at the beginning of this paper Q1- Do urban individuals (individualist) who have more exposure to the Internet exhibit lower context communication patterns? Q2- Do rural individuals (collectivist) who have less exposure to the Internet exhibit higher context communication patterns? According to the model it would seem possible.

To bring these queries into focus we must decide if rural communicators are high context because they choose to be. Is it possible that the necessary number of daily personal contacts is too few for the rural individual to form multiple in groups. If this collectivist lifestyle was not a choice before, the availability of CMC makes it one now. Countless, disposable, contextually limited contacts can be achieved on a daily basis with access to the Internet. But communication via a low context medium is not as frequent for the rural individual. Increased exposure to computer mediated communication has potential consequences when the user logs off into real life (RL) and is then forced to communicate once again in a high context manner.

This duality that is created between RL and virtual reality (VR) may be a motivating factor for users who form a low context relationships with the machines themselves. The machine represents an escape from the complex confines of a highly contextual world. Indeed, Sherry Turkle notes that CMC has turned computers into evocative objects capable of inspiring emotions in a user just like RL stimuli. I wonder how different relationships through the computer are from relationships with the computer?

So does this prediction that increased usage leads to a change in communication behavior mean that rural inhabitants should cut the phone lines and bolt the doors? Clearly it does not. Yet in the face of all this mounting pressure to jump on the technology bandwagon, rural communities need not rush towards the self-extinction of their culture either. Technology can be incorporated selectively so as to have a more evolutionary effect than a revolutionary one. As the potential for context on the Internet grows, perhaps we will see continued development of a rural niche in cyberspace. The potential is there for higher context communicators and socially rural peoples to preserve their lifestyle and tradition despite the technology wave. The catalyst is the manner in which these efforts are approached, for neither full embrace, nor complete rejection, can have the desired results.

CONCLUSION

The relatively new emergence of the Internet has presented new options regarding how to develop this common ground. This type of medium can be presented in a non-aggressive manner and bring hands on examples of relevant technology to the remotest of places. For the first time since before the development of a mass audience concept, the recipients of mass information do not have to adhere to a traditional "one to many" model of communication. Due to its interactive nature, Internet users can be selective about which information they wish to see, and in which activities they wish to participate, while all the while increasing their technological proficiency. When all is said and done, perhaps this flexibility will prove the Internet is more of a gateway than a barrier between the value systems, and communication styles, of rural and urban peoples.

REFERENCES

Casmir, Fred, and Nobleza Asuncion-Lande. "Intercultural Communication Revisited: Conceptualization, Paradigm Building, and Methodological Approaches."

Communications Yearbook. Ed. James A. Anderson. Newbury Park: Sage, 1989. 278-309.

Gozzi, Raymond. Jr. "Mass Media Effects in High- and Low-Context Cultures." Mass

Media Effects Across Cultures. Ed. Korzenny, Felipe, Stella Ting-Toomey, and Elizabeth Schiff. 1992. 55-66. London: Sage 1992

Gudykunst, William, Yuko Matsumoto, Stella Ting-Toomey, Tsukasa Nishida, Kwangsu Kim, and Sam Heyman. "The Influence of Individualism-Collectivism, Self Construals, and Individualistic Values on Communication Styles Across Cultures." Human Communications Research 22.4 (1996): 510-43.

Hall, Edward T. The Silent Language. New York: Doubleday. 1959.

Hall, Edward T. "Context and Meaning" Beyond Culture. New York: Anchor Press, 1976.

Hilton, Laurence M. and Karen Mumma. "Screening Rural and Suburban Children With the Preschool Language Scale." Journal of Communication Disorders 24 (1991): 111-22.

Turkle, Sherry. "Constructions and Reconstructions of Self in Virtual Reality: Playing in the MUDS." Culture of The Internet. Ed. S. Kiesler: 1997.