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Demand characteristics for telephone among a community of senior citizens: A communications approach

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Demand characteristics for telephone among a community of senior citizens: A communications approach

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Content DEMAND CHARACTERISTICS FOR TELEPHONE AMONG A COMMUNITY OF
SENIOR CITIZENS: A COMMUNICATIONS APPROACH
by
Patricia Janet Lum
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
in Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(Communication Theory and Research)
December 1986
UMI Number: DP22405
All rights reserved
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Published by ProQ uest LLC (2014). Copyright in the Dissertation held by the Author.
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UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY PARK
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA 90089
This dissertation, w ritten by
Patricia Janet Lum
under the direction of h ...sz Dissertation
Committee, and approved by all its members,
has been presented to and accepted by The
Graduate School, in partial fulfillm ent of re
quirem ents for the degree of
D O C TO R OF PH ILO SO PH Y
Dean of Graduate Studies
O c t o b e r 7, 1986
DISSERTATION COMMITTEE
| \ Chairperson
Ph.T>.
CM
L?57
3 2 e f / \ 2-4
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Many people have contributed to the success of this
dissertation. To the following people I owe particular
credit for their insights, their support and their patience.
Any mistakes found in this dissertation, however, remain the
sole property and responsibility of the author.
I owe a great debt to the senior citizens of Hawaii,
without whom this study would not be possible. I not only
learned a lot about telephone use from these seniors but
also about life. My interactions and the insights that
Hawaii's seniors brought in answer to the questions I asked
are still a constant source of joy and understanding to me.
Edward Lum, my husband, put up with the almost
impossible demands placed on our home life by my pursuit of
a doctorate. Not only did he handle the situation gracefully
but the emotional support was unending.
Dr. Ronald E. Rice, as the chairman of my committee,
provided guidance, organizational skills, knowledge and
caring throughout both the research and writing of this
dissertation. Many times a kind and well placed comment on
his part kept me from giving it up altogether. Most
important to me, however, was the extremely high level of
integrity that he brought to the exercise of his
responsibility in guiding this dissertation. It will always
remain a model to be emulated in guiding all my future
ii
endeavors.
Dr. Jorge Reine Schement taught me a great deal about
structuring my thoughts and getting them across to others.
He was also an inspiration in dealing with my Los Angeles
environment because, as a minority member, he understood the
cultural divergence between Hawaii, my home, and Los
Angeles.
Dr. Lowdon Wingo, my outside member, taught me much
about policy and economics without which this study would
not have been possible. He provided me with access to
materials I was unaware of and he contributed considerable
time and insight in helping me structure and analyze this
problem. In short, Dr. Wingo contributed both wisdom and
insight to my progression both in my dissertation and in my
life.
Mr. Herbert S. Dordick facilitated my interest in
telephone use by providing a project related to
telecommunications policy and telephone use from my early
days at the Annenberg School. Under his tutelage I was
allowed to pursue what was, at times, a very nebulous set of
ideas about the demand for telephone service from a
communications perspective. He became both my mentor and my
friend during that period.
Dr. Amy Phillips provided support during the early
years at Annenberg School both emotionally and
intellectually. To Amy I owe an especial debt of gratitude
iii
for her introduction of anthropology into my awareness.
Mr. William W. Milks, Hawaii's Consumer Advocate,
provided continual links between Los Angeles and Hawaii for
me that facilitated my pursuit of this research in my home
context. He also provided access to the policy process in
Hawaii that has helped me to understand how policy worked
and how research efforts on my part, now and in the future,
could potentially contribute to the policy process.
In addition to those already mentioned, many other
people have been important to this study. Dr. Dan J.
Wedemeyer provided physical support systems that made it a
far less painful process to complete writing this
dissertation. Dr. Meheroo Jussawalla always took an
interest in my work and provided a willing ear for
discussion of my thoughts. Dr. David Waterman contributed
much to my understanding and integration of economic thought,
into the field of communications. Dr. Frederick Williams
helped to support and think through the telephone project or
which I worked. Dr. Janet Fulk provided invaluable
knowledge about research methods and techniques. And
finally, to Dr. Ibarra Gonzalez and Dr. Rosita Valencia, my
classmates, who were always there to offer support and get
me going when I wanted to stop, thank-you.
Many others, too numerous to mention, have contributed
to this endeavor. To anyone who knew me during this time,
thank you.
i'v
--------------------------- FKEFSCE
I became involved in the study of social uses of the
telephone during my first semester at the Annenberg School
under a project with Mr. Herbert S. Dordick. My first
surprise was the little actual research that had been
conducted and compiled on telephone use. Given the part the
telephone played in everyday life, its neglect by social
scientists was unique among communication technologies.
As a new and rather poor tenant in North Hollywood just
prior to this time I had lived without a telephone for
almost a month. It was interesting to me that it seemed to
bother others more than it actually bothered me.
As we began the project and I got a home telephone
installed, I decided to keep a diary of telephone calls to
get a feel for what people did and did not call about. This
diary later lead to a pilot study utilizing a diary
technique for gathering information on telephone calls. Amy
Phillips and I conducted this first study together. Many
other pilot research studies on social telephone use
followed.
During this time, we were also gathering what research
there was on telephone service. Dr. Wingo, one of my
planning professors, alerted me to the wealth of economic
studies on telephone that are used in the regulatory
process.
v
in these studies, age and ethnicity both showed
significant relationships to telephone usage
characteristics. At the same time, policy was changing and
the lifeline issue began to be debated in policy arenas.
The combination of these factors, coupled with
Hawaii's ethnic multiplicity and my own homesickness,
ultimately lead to this dissertation.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS............................................ii
PREFACE................ V
LIST OF TABLES........................... x
LIST OF FIGURES............................................xii
CHAPTER 1: BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY....... 1
Importance of the Problem............................ . .1
The Context of the Study.................... 7
Background of the Problem............................. 16
Problem Statement...................................... 19
Telephone Use........................... 21
CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL FOUNDATIONS OF THE STUDY........ 34
Theory of Option Demand................................34
Household Demand For Telephone Service...............39
Information Economics and its Relationship to
Telecommunication..................................50
Functions of Information/Communication..*............54
Concluding Summary..................................... 67
CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH QUESTIONS............................ 72
What Is the Option Demand Associated With
Telephone....................... *..................74
The Relevance of Information Functions to
Option Demand...................................... 79
vii
Value or option Demand Across Social Groups......... 80
Summary of Research Questions.........................82
CHAPTER 4: EXPLICATION OF THE MODEL......................84
Rationale for the Model............. 84
Description of the Model.............................. 87
Explication of the Model.............................. 89
Summary of the Model...................................96
CHAPTER 5: METHODOLOGY.................................... 98
Qualitative Method.......... 99
Qualitative Research Technique........................105
Qualitative Analysis................................... 108
Quantitative Analysis..................................114
CHAPTER 6: RESULTS........................................119
Qualitative Analysis..................................119
A Description of Situational Context................ 140
The Perception of Importance Associated with
Telephone...........................................150
Reciprocity........................... 157
Complementarity....................................... 159
The Second Interview...................... 162
Quantitative Analysis.................................170
Summary of Results...................... 180
CHAPTER 7: CONCLUSIONS AND DISCUSSION.................. 183
viii
CHAPTER 7: CONCLUSIONS AND DISCUSSION (CONT.)
Nonroutine Telephone Use............................. 185
Routine Use............................................194
Implications for Pricing............................. 197
General Summary of Telephone Use.....................199
Discussion of Content.................................200
Discussion of Methodology............................ 209
Sense-making...........................................211
Research Agenda....................................... 212
REFERENCES....................... 218
APPENDIX A: STATEMENTS ABOUT TELEPHONE'S IMPORTANCE... 223
APPENDIX B: COMPARISON OF CALLS DESCRIBED: INTERVIEW
1 AND INTERVIEW 2..................................... 225
LIST OF TABLES
Table 1.1 Glossary of Terms................................25
Table 2.1 Significant Socioeconomic Variables in
Telephone Access......................... 43
Table 2.2 The Situation Movement States................. .58
Table 5.1 Topical Schedule for Open Interviews......... 103
Table 6.1 Routine Telephone Uses Reported...............120
Table 6.2 Classification of Call According to Typology.125
Table 6.3 Non-Routine Telephone Uses Reported...........128
Table 6.4 Situation Movement States Reported Bridged..136
Table 6.5 Mean Number of Calls Mentioned By
Household Size........... 147
Table 6.6 The Overlap Between Situation Movement
State and Telephone Use: Routine Calls..............155
Table 6.7 The Overlap Between Situation Movement
State and Telephone Use: NonRoutine Calls...........156
Table 6.8 Reciprocity of Calling Between Parents and
Children.......... 158
Table 6.9 Complementarity Matrix............ 160
Table 6.10 T-Test Between Routine and Nonroutine Use...171
Table 6.11 Differences Between Calls: Categorized by
the Two Levels of Typology............................ 172
Table 6.12 Zero Order Correlation Matrix................ 175
Table 6.13 Results of Multiple Regression for
Nonroutine Use..........................................176
Table 6.14 Results of Multiple Regression Using Log
Transformation..........................................177
Table 6.15 Results of Simple Regression of Frequency on
Nonroutine Use..........................................179
Table 6.16 Results of Multiple Regression on
Terminal Use............................................180
Table 6.17 Results of Simple Regression of Frequency on
Terminal Uses...........................................180
XI
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1.1 Demand Decision Tree for Telephone ....... IE
Figure 4.1 A Matrix of Telephone Calls......................91
Figure 4.2 Typology of Telephone Use: Qualitative
Analysis...................................... .9
Figure 6.1 Typology of Telephone Uses......................12
xm
CHAPTER 1: BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
Changing telecommunications technology and changing
regulatory policies toward traditional telephone service
and the associated market structure are causing many
changes in the potential access and use of the telephone by
consumers. This study sets out to develop a more
comprehensive explanation of telephone demand based not on
the non space- time bound variables of demographics but
rather based on the perceptions of information needs that
access and use of telephone service can satisfy. The study
concentrates on senior citizens for two reasons: 1) they
are among the most vulnerable groups in society from a
rising cost perspective; and, 2) they exhibit a gap between
their perception of use and their actual usage behavior not
found among other age groups which suggests that the
valuation of their telephone service is not based on their
perception of use.
Importance of the Problem
One of the consequences of the divestiture of AT&T
from the local operating companies has been a historic
number of rate increase requests by the local operating
companies in their respective states. The increase in
rates has been accompanied by an outcry for lifeline
service. Lifeline service is a guarantee of access to
household telephone for basic voice communication mandated
1
by law under state regulations. Currently 5 states have a
lifeline rate and many others are in the process of
implementing it. Hawaii is among those states whose
legislatures have mandated a lifeline rate. Lifeline
rates, however, can vary in the type of rate structure that
is to be provided. Some are budget measured rates while
others are flat rates. Senior citizens are one of the
target groups for lifeline. Yet little is known about the
demand characteristics of telephone use by the elderly. In
order for the rate structure (price) to optimize the
symmetry between the value they place on telephone service
and the value of their demand for it, the price should not
violate demand characteristics.
Seniors' telephone use differs along a number of
dimensions from that of the overall population according to
empirical studies of household demand for telephone. Their
access is higher and their usage is lower. One theory of
telephone demand suggests that there is an option value
involved. An option value is a value associated with a
future potential need for a good or service that is not
predictable in the present. The structure of the
divergence between seniors and others, suggests that this
might be very important in the demand characteristics for
telephone service by senior citizens.
This study sets out to look at seniors' telephone use.
We are primarily interested in seeing if seniors have a
2
higher demand for telephone service in case they need it at
some later time. This is known as the option demand for
telephone service. If we assume that this demand is based
on the relationship between the need for information and
situational uncertainty then it can be understood by 1)
contrasting the importance of their calls with the number
of calls they make and the proportion of calls made to
calls received; 2) assessing the situational uncertainty
present in their household context by comparing income
level and physical health with importance and calling
patterns; 3) by exploring the role of their social status
in the pattern of calls made and received that they report;
and, 4) by developing a typology of telephone uses and
contrasting the range of telephone uses reported with the
importance of each use to the person. This information and
analysis will then be used to draw implications about
whether calls would be reduced if priced and if these call
reductions exhibit relationships, i.e. are some general
types of telephone use more susceptible to reduction
overall than others?
Summary of the Problem
The emergence of competition in telecommunications has
pushed the provision of telecommunication from value-based
pricing structures toward cost-based pricing structures.
The telecommunication system is a conduit for the flow of
information and communication. The value and demand for
3
telecommunication, therefore, is inextricably linked to the
value of access to information. Since information is
accessable through other sources, the value of the
telephone is the reduction in the transaction costs
associated with telephone as opposed to other channels.
Typically, it is assumed that there are no good substitutes
for telephone service since the time and uncertainty
factors are very different for other mediums.
As a medium of information access, the telephone is
used to seek many kinds of information. Broadly, these
include information that leads to some other activity and
information that is an end in itself. The organizational
aspect of information is a complement to other goods and
services. Information of this type results in some other
activity and in this sense involves a non-terminal act
(i.e., leads to some other activity).
On the other hand, there are terminal information acts
(the act is an end in itself). These are typically social
communication or surveillance. Some functions of
information are more important to us than others and the
heirarchy of importance that we associate with various
kinds of information may change as our situational
conditions change.
Today we are rapidly instituting usage pricing
structures in the United States where information access is
priced not only by access to the system but also access to
4
a particular call. This raises two issues: lj are those
utilizing the telephone the most also gaining the most
satisfaction?; and, 2) are some types of information that
would be considered socially beneficial (and therefore
subject to a distributed benefit) subject to different
levels of importance than other, more private uses? If so,
which is more important to seniors? How do we evaluate the
importance of information flows to people to understand
what calls would most likely be curtailed if they were
charged?
In current usage analysis, the reduction in calls
placed are treated in an undifferentiated manner. The
resulting reduction in consumer surplus is labelled the
social loss. This means that a call regarding the weather
conditions is treated as equal in value to a call to the
police to report a suspicious person lurking outside the
neighbor's house.
Such a scheme fails to take into account the fact that
different kinds of information hold different values for
people. Some kinds of information may also be considered
more important from the context of societal welfare.
The Purpose of This Study
In order to properly understand the social impacts of
usage pricing, one must be able to determine the types of
information and communication for which the telephone is
used, to classify how much telephone use is an input to
5
other activities (i.e. non-terminal) and how much does not
lead to other activities (i.e. terminal), and which are
important.
The actual information types that are carried on over
the telephone have been relatively little studied. Studies
that have been carried out on the telephone concentrate on
static influences on the volume of telephone communication
and the decision to access the telephone system. Studies
of price and income effects are the most numerous. Other
studies have sought to relate telephone usage and access
with household demographic characteristics. Additionally,
although primarily at the theoretical level, some analyses
have sought to define demand in terms of the demand for the
actual use of the telephone and the option demand for the
telephone. Historically, these types of analyses were
justified on the basis of the common carrier notion and the
flat rate pricing structure.
The categories of terminal and non-terminal calls,
which, unlike other demand studies relies on the content of
the call for classification, can be further broken down
into categories of communication functions. These
functions can be thought of in terms of the perception of
frequency of telephone use for a particular type of
communication message and the perception of importance of
each type of use. If we consider the social loss from a
reduction in telephone calling (i.e. the reduction of
6
information flow in society and its associated decrease in
the distribution of information) as broken out between
terminal and non-terminal then the non-terminal information
act's (organizational information) social cost of decreased
non-terminal information is an increase in price for some
other good/service and/or a decrease in the volume of that
other good or service. What is clear from studies
throughout the world by various parties in conjunction with
the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) is the
secondary benefit derived by society in the production and
distribution of other goods from provision of efficient and
reasonable telephone service — that is, from non-terminal
information accessed through the telephone (Butler, 1983).
On the terminal side of information use, there may be
biases inherent in the provision of information by some
parties relative to others. The second general purpose of
the study, then, is to compare telephone demand across
demographic characteristics to determine whether certain
groups are more vulnerable or will be differently affected
by a usage price for telephone calls in order to help
policymakers understand: 1) how information flows will be
changed and what kinds of information flows might be
reduced; and, 2) who will be affected and how?
The Context of the Study
Until recently, telephone service has not been priced
according to use. This allowed telephone service providers
7
to ignore content and concentrate only on relationships
between the demand for service as it was related to
non-space/time bound variables such as household
demographic characteristics in order to satisfy equity
requirements and insure adequate network provision.
The Historical Situation
According to Dervin (1983), and others, information
seeking is gap bridging. Information is not valued in and
of itself but is valued on the basis of its ability to move
us from one time space to another time space. Those time
and space situations are called situation movement states.
Hence, information is a complement to action. Ackoff (1966)
postulates, in his theory of purposeful states, that
information can affect action in many ways. For instance,
it can alter the efficiencies of reaching a certain outcome
or it can alter the outcome desired. Hierarchies of needs
suggests that needs for activities are progressive. Needs
associated with self-maintenance are foremost (such as
food, clothing and shelter); these needs are followed by
needs associated with self-perpetuation and finally by
needs for self-gratification. While these act alongside of
each other, perhaps needs for self-maintenance are most
important. If we assume that information related to
self-maintenance is also most important, we would expect
such information to be highly valued. If we apply this to
the telephone, we should find that the value of emergency
8
calls (particularly in a life and death situation) is often
cited as the highest value of a telephone. Indeed, Brooks
(1976) notes that this certainly was the case in early
reports on the usefulness of a telephone.
The value of information related to self-maintenance
is often not predictable in advance. Most of us do not
anticipate emergencies or changes in our situation that
will necessitate changes in our actions. This inability to
anticipate telephone use makes the demand for such use a
part of our option demand for the telephone. Option demand
for the telephone is a utility (usefulness) associated with
a future potential need to use the telephone that one
cannot predict. Because this utility is based on future
use, it is not excludable (i.e. my potential future use
does not exclude anyone else's potential future use). The
option demand therefore acts as a public good.1 Generally,
since people perceive the benefit of a public good as being
distributed between themselves and others, they will not
reveal their true preference for it. Therefore, they show
a lower willingness to pay for a public good than they
would for a private good for which there is competition
with others for the good's consumption. The price, then,
must be low enough that they will pay something and the
balance must be subsidized through a general tax or some
other political intervention to make sure the supply is
adequate. Indeed, the case of telephony exhibits such
9
intervention historically. The price of telepnone service
was first regulated in 1885 by the State of Indiana. By
1910, when the Interstate Commerce Commission was charged
with regulating telephone traffic at the interstate level,
34 states already had laws regulating telephone service in
their intrastate domain (Dordick and Lum, 1983).
Historically, telephone service was provided under a
structure of legally mandated monopoly. The jurisdiction
for regulation in this monopoly situation was separated
between interstate and intrastate traffic on the basis of
Constitutional provision for the regulation of interstate
trade. Under this regulatory and structural scheme, a
pattern of cross-subsidization emerged between long
distance and local exchange service. In order to keep the
price of access low, long distance calling was priced
higher than the cost of providing it and the extra revenues
were assigned over to cover the deficit caused by pricing
local service for telephone at less than its cost.
Clearly, the policy involved in such a subsidy program
does not suit a model of pure economic efficiency.
However, the policy was based on the equity goal of
universal service. By maintaining a low price for access
to the telephone system, more people could afford telephone
service and therefore be a part of the "telephone
community." Paradoxically, this enhanced the value of
telephone service for everyone.
10
Ttie original definition of universal service as set
out in Title II of the Communications Act of 1934 provides
for 'like service at same price' and 'reasonable rates.'
This implies a 'postal equity' notion where everyone would
have the same service at the same price much like the
system of postal pricing that exists in the U.S. The
actual implementation of rates over time developed more as
a structure based on the benefits received from telephone
service. Hence, business pays more for telephone service
than residential users because the telephone was perceived
to have greater benefits for business users. Thus the
willingness to pay for telephone service is higher among
business subscribers that it is for residential subscribers
regardless of the cost of telephone service. Businesses
have therefore been charged at higher prices that the
actual cost of the service. Residential users, on the
other hand, have been charged less that the cost of
providing the service. This is known as price
discrimination. In the telephone industry, this is
referred to as pricing on the basis of the value of
service.
The Current Situation
This system of cross subsidies (long distance
subsidizing local service and business subsidizing
residential) is not possible in a competitive marketplace.
Over the last two decades, the Federal Communications
11
commission has made decisions on telephone service aimed at
promoting competition. With this continuing deregulation
of telecommunications services by the FCC and most recently
by the implementation of the Consent Decree Modified Final
Judgement (MFJ) between AT&T and the Department of Justice
(1982), both long distance and customer premises equipment
have become competitive markets in telecommunications
provision.
In a competitive situation, it is not possible for
prices to be greater than costs. Hence, long distance can
no longer subsidize local service. Local service revenues
will now have to cover the costs of providing local
telephone exchange service. This situation alone, however,
would not necessitate the elimination of cross-subsidies
between business and residential telephone service within a
regulated local exchange area. Rapid technological change
in telecommunication services, combined with the FCC's
procompetitive mode, are placing pressures on the local
exchange to move toward a fully cost-based pricing
structure in order to meet competitive challenges in the
local area (for example, shared-tenant services and private
microwave).
This mandate provides the impetus for a massive move
on the part of local exchange carriers toward cost-based
rather than value-based pricing. Carriers are being forced
to price on the basis of marginal cost .2 If they do not,
12
other firms or potential competitors providing the service
at lower costs will take over their market share.
In 1975, 89% of the telephone exchanges in the United
States were operating under a flat rate pricing scheme
(Meyer, J.R., Wilson, R.W., Baughcum, M.A., Burton, E. &
Caouette, L., 1979). By 1984, 45 out of 50 states had
instituted some form of usage pricing but it is typically
mandatory only for business users and an optional rate
structure for residential users (State Telecommunication
Regulation Report. October 1984). The costs of local
exchange service providers are traditionally split between
the cost of accessing the system (non-traffic sensitive)
and the costs associated with actual use of the telephone
(traffic sensitive). Telephone companies are therefore
revising their local exchange rates to reflect these
separate costs. In order to more accurately capture these
costs there is a move toward pricing structures that
reflect usage rates. The Bell Operating Companies
typically refer to such a rate structure as local measured
service (LMS) while GTE prefers to call it usage sensitive
service (USS). Both terms refer to a rate structure which
incorporates two separate charges (known as a two-part or
multi-part tariff).
One part of the price for telephone service is set as
a charge for access to the system while the other charge is
variable and based on the amount an individual subscriber
13
actually uses the system. This second part of the charge
may be defined in various ways. Potentially there are four
elements associated with usage costs: 1) the time of day
and the day of week (TDDW) which is a peak/off-peak
differential; 2) the minutes of use (duration); 3) the
number of calls (set-up); and, 4) the distance between
callers. In the future we may see a fifth element, a cost
per bit of information transmitted, as multiple speeds of
transmission become available.
In the past, the decision associated with telephone
demand was based on whether to access or not access the
telephone system. Once a consumer subscribed to telephone
service, the choice,about when and how to communicate by
telephone was associated only with the opportunity cost3 of
doing so (i.e., given the sum cost of subscription, the
transaction costs were only opportunity costs and not real
costs plus opportunity costs).
The proposed usage costs of measured rate service,
however, impose a decision tree on the demand for
telephone. In addition to the initial demand for access, we
must now determine the demand for making a call (both real
and opportunity costs), the optimal time for doing so and
the optimal utility4 derived from the appropriate length
of conversation.
These demand decisions are based on the communication
and information functions they serve. While some calls are
14
placed for the sake of the communication itself, others are
made as part of the transaction for some other product or
service. These are terminal (the purpose of the call is
completed within the conversation) and non-terminal (the
call is part of another transaction). Some of these calls
are anticipated and some are not. This also affects the
demand decision. The demand decision tree is set out in
Figure l.l to reflect these decisions.
Figure 1.1
Model of Telephone Demand From a Communications Approach
Calls
Made
Routine or
NonRoutine?
Terminal or
NonTerminal?
Calls
Received
Routine or
NonRoutine?
Terminal or
NonTerminall
Telephone calls are therefore distinguishable as being
routine (anticipated) and nonroutine (unanticipated).
The rate structures associated with measured service
derive their justification from the cost of supplying
service; they are not derived from the consumer's demand
structure associated with such multi-level decision making
regarding telephone usage. In fact, we know very little
about the needs for telephone communication. One thing is
15
clear. Each of these separate prices has a potential effecij:
on the way in which telephone service is demanded. Further,
these demanded effects, if they are related to social
characteristics such as demographic profiles, may force
policy makers to redefine the way in which equity is
balanced against efficiency in providing 'universal
service.' Thus, there is a growing problem: how to determine;
usage based prices in ways which take into account social
benefits and their demographic relationships.
Background of the Problem
The argument that is frequently made by telephone
companies in the policy arena is that usage-based pricing
is not only more efficient but also more equitable because:
1) the cost causer becomes the cost payer; and, 2)
usage-based pricing lowers the access cost, thereby making
telephone service more affordable for lower income groups.
This argument rests on two assumptions: 1) that the shared
benefits of telephone use are equally distributed among
individuals in the system; and, 2) that the demand
structure and its associated value is the same for all
subscribers.
Demographic and Social Characteristics
Previous studies have shown that there are many
variations in both telephone access and usage by different
groups in our society. For instance, blacks have lower
access but use the telephone more when they do have access.
16
Senior citizens have higher access but lower usage than the
population in general. The conclusion that usage-based
pricing is more equitable rests on the assumption that the
benefits are proportional to the cost for each individual
and that the interdependence is therefore internalized
(Artie and Averous, 1972; Littlechild, 1975).5 If, however,
there are correlations, as suggested by relationships
between demographic groups and telephone use and access,
between the costs and benefits from telephone calls and the
social and/or demographic characteristics, then a charge
per call may burden one particular group in our society
more than others, so the costs are not independent across
individuals. Such a result would require that we view
equity as it applies to target groups who are vulnerable
and/or deserving from the value perspective of society in
determining rates and rate structures. An exemplary case,
occurring now in the United States, is the provision of
lifeline telephone service for the poor, the handicapped
and the elderly through political intervention at both
state and national levels due to the rising costs of local
exchange service.6
Geocrraphic Characteristics
Another change that is occurring in telephone pricing
as it moves toward cost-based pricing is a de-averaging of
costs within the local exchange areas. Traditionally,
rural service has been subsidized by urban service because
17
the price has been averaged over the entire local exchange
area. De-averaging costs would ultimately mean that each
portion of the local exchange would bear the full burden of
the actual costs of service provision. This would mean
higher rates in rural areas than in urban areas (given that
there is no competition for service provision).
Paradoxically, the potential value of service in urban
areas is higher because there are more people to talk to in
areas of higher population density but the costs of
provision of telephone service in urban areas is lower for
precisely the same reason (i.e., since much telephone cost
is upfront, and ’in common', the more people in a given
service area, the less the marginal cost per customer).
The opposite case applies to a rural subscriber. Hence, we
need to insure that we do not increase this discrepancy
between cost of supply and price for demand that is
associated with de-averaging rates.
Entitlement to Information bv Telephone.Finally, there is
the question of entitlement. To what extent (given that
most people agree that the telephone is a necessity) are
citizens entitled to affordable telephone service as a part
of their communication rights as they have been set out in
the 2 00+ years of legal interpretation of the First
Amendment? This last question is difficult to answer
(although economics has not come very far in answering, or
even addressing, the previous questions of equity so far
18
either) because it requires that we go beyond the
traditional minutes of use and number of calls measurements
to characterize telephone demand; even beyond the
attribution of benefit between parties; and address the
peculiarities of the product that flows over the conduit,
information and its role in maintaining our social
structure; our free market economic system; and our
democratic form of political process— i.e. government by
participation.
Summary
The telephone's value is a value based on its ability
to provide timely access to a variety of information
sources. It is difficult for consumers to anticipate their
needs for information because such needs often arise out of
uncertainty created by changing situational conditions.
Potentially, this uncertainty can be reduced by
communication. In order for society to function
efficiently, an adequate flow of information must be
maintained. Yet changes in pricing policies for public
telephone usage may differentially affect access to
information by social and geographic classes.
Problem Statement
The presence of a multidimensional demand structure
for telephone is implied by the dependence of demand on the
need for information. Information and communication serve
many functions. This suggests that usage-based costing may
19
potentially cause a divergence between the way telephone
service is priced and the way a consumer values telephone
service.
Potential Access; Whv Is the Option Value Important?
Sometimes we are willing to pay something to maintain
access to a product or service just in case we need it.
Even if we cannot predict using such a product or service,
we might want to use it in the future but we don't know
when, for what purpose, or why. Such a demand is often
referred to in economics as the option demand. The option
demand is a public good because we cannot exclude people
from potential future use. The price we are willing to pay
for such a future option is called the option value.
In addition to the willingness to pay7 for something
in case we need it, we may also be willing to pay something
to have a product or service available even if we believe
we will never use it. Such a demand characteristic is call
non-participant demand. It is usually associated with our
sense of social responsibility. Hence, even though we may
never use it, it is potentially of value to our society and
we may be willing to pay something to insure that those who
wish to use it will be able to do so (it is a right).
Demand for telephone service potentially involves both
of these 'demand characteristics.' The value associated
with the option demand is the value of unanticipated
potential future usage. Hence, this aspect of the option
20
value is positively related to telephone use. In order to
understand willingness to pay for such an option we must
consider it in the context of decisions related to usage.
The option demand is directly related to household access
of telephone service and, as Taylor (1980) points out, it
is dependent upon usage— that usage which is unanticipated.
The non-participant demand is related to a perception
of entitlement to having a telephone system. One might
characterize this as the association of the 'right to
communicate' as it extends to the telephone system. The
non-participant demand is associated with the general
provision of telephone service but not necessarily as a
consideration for household access to a telephone.
Incorrectly estimating these various components of demand
associated with telephone service can lead to a price for
access which is too high relative to use causing people to
drop off the system and threatening universal service; or a
price for access which is too low may cause the purchase of
too many lines (i.e. inefficient access decisions)
resulting in underutilization of the capacity that must be
provided.
Telephone Use
The characteristics of demand for telephone service
have rarely been linked to the kinds of use (i.e.
information/communication being sought) and therefore the
relative importance (value associated with a particular
21
use). Use has traditionally been measured in terms of
frequency and duration and left undifferentiated beyond
that. Such household characteristics of use, however, can
and have been linked to socioeconomic variables. These
measurements, while useful in policy, cannot help us to
determine the proportions of anticipated versus
unanticipated usage. Nor can they aid us in understanding
the potential of different levels of value attached to
specific kinds of telephone use.
Historically, this failure to consider content has its
basis in the definition of common carrier.8 In order to
avoid regulating on the basis of content— itself perceived
to be government interference with freedom of speech— the
conduit was regulated to insure equal access, thereby
disallowing discrimination on the basis of content by the
carrier in order to insure the freedom to speak.
Linking Telephone Use to Information and Communication
Needs
Relationships can be characterized as single-stranded
or multi-stranded. This categorization derives its basis
from the purpose of the relationship. Some relationships
involve only one purpose. An example for telephone use
would be calling a store to see if they carry plaster
products. However, other relationships serve more than one
communication purpose. Friends often act as sources for a
variety of information, entertainment and comfort. Such a
22
relationship with a friend would be multi-stranded because
it serves more than one purpose.
This author (1984) set out to look at how people's
relationships affected their telephone use. She concluded
that relationship is connected to use— almost all intrinsic
telephone use is with people they know very well, such as
family and close friends. Such use is also the most
predictable, i.e. they can estimate in a month's time the
number of calls that will occur that involve communication
with close friends. The degree of precision with which a
person can predict telephone use varies. We consider it
predictable use if they perceive a certain number of
telephone calls would occur within a given time span, i.e.
when asked how often they talk to a particular person, they
can respond with some number.
Due to the limited information available regarding the
actual use of the telephone for satisfying information and
communication needs, we must look to more traditional
studies of information use. We will rely on the work of
the sense-making researchers to link information to
situational context in order to differentiate information
needs.
Uses and gratifications research that has been carried
out will help us to link media (although not telephone) to
the gratification of information and communication needs.
Calling upon this broader framework and utilizing the
23
few studies where telephone has been characterized in terms
of needs for information and communication, we set up a
framework for looking at telephone demand.
Summary of Problem Statement
Demand for telephone use is multi-dimensional.
Included among these dimensions of demand are the demand
for use and the demand for the option to use it. However,
each of these traditional aspects of demand are potentially
related to different kinds of information and communication
flows. These information and communication flows are
affected by demographic characteristics, income and our
relationships with the people we talk to. In order to
understand the context of changing rate structures, we need
to know how these are related. Otherwise, we incur the
risk of having people drop off the system or distort demand
for access lines.
This study sets out to provide a multidimensional
demand structure for telephone service and use that
provides symmetry between demand for the medium with the
information and communication needs which such demand is
contigent upon. The content of this study necessarily
includes concepts from both communication and economics.
In order to make the material accessable to both
communication scientists and economists, the key terms used
from both fields have been defined and are presented as
Table 1.1.
24
Table 1.1
Glossary of Terms
affective - emotional as opposed to intellectual or
behavioral.
bit rate costing - charging by the cost per bit of
information rather than by amount of time and/or the
distance traversed.
common carrier - one whose services are open to public hire
for handling interstate or foreign communications by
electrical means under law (FCC Common Carrier Services.
Communications Law and Policy, pg. 70.
communication functions - uses of communication for
achieving some satisfaction.
community leader - a central node in a communication
network who operates as a source of information for many of
the people in that network.
community of interest - analysis of the distance patterns
of calling normally related to the determination (from a
telephone company's point of view) of the amount of calling
that occurs within a central office area (i.e. stays within
a certain radius) by a household subscriber as opposed to
calling that occurs over greater distances.
complement - a product whose demand is interdependent with
demand for another related product because the consumers'
desired outcome involves conjunctive utilization of both.
Consent Decree Modified Final Judgment - Modified Final
Judgment in United States v. Western Electric Co., Action
No. 82-0192 (D.D.C., filed August 24, 1982), I (A) (2).
consumption externality - a benefit or disbenefit accruing
to a consumer from another consumer's use or consumption of
the product. We are often concerned with consumption that
causes a disbenefit to others such as an industry polluting
a stream by use of the water for waste disposal. However,
the consumption externality in telephone is generally
assumed to be positive, i.e. other subscribers on the
network benefit from the addition of a subscriber. The
consumption externality is a public good because the
benefit is not excludable.
cost-based pricing - basing the price on the marginal cost
of producing the product or service. This is the
25
traditional pricing scheme in a competitive marketplace
(see also, usage pricing).
cross subsidization - using profits from one business or
division to offset losses in another. For competitive
market products this is not a viable long term strategy.
For regulated markets it can potentially occur over long
periods of time.
entertainment - a communication function. Entertainment
generally satisfies affective needs. Enjoyment.
entitlement - a positive right recognized by society.
ethnographic interview - an in-depth interview technique
that seeks to provide a cognitive map of a particular
culture or situation in order to inductively develop a
broader structure of constructs associated with the
situation that can provide a model.
information - information is used in its semantic sense in
this report; it is therefore assumed to have meaning to the
individuals engaged in its transfer.
information helps and hurts - messages that affect the
persons* ability to create personal sense, both positive
(helps) and negative (hurts).
information service - a service that provides access to a
range of related information products.
instrumental communication - a message that relates to
accomplishing some other task or satisfaction outside of
the communication.
interdependence of telephone demand - a function of the
nature of communication. Both people involved in the
conversation are deriving some benefit. There would be no
benefit for either party without participation of the other
— i.e. each person's benefit is dependent upon the
other's. When we assume that this benefit is internalized
we really must make two assumptions: 1) that over time
each telephone subscriber receives a benefit from each call
similar to the benefit achieved by the party on the other
end. Presumably, if this were not the case, the subscriber
receiving less benefit from the conversations would choose
to eliminate them; and 2) that, over time, each telephone
subscriber receives the same amount of benefit from other
subscribers availability. In economics, what we are
actually saying is that tastes are held constant among the
subscriber population.
26
intrinsic communication - similar to terminal, intrinsic
applies to a value and/or goal that is contained within a
message itself as opposed to instrumental.
legally mandated monopoly - a government granted right to
be the sole supplier in a market; usually the limits of the
market territory are geographically defined. Hawaiian
Telephone is a legally mandated monopoly.
lifeline - access to basic voice telephone service at a
reduced cost, based generally on criteria of financial
need.
Lifeline can be provided throuugh a number of mechanisms.
Generally it is subsidized by a tax on telephone service or
some other general tax. After divestiture, local exchange
rate increase requests began to rise dramatically. 1984
saw record breaking requests for rate hikes, despite the
FCC's study in response to the Michigan PUC's request for
an analysis of the impacts of divestiture on local service
that suggested increases in local service would be minor.
For lack of another criterion, the FCC, at that time,
defined 'universal service' as that level of penetration
documented by the 1980 census. Congress stepped in and the
FCC opened a Joint Board inquiry to review the situation.
Currently, a Federal fund will be provided by the Congress
for lifeline service to be matched by the states. The
rapid increase in the lifeline proposals (5 states have
lifeline and another 20 have it on their current agenda) is
part of a legal mandate to maintain 'universal service'.
marginal cost - as the addition to total cost resulting
from the addition of the last unit of output. Marginal
cost normally decreases, attains a minimum and then
increases as output increases. In telecommunication,
economies of scale (the presence of a minimum size plant to
operate at all, making it capital intensive) created a
situation historically that caused marginal cost to
continue to decrease over a long period of time., i.e. the
variable costs of adding a subscriber were very small given
a system size capable of accomodating more subscribers.
This lead to telephone service being defined as a natural
monopoly. One supplier could supply the whole market more
cheaply than two or more suppliers due to duplication
involving very high fixed costs. Two forces are at work
today in telecommunications provision that challenge
natural monopoly. The first is technological change which
provides alternative transmission systems which do not
exhibit the capital intensity of wired systems and second,
the shift in demand characteristics that might justify the
provision of another whole network in addition to the
existing one.
27
multidimensional - in this case, being associated with a
set of satisfactions that are differentiable from each
other.
multiple transmission speeds - having available a number of
different speeds of getting information from one place to
another rather than only one as was the case in the
traditional telephone service.
negative externality - generally ignored as being small in
the case of telephone service because the positive
externality is much more pervasive. However, increasing
telemarketing schemes have made this of greater concern in
the present than it was historically. Other negative
external disbenefits associated with telephone are nuisance
calls, obscene phone calls and wrong numbers.
non-routine telephone use - use that cannot be predicted or
anticipated.
non-space/time variables - factors that are not contigent
upon situation but are stable across time and situations.
Race is a non-space/time variable.
non-terminal - the objective of the act is not contained
within the act itself; the act is a means to a
differentiable outside goal.
opportunity costs - the costs associated with potential
other uses of the inputs for a particular activity. In the
case of a telephone call, we are looking at time spent as
an opportunity cost since I could choose to spend my time
on some other activity. In assessing the opportunity cost
associated with telephone use in order to determine the
appropriate price for GTE *s venture into mandatory usage
sensitive pricing, Beauvais (1977), measured the
opportunity cost of a call in terms of the hourly wage of
the household. This lead, however, to the determination of
income elasticity that was negative, suggesting that
telephone service was an inferior good.
organizational information - information that is necessary
to maintain a system and its component parts in a balance
that allows them to operate effectively.
personal sense - the integration of information into a
person's value system in order to understand and utilize
the information is ways the person deems appropriate.
price discrimination - the pricing structure differentiates
on the basis of the value of the product between consumer
jroups or market segments even though each segment is
buying the same product.
28
probit model - model to differentiate between existing rate
choices which incorporates the ability to handle different
probabilities of choice for LMS between groups existing
prior to LMS introduction (i.e. between measured rate
subscribers and flat rate subscribers). A logit model
would predict equal conversion rates for both groups if
such households exhibited the same socioeconomic
characteristics and calling patterns. In fact, in the
Charels River Associates research (1982) it was posited
that there would be different likelihoods of conversion
between the measured service group and the flat rate group
since they had originally chosen different rate structures.
The probit model captures the original difference.
public good - a product that exhibits characteristics of
non-rivalry and potentially, nonexcludability. Non-rivalry
refers to a situation where one person's use does not
diminish use of the same product by another person, thereby
yielding a 'double-benefit'. Information is a public good.
Excludability rests on the ability to exclude (by price)
from use. Telephone service is excludable. However,
excluding people from access makes the product less
valuable because that provides fewer people one can contact
(the main value of telephone service) to begin with.
reciprocity - a relationship or situation in which both
parties' expect the other to return, in kind, products
services, or actions they have given or provided.
relationship - an ongoing interaction between two people or
entities.
risk aversion - a situation where the person wants to avoid
risk taking. Therefore, he/she takes actions that diminish
potential risks. Insurance is a product related to the
value associated with avoiding or minimizing risk.
routine telephone use - use whose frequency can be
predicted and anticipated in a given time span: number of
calls per month for instance.
situation movement state - a situational context in which a
person may need information to move from one context to
another. Table 2.2 defines each situation movement state
currently defined by sense-making researchers.
shared benefits - a product whose consumption is beneficial
to more than one consumer. In a telephone conversation,
shared benefit is the mutual satisfaction of the two
parties' communicating.
29
social loss - the reduction in consumer surplus that is not
captured and offset by price. As I have used it I am
referring to the reduction in the benefit to a person or
persons (i.e.society) that is attributable to a third
party's decision not to utilize telephone or share
information (of benefit to both) because of the price of
service.
social segments - groups identifiable in society according
to a particular trait they hold in common that is not
subject to rapid change.
space/time variables - factors that are time and situation
based and can be changed.
structural typology - a hierarchical classification scheme.
surveillance - a communication function. Surveillance
refers to monitoring activities to minimize risk or
uncertainty.
system constraints - constraints placed on people by the
rules imposed to insure that the system as a whole will
operate effectively in order to achieve its objectives.
telephone access - refers to the availability of the
product to the consumer. Access decisions about telephone
service are based on the perception of willingness to pay
and the actuality of the ability to pay.
telephone use - the actual calling behaviors.
terminal - the objective of the act and its satisfaction
are contained within the act itself.
uncertainty, situational - the degree of uncontrollable
circumstances inherent in the person's environment to which
one has no way of assigning a probability of occurrence.
usage pricing - separating the price for access from the
price for actual calls. A usage price is based on the
actual variable costs associated with the call itself (also
called USS).
uses and gratifications - a research tradition developed
first by Katz (1974) analyzing the gratifications
(satisfaction) sought or received from communication
'products'.
utility - a number that represents the level of
satisfaction that the consumer derives from a particular
market basket. A market basket is the assortment of
30
products that the consumer buys. Utility generally refers
to an ordinal ranking of value associated with a market
basket.
value-based pricing - pricing the service on the basis of
its value to the subscriber rather than basing price on
actual cost. An example is the discrepancy between price
and cost of residential versus business telephone service.
willingness to pay - the entire area under the demand
curve. Basically, it represents how much a person is
willing to pay to consume a product if he/she could afford
to do so. Ability to pay is another matter. It is
difficult to measure the willingness to pay for any good
exhibiting public characteristics because consumers
correctly perceive that it is not beneficial to them to
reveal their true preferences for a public good since it is
a value shared by others.
Notes
1. A public good is a product that exhibits
characteristics of non-rivalry and potentially,
nonexcludability. Non-rivalry refers to a situation where
one person's use does not diminish use of the same product
by another person, thereby yielding a 'double-benefit'.
Information is a public good. Excludability rests on the
ability to exclude (by price) from use. Telephone service
is excludable. However, excluding people from access makes
the product less valuable because that provides fewer
people one can contact (the main value of telephone
service) to begin with.
2. Marginal cost is defined as the addition to total cost
resulting from the addition of the last unit of output.
Marginal cost normally decreases, attains a minimum and
then increases. In telecommunication, economies of scale
(high upfront capital investment) created a situation
historically that caused marginal cost to continue to
decrease over a long period of time., i.e. the variable
costs of adding a subscriber were very small given a system
size capable of accomodating more subscribers. This lead
to telephone service being defined as a natural monopoly.
One supplier could supply the whole market more cheaply
than two or more suppliers due to duplication involving
very high fixed costs. Two forces are at work today in
telecommunications provision that challenge natural
monopoly. The first is technological change which provides
alternative transmission systems which do not exhibit the
capital intensity of cable, and second, the shift in demand
characteristics that might justify the provision of a whole
network in addition to the existing one.
3. Opportunity costs are the costs associated with
potential other uses of the inputs for a particular
activity. In the case of a telephone call, we are looking
at time spent as an opportunity cost since I could choose
to spend my time on some other activity. In assessing the
opportunity cost associated with telephone use in order to
determine the appropriate price for GTE's venture into
mandatory usage sensitive pricing, Beauvais (1977),
measured the opportunity cost of a call in terms of the
hourly wage of the household. This lead, however, to the
determination of income elasticity that was negative,
suggesting that telephone service was an inferior good.
4. The person's utility is a number that represents the
Level of satisfaction that the consumer derives from a
particular market basket. A market basket is the
assortment of products that the consumer buys.
32
5r: The interdependence of telephone demand is a function of
the nature of communication. Hence, both people involved
in the conversation are deriving some benefit. There would
be no benefit for either party without participation of the
other — i.e. each person's benefit is dependent upon the
other's. When we assume that this benefit is internalized
we really must make two assumptions: 1) that over time
each telephone subscriber receives a like benefit from each
call as the party on the other end. Presumably, if this
were not the case, the subscriber receiving less benefit
from the conversations would choose to eliminate them? and
2) that, over time, each telephone subscriber receives the
same amount of benefit from other subscribers availability.
In economics, what we are actually saying is that tastes
are held constant among the subscriber population.
6. After divestiture, local exchange rate increase requests
began to rise dramatically. 1984 saw record breaking
requests for rate hikes, despite the FCC's study in
response to the Michigan PUC's request for an analysis of
the impacts of divestiture on local service that suggested
increases in local service would be minor. For lack of
another criterion, the FCC, at that time, defined
'universal service' as that level of penetration documented
by the 1980 census. Congress stepped in and the FCC opened
a Joint Board inquiry to review the situation. Currently,
a Federal fund will be provided by the Congress for
lifeline service to be matched by the states. Lifeline is
generally defined as basic access to voice service. The
rapid increase in the lifeline proposals (5 states have
lifeline and another 2 0 have it on their current agenda) is
part of a legal mandate to maintain 'universal service'.
7.The consumer's willingness to pay is the entire area
under the demand curve. Basically, it represents how much
a person is willing to pay to consume a product if he/she
could afford to do so. Ability to pay is another matter.
It is difficult to measure the willingness to pay for any
good exhibiting public characteristics because consumers
correctly perceive that it is not beneficial to them to
reveal their true preferences for a public good since it is
a value shared by others.
8. A common carrier is one whose services are open to
public hire for handling interstate or foreign
communications by electrical means under law (FCC Common
Carrier Services. Communications Law and Policy, pg. 70.
33
------ CHAPTER -21 THEORETICAL FOUNDATIONS OF THE“STUDY
Historically, the demand for telephone service has
been theoretically broken out into two demand functions:
the demand for usage and the option demand. In actual
analysis, telephone demand has typically been categorized
as access demand, i.e. the availability of telephone
service; and usage demand, that demand actually associated
with calling. In predicting demand in a stable marketplace
this has proved very useful. However, the value of
telephone service is based on the information and
communication that it can provide. Hence, in a changing
social/economic environment, it is necessary to return to
the fundamental characteristics of demand for information
and the telephone's functions in serving that demand in
order to correctly predict and explain the market demand.
Theory of Potion Demand
The option demand, potential though unanticipated use,
is a public good. For this reason alone, its presence in
telephone demand should be considered separately. However,
because communication and information seeking is usually a
response to uncertainty arising, it is doubly important to
separate it in the context of telephone because the value
of telephone's ability to handle uncertainty is not
necessarily related to the frequency of use. Hence, the
characteristics associated with a subscriber's demand for
34
the option to use it may be very different from his/her
demand for anticipated use. It will be more dependent upon
the information value.
The concept of the option demand and its value was
introduced into the economic literature by Weisbrod (1964).
He pointed out that option demand was important when
determining the supply of a good that exhibits both private
and public characteristics.9 Given the presence of public
good characteristics we must consider the value of a good.
...there are consumers who, though they may never use
it, will be willing to pay something for the option to
consume it in the future. The option value acts like
a public good since it is non-rivalrous. Further, it
may be viewed as an external economy from current
production; that is the current production of the good
enters positively into the utility functions of
prospective users. (Weisbrod, 1964).
In a critique of Weisbrod's conceptualization, Long
(1964) shows that the option value (of a product with
certainty of being produced) is part of a traditional
consumer's surplus (i.e. the additional value a consumer
jets from consuming a product above what he/she actually
pays to consume it). Hence, Long concludes,the option
value is important only when there occur discrete changes
in a commodity for which there is no good substitute.
Cichetti and Freeman (1971) later extended the concept of
option value to show that the value of the option will be
positive for people who tend to try to minimize their
risks.10
35
Taylor (1980) incorporated the option demand in his
model of telephone demand to show that there is a
difference between the consumer's willingness to pay for
the future option to make a certain amount of calls and the
amount of calls (valuation) that the consumer actually
makes. since some telephone use is contingent upon a
change in situational context which is uncertain (i.e. my
car won't start and I have to phone the garage to send out
a mechanic), we are willing to pay something for the
availability, in case we need it, although we may not
actually make such a call. The value that we assign to
such a potential use is therefore a part of our willingness
to pay for access although it does not affect the valuation
of actual usage demand (Bethesda Research Institute, 1984).
Thus, the option demand and its influences are a crucial
element in considering possible pricing structures for
telephone service.
Empirical Considerations of Option Demand
In 1978, Mitchell's explication of optimal pricing for
local measured telephone service, incorporated a value for
those uses which are unanticipated but of value. In a
footnote he explains that this variable could be
interpreted as the option demand. Two call measures are
included in the value - the first is emergency calls made,
the second is all calls received (the consumption
externality).11 It is easy to see why option demand might
36
be defined in this manner. Emergency calls are certainly
unanticipated and calls received associate themselves with
no price to the receiving party but usually provide that
party with some benefit.
While this is an explicit incorporation of the option
value in telephone pricing, the consumption externality in
telephone service has a long history in economic studies.
It is the characteristic of public good most clearly
associated with telephone service. The externality of
consumption is generally defined to be positive. While
admitting that there is a potential negative externality12
associated with telephone service, generally it is ignored.
The consumption externality, therefore, consists of the
benefit derived by other subscribers from one subscriber’s
access and use. Implicit in this statement is the concept
that there are two parts to this externality. The first is
the benefit of being available (the externality of access)
while the second is a benefit derived from actually
receiving a call (the externality of use).
Clearly, both aspects of the consumption externality
potentially involve option demand and option value and are
dependent upon a perception that one might need to use the
telephone. The externality of access is part of access
demand or basic price for availability - — some may be
anticipated benefit while some may not. The externality of
use comes into play as a separate function under a usage
37
pricing structure. Perceived benefits are now associated
with real costs and price. However, the benefit derived
from a call received is only available if one has access.
Therefore, part of the willingness to pay for access is
dependent upon actual use of the telephone.
Importance of Option Value to Policy Models for Telephone
When telephone service is priced by usage the benefit
of consumption diminishes along two dimensions — the
external benefit and the actual usage benefit. The
benefits associated with access diminish according to how
much the person perceives that they will reduce their own
calls and, in addition, by the perception that fewer calls
will be received from others because there is a cost
involved (Squire, 1975). Since calls received are
considered part of the option demand, this would then lower
the value of the consumption externality component of
option demand for telephone service by the amount of
perceived reduction of calls coming in.
The results of a study by GTE on users' attitudes,
conducted in conjunction with the implementation of usage
sensitive service in Illinois by Opinion Research
Corp.(1981), indicate that most groups of subscribers
showed a positive correlation between their desire not to
have measured service and a perception that their telephone
use was high (a perception generally borne out by actual
usage data that GTE collected). This supported the model
of a rational person minimizing costs. However, both
senior citizens and physically handicapped subscribers
expressed a preference for a flat rate even though their
actual telephone use was low and a measured rate would save
them money. This 1 1 counterintuitive1 1 outcome might be a
function of the option value. Common sense suggests
seniors and physically handicapped persons might be
characterized by high physical uncertainty (e.g. poor state
of health). The knowledge that the unexpected is covered
may provide psychic income (much like insurance) that
should be taken into account when policymakers determine
rate structures for local telephone service.
Summary of Option Demand
Demand for telephone includes an option demand that is
contingent upon two factors: the consumption externality
(benefit of access to other subscribers and benefit of
calls received) and the ability to use it to handle
situational uncertainty. There is some indirect evidence
that the option demand is more important for some groups of
subscribers than for others: particularly senior citizens.
Household Demand for Telephone Service
Explanation and prediction of actual demand for
telephone service utilizes research on households' access
to telephone service and actual use of the telephone. Such
research done on the relationship of demographics to
telephone demand shows that income is the most important
39
characteristic associated with telephone demand. Most of
these studies look at demand in the aggregate sense and do
not address demand across particular social segments.
This was acceptable in the past because the cost of
telephone (local exchange) was relatively low and the rates
were based on a flat monthly charge independent of actual
use. More recent work has begun to address the broader
socioeconomic differences in household telephone demand
characteristics.
If the demand characteristics for telephone are
different across social groups, then the impacts of
changing pricing structures will have different effects on
different groups. It is therefore essential to know what
these effects will be. One potential way of determining
these effects is by reviewing how telephone access and
telephone use have been shown to differ across
socioeconomic characteristics. An even more critical point
in assessing demand is the difference in the characteristics
that are related to use as opposed to those that are related
to access to telephone service. Understanding these
discrepancies can help to clarify the nature of
interdependency between actual use and simple availability.
Demand for Telephone Access
Mahan (1979) examined telephone access and grade of
service in a study of telephone in North Carolina. He
collected cross-sectional data on geographic, demographic
40
and economic variables and analyzed it using a binary
probit model.13 Specifically, data was gathered on
household income, grade of service, employment status
(employed/unemployed, self-employed), occupation, race and
calling scope of the exchange. His results indicated that
income race, education, children under 8 and adults over 60
all affect telephone penetration levels. In addition, of
all occupations, only rural farm operators were more likely
to have a telephone than other occupations. Households
where the head of household was black and households with
children under the age of 8 were less likely to have a
telephone than others. Household income, education and
adults over 60 were positively related to telephone
subscription.
In addition to access, Mahan also explored the grade
of service choice made by the household, differentiating
between one-party, two-party and four-party service. He
found that price levels affected the choice of a grade of
service and that households with higher education levels
and households headed by blacks who subscribed to telephone
service, chose higher grades of service.
The most comprehensive studies of the relationships
between demographic characteristics and telephone access at
the household level have been conducted by Perl (1978;
1983). Using data on rates for various geographic areas
collected from the Bell operating companies and national
41
census data, Perl examined household telephone access
across the United States using a probit model. Both
studies examined the demand for residential telephone
service. The first study, done in 1975 and later revised
in 1978, examined 1970 census data. Perl used essentially
the same model for both studies although some modifications
were made in the second study. In addition to examining
income and price effects, Perl included as variables "age
of the head of household," "education of the head of
household," the "type of household" and the "age
composition of the household" together with "household
size." Table 2.1 summarizes the results.
Generally, as age and education increase, so does the
rate of telephone penetration. The presence of a female
adult, presence of children over 6 and people over 65 also
increase the level of telephone penetration.
Prediction of lower levels of telephone penetration
included unemployed head of household, head of household
who is black, residence in the southern United States and
poor English proficiency.
Both Perl and Mahan found differences in telephone
penetration according to income and education as well as
race. For example, a household headed by a black was less
likely to have a telephone. In addition, they agree that
older adults (Perl used adults over 65 while Mahan used
adults over 60), increased the likelihood of telephone
42
Table 2.1
Significant Socioeconomic Variables in Telephone Access
Perl 1978 Perl 1983 Mahan 1979
Age Age
Children over 6
Adults over 65
Age
Children under 8
Adults over 60
Income Income/price Income
Education Education Education
Unemployed head
of household
Unemployed head
of household
Rural farm operator
(but not other
occupations)
Household size Household Size
Black race Black race Black race
Rural areas
South South
Installation
cost
Monthly service
cost
Female
Type of Household
English proficiency
Sources: Mahan, G. P. 1979. The Demand for Residential
Telephone Service. East Lansing: Michigan State
University, Institute of Public Utilities. Perl, L.
J. Residential Demand for Telephone Service. 1983.
National Economic Research Associates, Inc. White
Plains, N.Y.
penetration. Mahan found an occupational difference only
for rural farm operators and did not find a significant
difference in telephone penetration for unemployed head of
43
household. Unlike Mahan, Perl found a difference in the
employment status.
Demand for Use of Telephone
Mayer (1976) was among the first to analyze telephone
usage data. Mayer noted that the most parsimonious
explanation of differing calling patterns was explained by
race; specifically blacks versus non-blacks. The way Mayer
comes to this conclusion is through analysis of telephone
calls (both duration and number) by income level. He
notes:
...in a broad-based study of flat rate customers,
including suburban exchanges as well as center cities,
the heaviest users of the telephone were people with
the lowest income." He continues; "Nobody likes the
looks of the graphs (because) The easiest explanation
is that racial factors contaminate the results —
blacks make more telephone calls than whites, other
things being equal, and they take more time on each
call...(Mayer, 1976 pp.233).
Mayer finds that several other demographic
characteristics also affect telephone use. The most
important factor is the number of people in the household
old enough to use the telephone. The second most important
factor is the presence of a woman between the ages of 19
and 64. The third most important factor is the presence of
a man who is not the head of household and who is over 65.
Following these are the presence of teenage girls and the
presence of girls or boys under the age of 10. We include
Mayer here because he introduces more questions than he
answered. His article utilized data provided to him by
44
AT&T. For that reason, we have no background on the
methods of analysis. However, Mayer's study has been
followed by others, usually economists, who have shown
enhanced interest in usage demand characteristics in recent
years.
Infosino (1980) used data from both California and
Cinncinnati to examine the relationship between telephone
calling rates and household demographics. The data was
collected from mailed questionaires for which they got a
40% response rate. The analysis was cross sectional and
provided information on the following demographics
characteristics: age, sex, household size, education,
income and marital status, employment, type of housing,
length of residence and size of the exchange area. Two
discrepancies between the data sets were the lack of home
ownership and race data for the California sample. Race
was added for California from census data later.
Households with heads over 65 showed the lowest calling
rates. Females, blacks, and Hispanics made more calls than
others and household size of 2 differed from other
household sizes in their calling rate. In addition, income
and density of exchange proved to be important for
California but not for Cinncinnati.
By far, the most comprehensive study of traditional
demographic factors was carried out by Brandon (1981) in
Chicago. Brandon and her colleagues examined telephone use
45
according to demographic characteristics from the
perspective of urban versus suburban, time of calling, day
of the week, number of calls, and duration of calls as well
as distance. She then analyzed each of these calling
characteristics according to each individual socio-economic
variable. The socio-economic factors that she incorporated
included age, income, household size, composition of the
household, type of householder, employment status and race.
The results show several significant relationships between
demographic characteristics and telephone use. The main
predictor for length or duration of a telephone
conversation was the presence of elderly females (55 and
over).
Two aspects of Brandon's analysis of demographics and
usage bear special mention. First, the usage
characteristics for time of day are examined utilizing the
more qualitative data analysis of comparing medians and
means for different demographic groups. The authors
conclude, however, that there is little difference in
calling patterns by distance across demographic
characteristics. They suggest that the result that they do
get is more appropriately specified as a community of
interest14 variable that should be explicitly investigated
and accounted for before analyzing distance results. This
is an important reason for studying geographic communities
as well as communities of relationships. The relationship
46
of distance to calling is one of patterns of contacts
within and beyond a local calling area.
Another study of usage that bears close examination is
the Charles River Associates study (1982) used to analyze
the impacts of the introduction of local-measured service
in the Southern New England Telephone local exchange area.
A forecasting system involving three probit models was used
to analyze their data.
The first probit model shows the discrete choice
between the flat rate and a measured rate. It was
developed using data from a subscriber line usage survey.
The second probit equation examines the choice between flat
and local-measured choice based on survey data regarding a
hypothetical choice. The third probit choice model examines
the choice between measured-rate and local-measured
service.
At the time this research was begun, SNET subscribers
for residential service already had available to them a
choice between a flat rate and a measured rate which
included a 3 0-call allowance and charge on a per call basis
after the allowance was used up. Approximately 90% of the
subscribers chose flat rate. Therefore, each group was
evaluated according to their choice between the existing
rate and the hypothetical rate for LMS. Previous data on
usage was used to estimate their choice between flat and
measured rate offerings.
47
Specification of the models using price, time of day,
risk aversion, socioeconomic variables (age, income of the
household, size of the household, number of teenagers
present in the household, and education) was performed
based on theoretical and empirical a priori knowledge.
The original specification of choice resulting from
these predictive models utilized hypothetical data for LMS
(the perception of the householder). However, the true
test comes from actual predictive ability. In November of
1982, SNET local-measured service offering was approved.
Following up on the model's performance, Green and Zarkadis
(1984) found the following. Ninety-seven percent of the
switch to local measured service was accounted for by
customers switching from the flat rate service to LMS.
Only 3% of those who switched to a LMS rate were from the
customer segment who already subscribed to a measured rate.
Their overall prediction of subscription to LMS was very
good. However, the demographic differences did not exhibit
the influences they expected.
While the prediction of the economic aspects of the
forecasting system are very good, the ability to predict
migration according to demographic characteristics turns
out to be rather weak in comparison. When several
demographic variables were found to correlate with the rate
choice they were eliminated in order to eliminate bias that
would be created. Although two were kept to serve as
48
instrumental for socioeconomic conditions, they apparently
did not suffice in this respect. This leads credence to
the relevant effects of each demographic variable with the
choice of telephone calling patterns that Brandon explored
and maintained. Hence, while the inclusion of risk
aversion was very profitable (a fact that can be directly
related to the value of a telephone as an 'information
service1) the influence of complex demographic
interrelationships apparently still operates and are not
explained away by risk aversion, even when including
aggregate indicators for demographics.
Though the demographic analysis of Brandon is far
superior to that incorporated into the CRA study, the
Charles River Study is to be applauded for the careful
specification of risk and risk aversion that was
accomplished through the probit system. Few have sought to
analyze risk in terms of telephone use even though the
telephone is basically used to seek information (albeit
sometimes about self). Logically, one of the most
important characteristics of information economics, which
is the individual's orientation toward risk, should prove
to be a good indicator of information seeking behavior on
the telephone (see Hirschliefer & Riley, 1979 for
discussion of information economics).
Summary of Telephone Demand
Two things are important to consider on the basis of
49
previous telephone demand studies. First, demographics are
related, but not homogeneously, to both access to telephone
and usage of telephone. The most striking difference
between access demand and usage demand is that among the
elderly (over 60). Second, the demographics apparently
exhibit complex interrelationships which affect demand for
telephone. Both the work of Dervin and Atwood (1982) and
Atwood and McLean (1983) indicate that demographic
differences may be accounted for by influence of system
constraints on information seeking behaviors. The CRA
study (1982) and the follow-up by Green and Zarkadas (1984)
lend further credence to the impacts of demographics and
their complexity. Finally, the risk aversion predictor
provides a linkage between information and telephone use.
Although there is good empirical analysis that
indicates seniors use the telephone less than other groups,
they apparently prefer a flat rate structure which charges
everyone the same amount. In effect, seniors are then
subsidizing other users' telephone service. This would
suggest that the characteristics of demand are different
for seniors than for others.
Information Economics and Its Relationship to
Telecommunication
Why is it that given the opportunity to save money by
subscribing to a usage rate, people fail to do so? Usage
sensitive rate structures are being imposed by type, i.e.
50
many states are opting to make business rates usage
sensitive while maintaining residential rates as flat rates
or offering the choice of subscribing to either a usage
sensitive rate or a flat rate for telephone service. To
date, people in residential sections are not
enthusiastically adopting usage sensitive rates when given
the choice. Although the argument of the telephone
companies has been that approximately 60% of their
residential customers would benefit from subscribing to
usage sensitive service, the adoption rates in areas where
it is being offered as a choice are typically in the range
of 1 - 7%. The only notable exception to this pattern is
the 2 0% adoption rate experienced in Pennsylvania (State
Telecommunications Regulation Report. Nov. 1984).
In order to understand the parameters of this question
it is useful to examine the parameters of information, the
product that flows over the conduit. The value of the
telephone is secondary to the need for information and
communication. Generally, people seek information15 to
reduce uncertainty or risk. Uncertainty is a situation
where the outcomes are not known and the probability of a
particular outcome cannot be estimated (Mansfield, 1978).
Risk, on the other hand, implies that the person has enough
information to assign probabilities to potential outcomes.
In an analysis of information economics Hirschliefer
and Riley (1979) have treated uncertainty and information
51
as interrelated but separate parts. Basically, their
framework involves three main characteristics: states,
acts and beliefs about states. These three are varying,
usually together, and this results in a decision based on
expected utility (satisfaction) to be derived from a
particular decision. The state is the situation and
context under which a decision may be made, the beliefs
about states are evaluative weights assigned to the
situation and the acts, and the acts themselves are those
actions which are available (i.e. alternative courses) to
the person and/or system for reaching a decision utility
based on evaluation of potential consequences. Hence, we
reduce uncertainty by assigning probabilities based on
these factors and then we make a decision.
However, there are two possible kinds of acts. Acts
may be terminal or non-terminal. When the act is terminal,
the decision is made based on the information at hand.
Studies in economics show that terminal acts are usually
associated with a high degree of confidence about the
knowledge the person perceives he/she has to deal with it.
The non-terminal act is an informational act. This means
that the person faced with the situation is less confident
and will seek further understanding (reduction of
uncertainty) by seeking out messages. The addition of this
fourth factor, messages, will, in general, lead to a
revision of probability beliefs about the state or the acts
52
providing an expected utility.
It is not just the information that changes the
beliefs involved. The value of the information is based on
the credibility of the source. It is impossible to value a
message prior to its consumption. The content of the
message is inherently uncertain. Therefore, we reduce our
uncertainty to risk by assigning probabilities of value to
the information based on the source of that information.
Hirschliefer and Riley (1979) in their formulation of
information economics, define this as an information
service. In other words, what someone actually purchases
is "not a particular message but an information service -
y, generating a probability of a distribution of messages
m".
A telephone subscriber is really buying access as an
information service. Telephone service is a complement to
information. Further, it is a very valuable information
service because it connects us to a wide range of
information and specifically to those who have the highest
credibility with us — our friends and family. In studies
of information seeking, the type of informal network that a
telephone can support and enhance, is consistently shown to
be the most important source of information. Sources who
are known to us, however, can be evaluated as information
services in themselves. Hence, structuring pricing by call
should produce two branches of decision — one based on the
53
value of contacting an unknown and uncertain source of
information and one where the source is known.
Summary of Information Economics
If the source is known then it is possible to evaluate
the source with regard to its knowledge of a particular
subject. Some probability can be assigned to the value of
the message being sought in this case. If the source is
unknown, then no probability can be assigned to the value
of the message. Hence, telephone calls which occur between
the caller and a source that the caller knows can be
evaluated in the context of the need for a specific message
regarding a particular context. Calls to unknown sources
cannot be evaluated in this manner. Such calls are
evaluated on the basis of knowledge about the telephone as
a service that provides availability to a range of
information products.
Functions of Information/Communication
Communication scholars have defined communication and
information primarily from a functional perspective of what
purposes they serve. These were originally formalized as
they applied to mass media. Lasswell (1971) and later
Schramm (1973) were the first to set out functions of
communication. The four defined included entertainment,
information, instruction, and persuasion.
Functions of Information
While understanding demand on the basis of frequency
54
is useful, particularly in identifying the relationships
that occur between demographics and price from a
perspective of preserving equity, it tells us little about
the actual kinds of use people make of their telephone.
Few studies exist that address use of the telephone from
this function perspective. Two types of studies will be
reviewed here. First, we will generally look at studies on
information seeking in an interactive or
potentially-interactive environment. Two groups of
researchers have addressed this area; 1) the researchers
exploring "situation movement state" (e.g.Dervin, 1983);
and 2) researchers exploring demographic characteristics in
information seeking (Williams, F., Dordick, H.S. &
Horstmann, Woods, D. & Valenzuela, 1978). The functions of
communication have been set out by many researchers in many
different ways. Miller and Steinberg (1975) define
communication as functioning to reap some physical economic
or social reward from our environment. Dervin (1984)
reinforces this definition with what she calls the "role of
information" in achieving situation movement state. In a
review of studies, she notes that information is seen as a
means to an end; as a way of getting from one place in
space-time to another. The value of information is
therefore derived from its ability to help us move between
situation states. The point is, we value information
indirectly. What we really value is the ability of
55
information to reduce uncertainty about our world, our
relevant others and ourselves.
The work of Dervin and her colleagues is generally
referred to as sense-making research. Dervin (1983)
describes information seeking and use as constructing
activities whose purpose is to create "personal sense."
The research approach therefore assumes that information
seeking behavior is "responsive to and mandated by changing
situational conditions." The research question she poses
is then "What situational conditions will relate to what
sense making behaviors?" Generally, sense-making research
has looked at three dimensions: 1) the situation movement
states; 2) the gaps that need bridging to move; and 3) the
uses (helps and hurts) of information received. Results tc
date show that most gap-bridging is related to seeking
information related to self and others. It is not merely
fact finding.
Since traditional research has often concentrated on
the sociodemographic differences in information seeking and
use, some of these parameters have been included in order
to compare usefulness of the situation/gaps/uses approach
compared to the demographic or non-time/space bound
variables in predicting information-seeking behavior. In a
1982 study, Dervin and Atwood examined race versus
situation movement state. They found that the situation
predicted the nature of the questions posed but that race
56
and situation movement state interacted to predict use of
sources. The explanation that they offered for this
outcome was that source use is constrained by society and
that this result then hinges upon system or structural
constraints.
Atwood and McLean (1983) followed up on this result
with a further study using the same concepts and similar
methods. They conclude that race does play a part in the
perception of the situation or the Situation State as they
refer to it in their study. The reason that this happens
is the fact that it represents the way that the respondents
see themselves as being constrained or in control of
situations. White and Hispanic students asked more what/who
questions and were more likely to report being in a
situation where they had control such as in a decision
state or observer, whereas black and Asian students
reported more how/where/when questions and were more likely
to report problematic or barrier states. Overall, however,
they conclude that their findings suggest that a
significant relationship between a demographic variable
such as race with information seeking and use behaviors is
based on the respondents perception that their sense-making
capabilities are constrained by the message environment or
system in which they live. It is this difference that
results in differential use of sources by different
subcultural groups. An overview of situation movement
57
states is provided in Table 2.2.
Table 2.2
The Situation Movement States
Being at a point where you need to choose
between two or more roads that lie ahead.
Being dragged down a road not of you own
choosing.
Not having a road.
Being on a road and suddenly having it
disappear.
Knowing where you want to go but someone
or something is blocking the way.
Following someone down a road because he/she
knows more and can show the way.
Spending time waiting for something in
particular.
Spending time without waiting for something
in particular.
Tuning out.
Watching without being concerned with
movement.
Seeing self as proceeding unblocked in any
way and without need to observe.
Source: Dervin, B. "An Overview of Sense Making
Research: Concepts, Methods, and Results to Date." Paper
presented at International Communications Association
Conference. Dallas, TX May 1983. Also see Atwood, R. &
Dervin, B. Challenge to sociocultural predictors of
information seeking: a test of race versus situation
movement state. In M. Burgoon (ed.), Communication
Yearbook 5. New Brunswick, N.J.: Tranaction, 1982.
Despite the finding that media use/sources are
different because of structural constraints and not real
58
DECISION
PROBLEMATIC
SPIN-OUT
WASH-OUT
BARRIER
BEING LED
WAITING
PASSING TIME
OUT TO LUNCH
OBSERVING
MOVING
differences in subcultural groups, the evidence on -
telephone is quite clear. Whatever the underlying reasons,
race plays a part in telephone usage.
However, it may be possible to better predict the
nature of the racial differences in telephone use if we can
generally characterize uses of the telephone by the
situation state. Since particular racial groups can be
associated more with some situation states than with
others,
this might improve our assessments of the differential
impacts of alternative pricing structures on the kinds of
information flow that occurs by telephone according to the
racial group.
Media Functions In Information
In order to understand the relationship between the
information seeking and demographic characteristics from a
functional perspective, and how they were related to the
choice of medium, we now turn to another group of studies.
These studies were performed in the early 1970's by a group
of researchers in Los Angeles and utilized small samples in
specific neighborhoods known to have a particular ethnic
make-up within the city area of Los Angeles. Each
respondent was asked questions about their sources for
information: what kind of information was important and
what sources they used to get information about general
topic areas. In addition, each respondent was asked to
59
identify people in their community to whom they would turn
to seek information. The results of these questions were
later compared and those people who were identified most
often (community leaders) were later interviewed so that
their responses could be compared with those of the rest of
the sample population.
The researchers found that community leaders' sources
of information varied from that of the general population.
Also, their perception of the most important problems in
the community was different from those of the rest of the
respondents. Finally, for all respondents a predominant
source of "important information" (ranging from employment
to international news) was face to face contacts.
Face to face ranked highest for all three groups as
the source of recent important information. Telephone
ranked second together with mail for the low income group
while only mail ranked second for the community leaders.
Radio and television ranked second for the homeowners. The
conclusions reached by Williams, Dordick, Woods, Horstmann
and Valenzuela (1978) generally were: 1) there is a marked
bias between the three groups in their media habits as well
as their sources for information regarding different topic
areas; and, 2) in particular, the interpersonal network was
a more important source of information for the black
community, and institutions and agencies were more
important sources of information for Hispanics.
60
Unfortunately, the questions posed were not mutually
exclusive with regards to the source of information and the
medium sought to gain access to the source.
However, these studies represent an early attempt to
look at information seeking across all potential channels.
Prior research and most research that has followed has
concentrated either on a channel (almost entirely mass
media studies) or they have sought to identify and explain
the dissemination of a particular kind of information.
Uses and Gratifications Approach to Media Functions
The second group of studies is generally known as the
uses and gratifications approach. Uses and gratifications
research has sought to take a functionalist approach
through examining the gratifications associated with media
use. Most uses and gratifications research has concentrated
on the medium of television. However, in that the approach
concentrates on a gratifying outcome associated with actual
media content, it is potentially expandable to other media.
Furthermore, the assumption of the uses and gratifications
approach that people consciously and actively communicate
for purposes of self-satisfaction, i.e. that human
communicators are not passive reactors, makes the approach
particularly enticing for research of interactive media.
The major study in uses and gratifications comes from an
investigation by Elihu Katz and his colleagues into uses of
mass media in Israel (1974). This study provides a rich
61
interpretation of the approach. One intriguing finding in
the study was the crucial importance of friends and family
as sources of satisfaction for many of the needs which were
assessed. The telephone is a medium that people use to
communicate with family and friends.
Following up on the suggestive relationship between
the telephone and the use of family and friends as sources
of gratification of communication needs, Williams, Phillips
and Lum (1984) conducted a pilot study that looked at
gratification and the importance of the gratification by
content across media. Included in this study was
telephone.
Using the original Katz classifications and statement,
the researchers evaluated each medium according to its
perceived ability to serve a particular need and gathered
ranking information about the importance of each need. The
results showed that the telephone ranked high on the same
gratifications of communication needs that face to face
contact did although it was generally somewhat less
preferred. The mean rankings for telephone use in
satisfying certain kinds of gratification ranged from a
high of 1.7 (to spend time with friends) to a low of 4.1
(to understand how Russia feels). The two kinds of
gratifications ranked most important overall were to spend
time with friends and to know myself. Telephone showed a
strong tie to self, friends and family as referents.
62
Contact and emotional experience were the most prevalent
connections in the ten most important communication
gratifications associated with telephone. Only one of the
top ten was informational (to participate in discussion
with friends).
Telephone Functions
The previous sections have concentrated on the
differences between non-space/time variables (demographics)
involved in telephone use and the space/time variables
associated with information seeking and use. The purpose
of this section is to review the studies that have tried to
put them together. The most notable study in this area is
Singer’s (1980) study of the social functions of the
telephone. Singer's study is a baseline frequency analysis
of telephone use derived from interviews with 13 8
respondents in Ontario, Canada. The sample was not random
but rather chosen to elicit information from as widely
varying a group as possible within a contained geographic
area. Singer’s study is very broadbased and examines
several dimensions of telephone use that he generally
classifies as: 1) behavior; 2) attitudes; 3) norms; 4)
pragmatics; 5)efficiency; and 6) available services. The
discussion here will center on the attitudes and
perceptions about actual telephone behavior. Advantages of
the telephone were emergency use, convenience and contact
(less social isolation, etc.). Disadvantages included
63
interruption and overaccessibility, nuisance calls, and so
on. Of the entire response sample, 17.4% of the sample
population could think of no disadvantages while no one
reported no advantages. When asked if their lifestyle would
change without a telephone, 60% indicated that it would.
Further, when ranked against other media, telephone ranks
first, although television is a close second.
The pragmatic functions included emergency uses (58.8%
reported using it in an emergency) scheduling, using the
Yellow Pages, calling government agencies (45.8% reported
doing so, and 90% were satisfied with the results they
achieved through using the telephone) calling the doctor
(54%), ordering goods and services, obtaining news and
weather information.
Singer also sought to find out how well informed
people were regarding how to get information that they
needed by telephone. When queried about who to call, the
number of correct responses varied widely depending on the
topic in question. This finding is compatible with that of
the Los Angeles researchers (Williams et al, 1978). The
type of information that people considered important varied
considerably. One might surmise that people have
established behaviors in seeking information that is
important to them and little knowledge about getting
information that is not central to their interests.
When exploring telephone norms, temporal patterns came
64
into play. However, the reasons for calling at particular
times were varied. Most reported calling friends in the
evening. The largest percentage cited cost as the reason
(48.5% mentioned it was cheaper).
Clearly, on the basis of Singer's (1980) research, the
telephone is used to gather information of a very diverse
nature because of its convenience. Such information
typically pertains to the local environment and personal
context of individuals. Hence, much of the respondent's
telephone use (approximately 60%) occurred with family and
friends.
As part of the on-going research on telephone use at
the Annenberg School of Communication at the University of
Southern California, several small pilot studies were done
on use and attitudes toward the telephone. One of the
studies in this group (Williams, Dordick & Jesuale, 1985)
utilized a sample of 130 undergraduate students to explore
attitudes toward the telephone. The results of their final
questionnaire were analyzed using factor analysis. The
results (based on factoring responses of 13 0 students on 22
scales) yielded a six factor structure. The authors
conclude that factors 2, 3, 4, and 6 are interpretable and
useful for later research. They discard factor 5 as
uninterpretable and factor 1 as an artifact of scales rated
as low relative to telephone use.
Factor analysis has been much used for examining
65
attitudes. Attitudes tend to cluster. One way of
evaluating the efficiency of the results is to look for
factors known to occur consistently on attitude scales.
These are strength (affective orientation), evaluative and
activity factors. If we accept the authors' interpretation
of their results, we do not have these present. Upon more
careful examination of the actual scales on each factor,
however, it appears that factor 1 (labelled non-use) is in
fact an evaluative factor since all the scales loaded on
this factor show communication situations judged
inappropriate to conduct on the telephone. The social
factor is a strength factor and the transaction factor is
an activity factor. Generally, the nonuse factor
represents intensely personal interactions that subjects
are likely to perceive as only appropriate face to face.
Summary of Media Functions in Information
Media function to service a wide variety of
information/communication needs. Telephone, in particular,
serves the need to maintain social relationships to
transact business or daily activities and, generally, to
help us handle uncertainty when it arises. It is a tool
used in the functioning of our everyday lives, mostly with
people whom we are well-acquainted with. Telephone serves
our more personal information connections and it is used to
associate and integrate more than to acquire 'objective'
information. Therefore, telephone serves both current needs
66
and potential future needs for both terminal and
non-terminal information and communication activities. The
way these functions are served by telephone, and the extent
of its use as opposed to other communication channels for
meeting needs, differs across socioeconomic groups. This
occurs not because non-space/time variables determine
communication but because they influence the scope of
activities. The need for information and communication is
derived from other needs associated with these daily
activities.
Concluding Summary
The telephone is a tool for seeking information and
engaging in communication. It can be most easily valued in
its ability to serve the functions of information and
communication according to its ability to do so
efficiently. It has no good substitute since it forshortens
the space/time in which such functions of information can
be served. It shares the complexities of the public nature
of information since its value is derived from it.
Telephone can be viewed as an information service,
providing access to both known and unknown sources.
However, the telephone service can be differentiated
according to ability of the caller to predict the
credibility of information he/she is seeking in advance.
This ability is based on the relationship between the
parties engaged or seeking to engage in
67
conversation/information exchange. Information itself,
however, is valued on its ability to reduce situational
uncertainty.
Therefore, the telephone has a value for being
available (access) in order to deal with situational
uncertainty which can be construed as its option demand.
In the case of a known source, there is also a maintenance
function in telephone use that may be predictable and can
be associated as its usage demand. Both terminal and
non-terminal information is sought via the telephone.
Demographic characteristics consistently show
differences across groups for both access and use of the
telephone. Potentially, then, changing a pricing structure
can alter the utility functions of differentiable social
groups. One of the most striking differentiations is in
the case of the elderly. Their access is higher yet their
usage (in general) is lower.
The following chapters proceed to examine the
potential differentiability of demand characteristics of a
well defined community of senior citizens by exploring
their access and uses of the telephone. Chapter 3
discusses the research questions, chapter 4 sets out the
model, chapter 5 discusses the methodology, chapter 6
presents the results and chapter 7 draws the conclusions
and discusses their implications for economic studies of
telephone, for policy makers in examining rate changes and
68
for social scientists studying media use.
69
___ Notes
9. Minimally, a public good is a good that can be consumed
by one person without impinging on the ability of another
to consume the same good. For instance, while person A and
person B cannot eat the same apple, they can both read the
same article in a newspaper and derive the full benefit of
the information contained therein— hence, the newspaper
article is a public good. This situation is commonly
referred to in the economic literature as a situation of
non-rivalrous consumption.
10. Risk aversion is a situation where the person wants to
avoid risk taking. Therefore, he/she takes actions that
diminish potential risks. Insurance is a product related
to the value associated with avoiding or minimizing risk.
11. The consumption externality is a benefit or disbenefit
accruing to a consumer from another consumer's use or
consumption of the product. We are often concerned with
consumption that causes a disbenefit to others such as an
industry polluting a stream by use of the water for waste
disposal. However, the consumption externality in
telephone is generally assumed to be positive, i.e. other
subscribers on the network benefit from the addition of a
subscriber. The consumption externality is a public good
because the benefit is not excludable.
12. A negative externality is generally ignored as being
small in the case of telephone service because the positive
externality is much more pervasive. However, increasing
telemarketing schemes have made this of greater concern in
the present than it was historically. Other negative
external disbenefits associated with telephone are nuisance
calls, obscene phone calls and wrong numbers.
13. The rationale for a probit model rather than a logit
model of choice is discussed further by Hausman, Tardiff
and Baughum (1982) with respect to the SNET optional
measured service proposal. The rationale for using the
probit model to differentiate between existing rate choices
was based on its ability to handle different probabilities
of choice for LMS between groups existing prior to LMS
introduction (i.e. between measured rate subscribers and
flat rate subscribers). A logit model would predict equal
conversion rates for both groups if such households
exhibited the same socioeconomic characteristics and
calling patterns. In fact, they posited that there would
be different likelihoods of conversion between the measured
service group and the flat rate group since they had
originally chosen different rate structures. The probit
model captures the original difference.
14. A community of interest analysis is generally an
analysis of the distance patterns of calling normally
related to the determination (from a telephone company's
point of view) of the amount of calling that occurs within
a central office area (i.e. stays within a certain radius)
by a household subscriber as opposed to calling that occurs
over greater distances.
15. In the sense that information is used in this text, we
are referring to semantical information— i.e. information
that carries a meaning structure interpretable by both
parties involved in its exchange.
CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH QUESTIONS
The need to determine usage based rate structures for
telephone services that do not reduce the value of
telephone communication in our society requires an
understanding of the social benefits as well as of the
demographic relationships attributable to telephone
calling. In order to do this we must be able to
typologize telephone use by types of information flow. We
need to know how important each use is; whether it is
predictable use or not? and whether the benefits from each
type of call are direct or indirect. Sense making theory
argues that when communicating we are using information to
bridge a gap in order to move from one situation into
another. Information reduces our uncertainty, allowing us
to make a choice between alternative paths or outcomes.
Hence, the value attached to communication is an indirect
value based on physical, social and psychological needs.
This study proposes to determine the types of
information and communication sought through the telephone
to satisy these needs and to determine the extent to which
they may differ across groups and create differing demand
structures. The kinds of information and communication are
then examined according to the relative perception of
importance associated with each kind of message to identify
the potential consequences of changing a rate structure for
72
telephone service on tne information flows that occur over
the telephone.
The following research questions are therefore set
out:
1)
What calls do people perceive as being
anticipatable?
2) Of those calls that are not anticipated,
what calls are associated with a positive benefit
and what calls are associated with a negative
benefit?
3) Is there a positive relationship between frequency
of use and the option demand?
4) What proportion of the telephone's value is
associated with the option to use it? What
proportion is associated with actual use?
5) Does greater siuational uncertainty lead to more
use of the telephone for information seeking?
6) What is the range of uses (types of information and
communication) associated with the telephone?
7) Do all telephone subscribers share a common set of
information types related to option demand?
8) How is time valued that seniors spend on the
telephone?
9)
Can consideration of information values help us to
better predict household demand for telephone
service?
73
TUI How does the interdependent nature of communication
affect the perception of equity across factors of
telephone use?
What Is The Option Demand Associated With Telephone
Service?
If people can tell us what calls are anticipated, we
can differentiate between the value associated with actual
use and the value associated with availability of telephone
service. This enables a comparison of costs of service
with the value of service (upon which demand is based) in
order to minimize distortions based on incongruency between
how telephone service is valued and how it is priced.
Understanding the dimensions of telephone use as it relates
to the information and communication it carries helps
provide a demand structure that can identify use and
availability values.
The Two Characteristics of Option Demand
We have shown that there are two characteristics to
option demand in telephone service: the consumption
externality and the unanticipated or non-routine uses of
telephone calling (calls made) that associate themselves
with the unforseen arising of uncertainty. These two
characteristics can in turn be broken down further.
Consumption externalities associate themselves both with
being a subscriber and also with specific benefits derived
from an actual telephone call being received. Economists
74
have formulated demand equations which incorporate a
measure defined as the option demand. Two problems must be
addressed with respect to these measures. First, there is
the definition of anticipated versus unanticipated use.
Typically, the option demand has been measured as
"emergency telephone use" and the value of calls received
(the consumption externality). Not all unanticipated calls
made are emergencies. Calls that are not anticipated may
involve crisis calls in the context of getting information
or getting something done (i.e. instrumental use). On the
other hand, there are contact uses (intrinsic use) that
might also be characterized as unanticipated. For
instance, if I feel lonely, I might call a friend on the
spur of the moment to cheer myself up.
From the flip side of the coin, not all calls received
are really unanticipated. Most of us need not think too
long to recall a situation where we asked someone to call
us or left word to have a call returned. In fact, many
dramatic uses of the telephone as a prop in a story line,
play upon the theme of someone waiting for a telephone
call, i.e. the anticipation of a call to be received. This
arises out of the fact that there is an interdependent
utility present in all communication, including telephone
calls (Artie & Averous, 1972).
Each of these parameters needs to be examined and
understood in order to correctly assess the value of
75
telephone access that is associated with the option demand
as opposed to the value associated with access of the
anticipated usage of the telephone.
Rl. Therefore, our first task is to determine what
calls people perceive as being anticipatible and
what calls are not perceived as being
anticipatible?
R2. Second, we want to know which of the calls which
are not anticipated (i.e. part of the option
value) are associated with a positive perception
and which are associated with a negative
perception since this has implications for their
addition or subtraction from the overall value?
Theoretical Implication of Option Questions
The manner in which Weisbrod (1964) characterized the
option demand did not imply a direct link between the use
of the product and the value of having it available because
we perceived that we intended to use it. Having the
telephone is important in case you need it for emergencies
but you hope you never need to use it in this manner.
Perhaps what is really relevant here is that the frequency
of use for a specific purpose is not necessarily correlated
with its importance. Most people will cite emergency use
as one of the most important reasons for having telephone
access in their household.
Based on a diary study carried out by Lum and
76
Phillips, however, the use of the telephone for emergencies
(broadly defined to include all sorts of crisis calls and
not strictly life and death or property damage -i.e. uses
based on the presence of physical danger or damage)
comprised only about 5% of the calls made (i.e. it showed a
frequency of 5% based on total calls). However, when Lum
(1984) asked seniors about the importance of their
telephone to them, emergency was the most frequently given
specific reason for needing a telephone in the household.
Long, on the other hand argued that the value of the
option demand is associated positively with the intent, if
not the actuality, of use. Hence, the person may perceive
that they might want to use it at some time in the future
and therefore they are willing to pay something for this
option.
Those who have considered the option demand at the
theoretical level in telecommunications seem to agree with
Long's conception. Both Taylor (1980) and The Bethesda
Research Center (1984) indicate that the relationship to
use is positive. Present use establishes the perceived
need or want to use it in future time. The Bethesda group
goes somewhat further and suggests that low option value is
associated with low usage demand and that pricing by the
call therefore may cause some people to drop off the
system.
Evidence from the GTE attitudes study and the relative
77
use versus penetration indicated by seniors in Hawaii,
suggest that the relationship between option demand and use
from an actual research experience suggest that Weisbrod
(1964) was more accurate.
R3. Hence we must ask, is the option demand
positively related to frequency of use?
Summary of Questions About General Potion Demand
However, in order to make the actual leap from the
presence of option demand and value to the implications for
actual use, we must know what proportion of the telephone's
value (measure of demand) is actually associated only with
unanticipated uses both made and received. Hence the
question for determining a price structure change becomes
one of proportion. For instance, a person reporting little
use of the telephone for making scheduled or anticipated
calls but highly valuing receiving calls may find a price
per call as a deterrent to people calling them. If this is
their perception, i.e. that people, if they are charged,
will no longer call, then the value of the telephone may be
reduced. If they perceive that they make a lot of calls,
then the cost will rise and they may also find their
telephone less valuable.
R4. What proportion of the telephone's value is
associated with the option to use it? What
proportion is related to anticipated actual
usage?
78
The Relevance of information Functions to Option Demand
Many telephone calls are anticipated being received
because they are a response to some other communication
perhaps completed by telephone and perhaps arising from
communication in some other mode. For instance,
clarification of a message received by letter is often
accomplished by telephoning the sender.
Sense making studies have shown that people seek
information based on the need to move through time and
space. They identified several situation states such as
'•decision making", "problematic" and "barrier" where the
person might be particularly disposed to seek information
to help them move. They also identified situation states
such as "waiting" and "observer" states where people would
be less likely perhaps to seek information/communication.
The amount of information sought would then depend on the
uncertainty present in the person's situation.
R5. Does greater situational uncertainty lead to
more information seeking?
a. Is this done by telephone, if so how much?
b. Is it associated with the value the person
places on option demand?
The factors affecting this question pertain to
situational uncertainty present in the person's context,
the range of messages available to the person (i.e. that
part of the consumption externality associated with
79
subscription) and the relative credibility of the
components in this range. This can be addressed in part on
the basis of community of interest analysis. In order to
accomplish this we need to redefine the telephone option
demand as a function of information seeking
characteristics.
Value of Potion Demand Across Social Groups
The second problem of option demand is that the value
associated with it may vary across groups in society
relative to telephone service. Hence, an incorrect or
undifferentiated assessment of the value associated with
the unanticipated needs for telephone communications may
lead to significant differences in access across social
groups. In order to understand this potential, however, we
must understand the range of uses and their relative
importance by user groups.
R6. What is the range of uses associated with the
telephone?
a. Are these further specifiable in terms of
option demand and usage demand?
The next question then becomes one of differentiation
across traditional demographic groups. Telephone access
and usage have both been shown to be correlated with
certain demographic and income characteristics. One of the
most important characteristics is age. Currently national
attention is focused on lifeline. One of the primary
80
recipient: groups is senior citizens because they are often
on low fixed incomes and/or they suffer from physical
ailments which make a telephone a necessary component of
independent living.
Information seeking studies would seem to indicate
that while there are relationships identifiable between
certain demographic characteristics and information seeking
patterns as well as choice of modes, the sense making
studies would interpret this as a function of system
constraints experienced by identifiable groups in society,
not truly demographic differences. Demographics may simply
be an instrumental variable that covarys with particular
social orientations.
R7. Is option demand associated along different
information types by different people?
a. If so, when is it positively related and when
is it negatively related?
b. Is this a function of the value of information
to the person?
c. Since seniors exhibit a different orientation
toward penetration and use of telephone from
other groups, what characteristics associated
with information and telephone are important
to them?
Finally, we have suggested that the imposition of
charges for various usage components of telephone calling
81
imposes a decision tree on the actual usage pattern.We
must therefore consider the decisions facing the individual
at each level of this hierarchy rather than the simple
decision to access or not access. What factors enter the
decision to access? Previous studies suggest that the
opportunity cost of time affects the decision to make a
call and it also affects the duration.
R8. How do seniors value the time they spend using
the telephone?
Risk aversion, characteristics of age, race, income,
type of household, size of household and geographic
location are all related to telephone access.
R9. Can consideration of the information values help
us to better predict the demand for the telephone
at the household level?
RIO. Finally, because communication, whatever the
mode, is interdependent in its utility, how do
factors affecting use associate themselves with a
perception of equity?
a. How does reciprocity operate in telephone
calling? Who makes the call?
b. Is reciprocity related to the kind of
information sought?
Summary of Research Questions
The research questions posed here set out to redefine
telephone demand segments according to the type of
82
information and communication that telephone is used to
seek. It further examines the nature of telephone use
across levels of situational uncertainty and socioeconomic
groups to draw potential implications about the impacts of
telephone pricing structures on information flows. The
agenda seeks to segment demand for the telephone not on the
basis of use but on the basis of the importance of the
various functions of communication and information it helps
us serve. In doing so, we can then reflect this structure
of demand against the traditional demand structure to
identify critical areas of divergence that may be affected
(either positively or negatively) by particular rate
structures.
CHAPTER' 4 : EXPLICATION OF THE MODEL
This model seeks to classify telephone use according
to the way in which people perceive their use by the
predictibility of use, the type of call,and the importance
of information and communication functions served by
telephone calls. The model classifies calls as terminal
and non-terminal, routine and nonroutine. It structures
these according to thier importance by type of information
and finally, compares them across user groups and levels of
situational uncertainty. In doing so, it suggests a new
demand schema which is multidimensional.
Rationale for the Model
Demand for telephone has been characterized by Taylor
(1980) as a composite demand incorporating both an option
demand characteristic and a usage demand characteristic.
The option demand incorporates both some calls made that
cannot be anticipated (usually measured as emergency calls)
and all calls received; generally referred to as the
consumption externality.
Part of the externalities of the call are the shared
benefits. Squire's analysis of the consumption
externalities in telephone service points out that in order
to develop a demand model based on behavior we need to
identify two things: 1) the different types of calls and
their benefits; and, 2) the relationships between
84
different subscribers. These factors can be conceived as “
providing description of a community of interest which
Brandon (1981) has suggested is not a function of distance
(as it is traditionally measured) but of interests.
Communication by telephone in this conceptualization would
exhibit both a situational element and a relational
element. We cannot accomplish anything except through
communication and with cooperation of others. Hence there
is a community responsibility (based on the
interrelationship of demand for telephone) involved in the
use of telephone.
Lum (1984) showed that senior citizens classify calls
as calls placed, calls received or both. Calls placed
tended to be calls made for instrumental reasons. Hence,
the benefit to be reaped from such a call was related to
some other activity or communication beyond the call. The
benefit from a doctor's visit in which a telephone call was
involved is an example. On the other hand, calls that were
placed primarily for the sake of maintaining a relationship
were more reciprocal.
This reciprocity, however, is subject to certain
limitations that tend to be associated with social status
which is in turn affected by operating cultural values.
For instance, friends are perceived as equal in social
status and therefore the call would be reciprocal.
However, the telephone is also used for maintaining family
85
relationships. These may or may not exhibit reciprocity.
Laudon (1978) has pointed out that the telephone is a very
egalitarian medium, i.e. participation in the conversation
is more equal on the telephone than it is in person.
However, this may be mediated by who places the call. The
institution of usage sensitive service in telephone may
therefore cause a reevaluation of outcome and input in this
case.
This is suggested by Ng's (1984) model of social
equity which indicates that people generally compare their
potential outcomes to the total outcomes of the parties
involved in the interaction. They then compare their
inputs to the total inputs and attempt to equalize the
ratio of their outcomes to their ratio of inputs.
Two things are suggested by this. First, if the
outcome is perceived as being low relative to the input,
i.e. the outcome is not perceived as being important, then
the use of the telephone should diminish as the cost
increases. Second, the perceived outcome should be roughly
equal to the perceived input. However, in the case of
telephone use for social purposes, this equalization of
outcome and input may occur only over time. One way of
exploring this is through the perceived reciprocity of
calling suggested by Lum and its relationship to the
perceived status and closeness (equality) of the
relationship. For example, friends might tend to call each
86
other. While one may call the other several times in a
given time space, over a longer period of time they take
approximately equal turns calling each other.
Studies of demand for telephone at the household level
incorporate usage (a frequency of calling measure) and
access (the availability of a telephone in the household).
Traditionally, both of these have been predicted on the
basis of income and price and related to demographic
characteristics of the household. Age, for instance, has
been shown to affect both usage and access. One group
which exhibits differentiable usage characteristics are
senior citizens-i.e. people that are retired and typically
over 60. The elderly, in the aggregate, have been shown to
have higher telephone penetration levels (given constant
income) than other age groups. However, even though their
access is higher, their usage is generally lower. One of
the potential explanatory variables here is the presence of
a high option value. Unlike the characterization by Taylor
(1980) and the Bethesda Research Institute (1984), if this
is explained by option demand, the option demand may not be
positively related to actual use or intent to use.
Description of the Model
Demand for the telephone is a composite demand
exhibiting a multidimensional structure. At an aggregate
societal level can we conceive telephone demand as
consisting of usage demand and option demand. For the
87
purposes of this model, the usage demand will be
characterized as the calls both made and received that can
be anticipated in their frequency over a given period of
time. Those calls which cannot be predicted over a given
period of time according to the frequency of occurrence
will be characterized as part of the option demand.
However, the benefits can be characterized as benefitting
the consumer directly or benefitting the consumer
indirectly (i.e. the call is part of another transaction,
not a terminal transaction). Hence, it is necessary for
us to break out calls into terminal and non-terminal calls
in order to understand the direct versus indirect aspect of
the benefit.
The first part of our model, therefore, attempts to
characterize calls as routine and non-routine and to
determine the relationship, if any, between the
predictability of the call and the attribution of benefit
as direct or indirect. We will then examine the routine
and non-routine/terminal and non-terminal dimension
according to the typology of Lum (1984) to ascertain if the
relationship between callers impacts the likelihood of the
type of use. This aspect of the model examines telephone
use in the context of interpersonal relationship and
further differentiates use according to the perceived
reciprocity of calls. A difference in the reciprocity
might indicate an imbalance in perceived equity if the call
88
is subject to charge. Finally, the particular content and
its relationship to the forgoing dimensions will be
examined in the context of situation movement state
(Dervin, 1983) in an exploratory analysis to see if we gain
insight into differences that might occur between face to
face communication and telephone calls.
The second part of our model addresses the
relationships of socioeconomic variables (demographics and
income) to the typology of use to see if we can uncover
what Dervin (1983) and Atwood and McLean (1983) refer to as
underlying structural constraints that cause differences in
communication across demographic groups. Finally, the
third part of our model addresses situational uncertainty
and its relationship to the kinds of calls established in
our typology, since communication is generally
characterized as reducing situational uncertainty.
Explication of the Model
What follows is an explication of each part of our
model and how we have defined it and measured it. The
model is hierarchical in that routine and nonroutine is the
uppermost level at which we can differenctiate calls,
followed by terminal and nonterminal. These are further
differentiated according to a typology of telephone use
created by Lum (1984) and a typology of situation movement
states identified with using information to bridge gaps for
movement as characterized by Dervin and others (1983).
89
Routine and Non-routine Use
Routine telephone use is telephone use that a person
can predict the frequency of over a given time span. The
value of such use can be directly attributed to the
perception of actual use. At this level of use, the caller
should be able to value the call according to the specific
message since the source of that message would be known to
the person. A source can be known either in the context of
expertise on a particular subject or known on the basis of
a close association. The value of the call is then related
directly to the importance of the information (i.e. the
kind of call).
Previously, economists have characterized the option
demand as emergency calls made and all calls received.
This model diverges from that characterization in terms of
measurement. The consumption externality is not wholly
specifiable as option demand because: 1) there are rules
operating in the context of social norms that place certain
expectations on some calls received; and, 2) we can
therefore anticipate many of the calls we receive because
they are part of an ongoing relationship and we use the
telephone to help us maintain these relationships. We
derive this way of modelling from this authors previous
analysis that indicates that people can predict the
frequency of certain incoming calls. Such a call will
therefore be attributed to actual usage value if the
90
frequency over a given time span can be estimated (even
though the call is received).
Nonroutine uses are uses which cannot be predicted
over time according to a specifiable frequency.
Nonroutine calls can be perceived as either having a direct
\
benefit or an indirect benefit just as routine calls.
However, this cannot be predicted. Most nonroutine calls
arise out of changes in the person's context. These
changes can be characterized as either changes in
relationship or changes in situation. Since the frequency
is not specifiable we will consider nonroutine calls as
being attibutable to the option demand characteristic of
telephone— i.e. it is available in case I need it.
Terminal and Non-terminal Telephone Calls
This brings us to terminal and non-terminal. A
terminal call is a call that is made for the sake of
communicating and the purpose of the call is contained
within it. Economists generally refer to terminal acts as
acts ending in an activity and non-terminal acts as
informational acts— i.e. we are not confident of what to do
so we seek more information in order to help us decide.
While this may be a valid assumption in a rational,
non-affective framework, many telephone calls are affective
in nature. Keller (1976) proposed that telephone calls
could be viewed as intrinsic, i.e. the telephone call was
an end in itself, not an informational act based on an
91
intermediate demand dependent upon some other activity, as
well as instrumental, which results in some other activity
The way in which we have used the terms terminal and
non-terminal in this typology of use is closely associated
with Keller's explication of intrinsic and instrumental.
While the argument can certainly be made that an
intrinsic call can also be a non-terminal act, i.e. by
providing emotional reassurance that we are making the
right decision, we will not use it in this manner for the
purposes of this study. Both terminal and non-terminal
calls can be perceived as either routine or non-routine.
Further, they can be either calls placed or calls received
Figure 4.1 sets out the matrix for this part of the model.
Figure 4.1
A Matrix of Telephone Calls
Terminal
Made Received
Routine
Nonroutine
Non-Terminal
Made Received
The Content of Telephone Calls
In the second part of the model, telephone calls are
examined according to a more detailed typology of the kinds
of use as suggested by content. At this level, calls can
be classified according to two dimensions. The first
92
dimension of the typology is depicted in Figure 4.2.
This scheme was based on an earlier analysis drawn
solely from senior citizens perceptions of their telephone
Figure 4.2
Typology of Telephone Use: Qualitative Analysis
Non-Routine Calls
Instrumenta Cultural
Level
-Personal
Business
Sociological
Level
Psychological
Level
Getting
Something
Done
Getting
Information
To Do
Something
Helping Hand
lvxng
Problems
Routine Calls
Instrumental
Use
Psychological''
Level
Intrinsic
Use
Scheduling to
Do Something
Social
Obligation
I care
use. This typology was derived directly from the way in
93
which people characterized their telephone use. The
typology includes both calls that were perceived as
affective and calls that are basically cognitive in nature.
Further, at this level, calls received will be
characterized as either exhibiting a positive benefit or a
negative benefit. The negative externality has not been
examined by economists in the past. Such calls have been
mentioned in the literature before. They would include
wrong numbers and nuisance calls. However, they were
traditionally ignored. Perceived to be a minute portion of
all calls, it was assumed that if the negative benefit was
great enough to be taken into account by the subscriber,
he/she would take action to eliminate the situation, e.g.
change the telephone number or get an unlisted number.
The increase in the use of telemarketing on the part
of businesses selling products (herein called soliciting
calls) and the rise in popularity of answering machines
which are used to screen calls, suggests the negative
externality may have increased. Since it would be
necessary to subtract it from perceived benefits of
telephone calls, it will be explicitly set aside in this
model.
Finally, some kinds of telephone content may be more
important than others. We will examine how people
characterize the importance of their telephone and suggest
how this is related to perceived kinds of telephone uses.
94
Telephone Calls and Situations
Telephone calls are related to situations.
Communication does not occur out of context. Hence, it
might be useful to understand whether telephone
conversations are more apt to occur in particular types of
situations. Dervin's (1983) situation movement states were
postulated on the basis of eight years of interviewing
people in a variety of situations involving information
seeking when they have experienced a particular problem.
The categories are arrayed to show what potential blocks
are present in the situation and how they are perceived by
the person. These categories then depict paths that are
blocked and paths that are unblocked. All of this work has
been done in a face to face context. Therefore, this part
of our model is more exploratory. It attempts to look at
telephone calls across categories of situation movement
states to see if there are discernible patterns.
One small pilot study following a uses and
gratifications approach suggests that the types of content
of telephone calls closely parallels the types of content
of face to face communications among young adult college
students (Williams, Phillips and Lum, 1985). In this
author's examination of telephone use among senior
citizens, she found that seniors report that they talk
about the same things on the telephone as they do face to
face with the exception of misunderstandings between close
95
associates. Singer (1980) found that people also perceived
their telephone use in this way except that negative
situations might be more likely handled on the telephone by
a few people. These situation movement state categories
will then be contrasted with the telephone use typology to
examine relationships between the situation and the use of
the telephone.
Demographics. Income and Telephone Demand
Finally, all of this will be put together and
contrasted against the traditional demographic and income
characteristics that are associated with the prediction of
the frequency with which a person uses the telephone to
see: 1) if nonroutine telephone use is associated with
particular aspects of demographics; and, 2) to then
contrast the ability of frequency of use to predict actual
demand for use. If demand for nonroutine use of the
telephone is high, we would expect, on the basis of the
theoretical construct of the Bethesda Research Institute
(1984) that frequency and nonroutine use (the option
demand) would exhibit a significant positive relationship.
Summary of the Model
The model contrasts two aspects of demand: option
demand and usage demand as routine and nonroutine use of
the telephone. It then looks at the demand as being direct
consumer benefit (terminal calls) or indirect consumer
benefit (intermediate demand for something else). These
96
are examined according to the content of telephone calls
(i.e. the communication and/or information function it
serves), the situation state which the telephone call is
reported in the context of, and the importance of the type
of call to the individual. This typology of use is
contrasted against traditional demographic and income
variables known to predict the actual frequency of use.
CHAPTER 5: METHODOLOGY
The research method used to collect the data in the
present is basically qualitative. The original idea stems
from an interest in how telephone use is grounded in the
person's needs for information to handle uncertainty in
their lives and the use of the telephone for social
relationship. Keller (1976) had posited that use could be
classified as intrinsic and instrumental. Interpersonal
literature suggests that the level of relationship between
the parties would be important as a parameter for use which
Phillips, Lum and Lawrence (1983) and Lum (1984), have
applied to the study of telephone use. Most economic
studies of telephone use have related the use of the
telephone to certain income and demographic factors. In
addition, community of interest analysis suggests the
importance of local calling.
There is no general framework in the literature for
understanding telephone use as a tool for satisfying
information and communication needs and their relationship
to the demand for telephone service. Since this is our
primary interest, we approached the research problem from
the inductive perspective of grounded theory. Charmaz
(1983) explicates grounded theory. She notes that grounded
theory "stresses discovery and theory development rather
than logical deductive reasoning which relies on prior
98
theoretical frameworks" (Charmaz, 1983; p. 110).
The beginning part of this study, the interviews,
began with a topical outline about telephone uses and
general situational context based on their local
relationship to the community. In addition, some questions
that are quantifiable on the basis of previous research
such as demographics and income were also included.
Qualitative Method
The qualitative method used for this study was an open
interview technique. The interview was conducted in the
manner of an ethnographic interview where the questions
were posed on the basis of answers to previous questions
and the language used was the language of the respondents
rather than the interviewer. It deviates from the form of
an ethnographic technique by prespecifying the domain — in
this case telephone use. The interviews were then analyzed
to derive codes for telephone uses to create a typology of
use and contrast it with frequency of use, importance of
the telephone to the person and demographic characteristics
and income level. The coding is an iterative process where
each interview is first coded and then codes were compared
across interviews to derive a more general coding scheme.
This process was repeated until a coding scheme that could
fit all uses and all characterizations of importance of the
telephone could be applied across the interviews. These
general codes created the basis for the typology of use.
99
This typology was then examined in the context of each
interview to contrast it with frequency of use, the
importance of the telephone and demographics. The typology
was also analyzed in relationship to the kinds of
information they sought and how this was related to
characteristics of their perception of their telephone use.
Background Analysis
In order to establish the context of the research to
be done, background analysis was used to place the study
into the general social/economic/political context
(telephone service in the State of Hawaii). The background
analysis consisted of cataloguing changes occurring in the
provision of telephone service. Policy documents such as
rate requests were read and examined to determine recent
changes that would have affected the potential group to be
interviewed. Follow up interviews were conducted with the
Hawaii Pulbic Utilities Commission staff, the Executive
Director of the Public Utilities Division of the Department
of Commerce and Consumer Affairs for the State of Hawaii
and relevant officials at the Hawaiian Telephone Company.
Choosing the Site
Following this analysis, a site was chosen. The
particular site is important for a number of methodological
reasons. Because there is some relationship between
demographics and telephone subscription and use, the study
design attempted to minimize the number of demographic
100
characteristics that could be expected to vary.
Demographic information was still gathered and checked, but
it was important to keep the sample as relatively
homogeneous as possible. Yet, the community chosen needed
to be a 'typical community.' Further, age effects on
telephone use were of interest because the elderly exhibit
some variation from the general population with respect to
both access to telephone in the household and use of the
telephone.
In addition to these overall characteristics, the
researcher needed to be familiar with the community in
question so that contextual elements that might be
operating would not remain out of awareness. This was also
important from the perpective of the researcher in
conducting the interviews since they were to be done from
an insider's perspective. Choosing a familiar site enables
the researcher to overcome potential barriers that are
present and gain better results.
The site chosen was a community where the researcher
had lived for some ten years prior to moving to Los
Angeles. This fit the necessity of being familiar. It is a
single family dwelling neighborhood, therefore controlling
for effects on telephone use by type of housing unit known
to exist in Hawaii. The community is a stable, older
neighborhood populated by longtime residents of Hawaii and
and the people who lived here represented an aging but
101
middle class group. In terms of the general state
population, they are typical 'islanders'. Further, this
neighborhood is not generally part of the speculative real
estate market in Hawaii and the length of residence was
typically long. Another variable that affects telephone
use was therefore controlled. This community is one of
only four 'urban' communities that would fit this pattern
left on the island of Oahu. The researcher is familiar
with two of the communities. One of them is populated by
primarily one ethnic group — Caucasians. It was therefore
decided to choose the present community on the basis that
it is more ethnicly diverse and better reflects the actual
ethnic complexity of Hawaii's population.
Sample
The sample concentrated on the elderly residents of
this community which represents a substantial number of the
residents. All elderly residents that could be identified
and who were willing to participate were interviewed.
Approximately 69% of the elderly residents who were asked
to participate did so. This represented a sample
population of 65 people. Only 55 of these interviews were
included in this analysis for reasons of completeness.
Interviews
The interviews conducted with our sample of elderly
residents of this community were set up to include two
parts. The interviews addressed the context of the domain
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and the domain itselr — telephone use; A topical schedule
was used to guide the interviews and is represented below
as Table 5.1.
Table 5.1
Topical Schedule for Open Interviews
1. Community which subject lives in
a. Attitude towards community
b. Involvement in community
c. Length residence
2. A description of their telephone use
a. How much
b. For what purposes
c. With whom
3. Telephone's importance to them
4. General background information
a. Marital status
b. Income
c. Former occupation
d. Size of household
e. Education
f. Ethnic identity
5. Knowledge about changes in telephone service
a. What's happening
b. How do they think it will affect them
The interviews were set up by going from door to door
in the community and asking permission to conduct an
interview with any household member who was a senior
citizen about their telephone use and its importance to
them.
Role of the Interviewer
Lofland and Lofland (1984) suggest that that
interviewers can adopt a role as either a "convert" or a
"martian". A convert is someone who is sympathetic to the
attitudes of the people being interviewed. A martian is
103
Someone who basically operates as if he/she knows nothing
about the situation or context in which these interviews
are taking place. In this case, the researcher is an
insider and inevitably is therefore a convert. The use of
the role of a convert or insider to this context was felt
to override the advantages of being a martian. It provided
entrance to a community of island residents that might
otherwise be inaccessible to researchers due to a very
strong orientation common in island culture to play two
different roles based on their evaluation of the status of
the person they are interacting with as an insider to
island culture or an outsider to island culture.
In addition to the question of convert there is the
question of the role that the researcher wishes to portray
with those he/she is studying. In this case, the
researcher presented herself as a learner. This role was
natural for the researcher in that the researcher presented
herself in the interview situation as a student. Hence,
given that social status, together with the fact that the
researcher is indeed trying to learn about a part of their
everyday life, i.e. telephone use, this was a logical
choice rather than presenting the researcher as an expert.
Together, the researcher's role in this study represents 1)
an attitudinal stance of someone sympathetic and agreeable
with the attitudes and context of the people being
interviewed, i.e. a convert; and, 2) a cognitive
104
orientation of someone who is equal to the interviewees in
terms of the level of knowledge she has about this
particular subject.
The researcher introduced herself into the setting of
each interview as a student conducting research on
telephone use and the importance of the telephone to senior
citizens. This was a straightforward account of who she
actually was and what it was she was trying to accomplish
without being burdensome or boring in the explanation. In
order to establish the role of participant researcher,
however, the researcher did explain that she was a resident
of this general community pursuing a degree elsewhere and
had chosen to 'come home' to conduct the research.
Qualitative Research Technique
Following is a description of the actual qualitative
technique. This involved the following general steps: 1)
initial interview description which sets the context; 2)
the units of analysis explored; 3) the methods of data
reduction utilized in analyzing the first interview; 4) a
description of the second interview; and, 5) a summary of
methods used for the final analysis.
Description of the Initial Interview
The initial interviews were conducted face to face
in the home setting of the interviewee. An open-ended
interview grounded in the initial topical outline was used.
As the interview proceeded the interviewer both taped the
105
interview and took extensive notes. The interview began
either with general questions relating to the community
setting or it began as a response to answers or comments
made by the interviewee after the introduction of the
purpose of the research.
It proceeded according to the interviewee's schedule,
eliciting information with regard to the general topic
areas from questions relating to interviewee's responses in
so far as possible. Only when the respondent ended a chain
of reasoning, i.e. had nothing further to add along a
particular dimension of the topical discussion did the
interviewer move on to another area by introducing a
question about a different general topic.
This proceeded until the topic areas had been covered
and the interviewee had nothing to add in response to a
question about anything they could think of that we hadn't
discussed about their telephone. After this point was
reached, some general demographic data was collected and
the interviewer asked for a telephone number so that she
could contact them for follow up.
Interview Technique
The interview itself was approached from the
perspective of telephone calls as encounters. An encounter
is a mutual involvement in an interaction by two or more
people in a discreet and continuous period of time. A
telephone call can therefore be defined as an encounter
106
that usually lasts a few minutes. Encounters are bounded
by and maintained by the relationships among the people
involved in the conversation. This frame of analysis fits
well with findings on the importance of relationships in
telephone use by earlier pilot studies that the author has
been involved in.
The focus of analysis for the initial coding of each
interview, then, was the call. Therefore, the questions
asked about use were in relationships to calls as "kinds of
telephone use" (i.e. what type of messages were passed over
the telephone) and the relationships of the telephone user
(interviewee) to other people he/she talked to on the
telephone. We were not interested only in the calls,
however. The research also sought to understand how
telephone calls as encounters predicted general telephone
practice (i.e. use) and how that related to the person's
role in the community. Hence, the ultimate goal was to
understand a set of encounters and their relationship to
formal and informal roles of the participants.
Interview Process
The interviewer followed up answers with questions
about the answers. The ability to follow up and get good
responses is dependent upon the interviewer's ability to
use the language of the interviewee. In the setting chosen
for this research, this is particularly crucial. The
definition of "outsider" rests in part on the ability to
107
speak the local 1 dialect1. Hence, the maintenance of
convert status for the interviewer is dependent upon the
ability to minimally use the local dialect and understand
it very well.
However, more importantly, we are trying to build an
analysis based on the interviewee's own range of meaning.
The use of the interviewee's own words to direct questions
from answers facilitates the explication of the meaning of
the terms the interviewee has— i.e. in the context of
ethnographic interviews set out by Spradley (1979) one
establishes the cognitive map of the person by constructing
a domain based on his/her own language and connections
between terms which can later be compared with the domains
of others to establish a typology.
Qualitative Analysis
A detailed description of the actual methods used to
conduct the qualitative analysis of the data gathered
included many distinct though related methods. These
include: 1) creation and systematization of coding
schemes; 2) the construction of typologies of use and
situation state; 3) the comparison and contrast of content
(information demand) by other demand characteristics; and,
4) the integration of uses with the importance of the use
by constructing a complementarity matrix for
interpretation of the relationships among kinds of use
reported for telephone calls and the importance associated
108
with each kind of use.
Method of Analysis
Once the initial interviews were gathered they were
coded. Each interview was coded line by line on the basis
of encounters. The terms used to talk about these
encounters were utilized as category labels at the lowest
units. The encounter was characterized in two ways, by
relationship between the party and the person they were
talking to and by the description of the content of the
call, i.e., the kind of use. These descriptive typologies
of the interviews were then further coded according to two
coding schemes supplied by the theoretical literature. The
relationships reported were coded as cultural, sociological
or psychological (these terms refer to the level of
knowledge one person has about the other). At the cultural
level, no knowledge is assumed. At the other extreme
unique, knowledge of the other person is assumed. The
sociological level falls in between. The content of each
kind of use was coded as being instrumental or intrinsic.
A causal inference pattern was then drawn between the
kinds of telephone conversations reported and the level of
the relationship existing between the interviewee and the
other person they were talking to. The initial scheme
started with the kinds of use and traced their occurence by
level of relationship to establish categories of use by
relationship. However, what this necessitated was a return
109
to the coding to re-examine tne categories. This recoding
was a response to a problem of causality. The domain
suggests that there is a relationship between the type of
relationship and the kind of use. However, the data lend
themself to such a structural typology only if one allows
that the direction reverse itself. Therefore, the analysis
went back to find a common category that would suit all
calls. This resulted in a more general classification
scheme that was labelled routine and non-routine.
Each interview was then reclassified and coded using
the routine and non-routine categories at the top of the
typology followed by terminal and nonterminal (i.e. the
call content resulted in satisfying the demand that caused
the call or the call content lead to the information that
could be used to help satisfy some other demand).
The interviews were then coded for individual
characteristics of the interviewee. Demographic
information and lifestyle characteristics were coded by
interview to elicit information at the individual level of
telephone practice.
Relationships to the community in terms of involvement
were also coded by interview to examine how participation
and telephone practice were related or not related to the
person's perception of settlement or community well-being.
Finally, three categories that showed up in the
analysis of each interview were categories of importance.
11C
These categories were coded “according to the words of each
interviewee and then compared to see if a more general
category could be established. Two categories of
importance were generalized and they seemed to reflect a
division between the original notion of instrumental and
intrinsic use. They do not, however, reflect any
differentiation in terms of rank. The third category,
emergencies, was maintained as separate since it occurred
as a separate mentions together with both of the other
categories that were generalized. For example, a person
might say that the telephone was important because it was
convenient and it was good for keeping in touch with family
(coded as contact) but they were also likely to mention
that it was good in case of an emergency. The respondents
own cognitive map, therefore, separates these categories.
* Hence, the category was kept as a separate coded aspect of
importance of the telephone.
These typologies were then examined in the context of
individual demographic characteristics to draw inferences
about the relationships between importance of the
telephone, telephone use and specific demographic and
lifestyle profiles.
The Second Interview
While the first interview established that calls be
coded along general theoretical lines it also introduced
new categories into the research. These were routine and
111
non-routine and contact and convenience (the importance
categories). The second interview then attempts to clarify
and expand on these new 'codes' by following up with four
of the previous respondents. The first part of this second
interview was a repeat of the first interview in order to
complete a taxonomy. The researcher then asked
questions contrasting the responses to the first interview
and those of the second interview. These contrast
questions were used to discover the relationships between
the kind of telephone use, its importance, and its role in
social relationship. In addition, the second interview
sought to uncover changes in the person's lifestyle or
situational context that had occurred since the first
interview. New additional information was gathered in the
second interview about other media use and their attitudes
toward lifeline telephone service.
This second interview was analyzed line by line in the
manner of the first. These were compared to the first
interview results. These were then be subject to a
technique used in ethnographic interviewing known as
component analysis (Spradley, 1979). The aim of the
component analysis is to create a three dimensional
structural matrix of importance by 'routineness' by kind of
call.
In addition to the independent analysis of the
interviews the calls were then coded according to a
112
"typology of situation movement states associated with sense
making (information seeking) as developed by Dervin and her
colleagues (1985). Telephone tentatively follows face to
face kinds of information seeking as suggested by Williams,
Phillips and Lum (1985). The sense making research is a
typology of face to face information seeking.
In this part of the analysis, the calls were first
categorized by the sense making typology and then the two
typologies were combined (overlapped) to see if there were
notable areas where telephone calls were absent. If
telephone calls fall into every category, then we might
conclude that telephone indeed parallels face to face
communication.
In addition to being useful for this purpose, however,
the overlap of categories between sense making and
telephone use may also point out the areas where use is
most likely to be reduced if a call is priced. Basically,
these categories associate themselves with blockages
(primarily cognitive) in Dervin's scheme and with levels of
affect in Lum1s. Hence, they begin to identify intensity
associated with particular calls by reflecting both a
cognitive and an affective dimension.
At the other extreme, those calls least associated
with any kind of intensity may be the ones that people stop
making when the call carries a price. Knowing what kinds
of calls might be reduced will help to determine the
113
___
impacts on information flows and their social cost.
Quantitative Analysis
The quantitative methods employed here are meant to
complement but not replace the qualitative analysis of
kinds of calls as routine or non-routine. Necessarily,
some of the analysis reflects only a subset of the data
gathered. First, it can only incorporate those portions of
the data that are countable. These included demographics,
number and frequency of calls, and codes produced by the
qualitative analysis regarding kinds of telephone use. Not
all interviews have the complete data necessary for this
analysis. However, since it potentially sheds more light or
the qualitative aspect of the routine versus non-routine
call it is felt to add some value to the research. Many of
the subj ects gave us a 'guess' about how frequently they
use the telephone overall. A word of caution is
immediately advisable. Such guesses have been shown by
telephone company research to be generally exaggerated.
However, we are not primarily concerned with the actual
behavior but rather with the perception of use and its
relationship to predictability. While the perception may
or may not be related to actual usage patterns, it is
certainly related to the value placed on telephone service.
The multidimensional structure of telephone demand suggests
that a pricing structure associated with actual use may not
reflect demand characteristics over time. Such a
114
divergence could impact actual use by changing perception.
T-test
Two t-test analyses were performed. The first sought
to determine if the relationship between routine and
nonroutine uses reported were significantly different.
This t-test was set up to compare individuals according to
reports of routine use as opposed to non-routine use. This
was then further broken down to compare males and females
since the qualitative analyses suggested that females
tended to utilize the telephone for more routine purposes
than males did.
The second set of t-tests were performed to see if
there was a significant difference between the range of
uses reported as routine and those reported as nonroutine.
This was then further divided across the second level of
our typology involving terminal and nonterminal uses and
each of these categories was compared to the each of the
other categories resulting in a total of five category
comparisons. The intent was to determine if there was a
significant difference between calls that were terminal and
those that were nonterminal in their satisfaction of demand
according to their routineness.
A t-test analysis was also performed to examine
differences between calls that were terminal and calls that
were non-terminal in their purpose regardless of their
predictability. The use variable was again defined as the
115
number of unique kinds of information reported on calls
multiplied by the number of contacts (i.e. other people)
the person mentioned calling on the telephone.
Together, the t-test analyses lend greater precision
to the qualitative analysis and help further specify which
variables operating show the greatest impacts generated by
kinds of telephone use on the perception about telephone
use for seniors.
Multiple Regression
Following the t-test Pearson correlations were
computed and two multiple regression analyeses were
performed. The first regression analysis examined the
ability of demographic characteristics to predict the range
of nonroutine use reported for telephone and the range of
routine use reported for telephone. These were examined
using backward regression (i.e. no prespecified order of
entry for the independent variables was used). Two runs
were made, one including the organizational involvement of
the individual that was suggested by the qualitative
analyses and the other with only those variables found to
be explanatory variables in telephone frequency by previous
studies.
The second regression analysis was performed to
examine the ability of these demographic characteristics tc
explain nonterminal and terminal uses of the telephone
since the relationship of the telephone call to the demand
116
being satisfied for the individual is different. Again,
these were run with the same demographic characteristics as
the first.
Finally, the third regression analysis examined the
ability of the person's perception of the frequency with
which they used the telephone to explain nonroutine and
routine use.
All of the regressions were run in the backward manner
and the Betas were examined for indications of
multicollinearity and suppression. The demographic
characteristics that were used were household size, income,
and education. Organization was examined in addition to
these in one run for each of the regression analyses except
the regression of frequency on type of telephone use.
Summary of the Methods of Analysis
The analysis incorporates two main aspects. The first
is qualitative analysis utilizing open ended interviewing
techniques and relying on ethnographic approaches to
interviewing. These include guiding the interview with a
topic schedule and following up answers with questions,
using an insider approach to interviewing and applying the
respondents own language to the follow up questions. This
type of an approach was used because there is no
well-defined theoretical structure to follow in basing a
preset structure for questions.
Qualitative analysis was then applied to the data to
117
determine codes and develop a typology of telephone use
that could then be contrasted with the telephone's
importance and its relationships to demographic
characteristics of the individuals. Out of this analysis
came a coding scheme whose highest level was routine and
nonroutine and a secondary coding level called terminal and
nonterminal. These were then used as categories of calls to
count the number of mentions that fit into each category.
The resulting frequencies by category were then subjected
to t-test comparisons to determine significant differences.
Finally, these counts became inputs as dependent
variables in a two part regression analyses to determine if
demographic characteristics were able to explain routine
and nonroutine telephone use. The ability of frequency to
predict kind of use was then explored. In the actual data
results (chapter 6), the qualitative and quantitative
analyses are compared and contrasted to create an overall
picture of the results of the research.
IIS
------------------- CHAPTER 6: RESULTS"
The discussion of the results is provided in two
parts. The first part discusses the results provided by the
qualitative analysis. The second part of the results is
derived from a complementary quantitative analysis. The
results of these two parts are then compared and integrated
in the summary of results.
Qualitative Analysis
Our initial concern was to create a typology of
telephone uses. The highest level of our typology begins
with the distinction between telephone use that is
perceived to be routine (i.e. the number of contacts in a
given time span could be predicted) and telephone use that
was perceived as non-routine (i.e. it could not be reliably
predicted). The descriptions of calls that the
interviewees perceived as routine are presented in Table
6.1 on the following two pages. From this, we build
contrasts through the development of a complementarity
matrix that examines calls by their relative importance
categories. We then place it into the situational context
and examine this with respect to physical situation, i.e.
health and income, as well as social situation, i.e. the
patterns of relationships in their telephone use.
Routine Uses of the Telephone
In our study of senior citizens, most of the uses that
119
Table 6.1
Routine Telephone Uses Reported
Terminal Non-Terminal
to converse schedule to play golf
call Mother in Japan doctor's appointment
call daughter doctor's appointment
friendly calls, let us know
what's happening what's going to be the
direction
to visit whether she's coming out
or not
to visit give something
wish Merry Christmas call to watch children
how are you? babysit
how are you doing? go out to eat
keeping in touch to watch house
catching up on the news church volunteer work
giving information when she's coming home
think about what we did that bill paying
day
tells me everything ask a favor
what's going on here relay message to husband
about their health bill paying
catch up monthly meeting
just family schedule pick up of goods
all kinds of things if she's coming out
Saturday
how are things hometown association
how's school schedule visit
friends schedule grandchildren
news from Philippines make appointment
bringing out history make appointment
talk about grandchildren order prescription
how1s everything not just for friendly,
when I have something
same old things getting together with
friends for lunch
just visiting
visiting with friends
daughter
how they're making out in
school
tell them I love them
remind them that we miss them
find out how she is
how is she getting along
keep in touch
120
Routine Telephone Uses Reported, (cont.)
Terminal Non-Terminal
joke about age
health
food and cooking
how their week went
just talking story
don't talk too much
what I do
if I'm alone
about activities (what's
happening)
women, ah
catch up/find out what's
happening
how she is, how's it going
how she is
Mainland (keep in touch)
get in touch
bread and butter stuff
hear her voice
what is the problem
about their health
what's happening, if they're
okay?
find out how they are
how are you
grandson
daughter
all about her goings around
tenants she has
personal
get in touch
problems
get in touch
all kinds of things
find out how he is
how I'm feeling
tells me what's happening
tell me about (mutual) friends
how are you making out
for messages
how are they doing
were reported that could be categorized as routine calls
function to maintain relationships that are close and
121
personal. This includes talking to family members and ~
friends. In the context of maintaining a relationship, two
communication functions are operating. The most
predominant is surveillance. Much of the content of
telephone calls reported with family and friends relates to
making sure everything is going smoothly for the other
person and reassuring them that things are okay with the
calling party. Typical descriptions of such calls include
how are things going? how are they doing?, what's happening
with them and how is their health? These calls are only
reported in the context of family and close friends.
The other major communication function that seems to
be served by routine telephone calls is enjoyment or
entertainment. These differ in their content from
surveillance calls in that they are generally characterized
as just visiting or catching up on the news, bread and
butter stuff, and also include some particular references
to interests of the caller such as talking about cooking
and food, joking about age, discussing news from an old
home place and so on.
Both the calls that function for surveillance and
those associated with enjoyment or entertainment serve more
affective than cognitive communication needs. Some of the
respondents talk about these routine calls as keeping in
touch, getting in touch, hearing their voice and so on.
They are really not a response to uncertainty entering the
122
situation but rather a way of monitoring relationship
systems which are important to the individual.
This author's original typology included three
categories of calls that were routine: 1) I care calls?
2)social obligation calls? and, 3) scheduling to do
something calls. These reflected affective orientations of
the call. In recategorizing calls on the basis of ability
to predict frequency, this routine typology would need to
be expanded to include a fourth, getting information to do
something. This new scheme is set out in Figure 6.1.
The telephone calls reported were then placed into
this typology to examine the relative frequency of mention
Figure 6.1
Typology of Telephone Uses
Routine Calls Non-Routine Calls
Non-Terminal
\
Terminal
/
Non-Terminal
Scheduling Getting
Something
Done
I care Getting
Information
To Do
Something
Social
Obligation
Getting
Information
To Do
Something
Getting
Information Helping
Hands
Helping
Hands
Problems
I care
Social
Obligation
123
of the use according to category. The content of routine
calls remain primarily the initial three categories but
four calls show up as getting information. Generally,
these show an increasing affective importance from getting
information to scheduling to do something (often a family
activity) to social obligation to X care calls which are
the most affective in their verbal characterization. The
number of calls mentioned are categorized and displayed in
Table 6.2.
In order to understand how these routine
communications by telephone might be related to the
situation movement state as categorized by Dervin (1983),
we have tried to place calls in categories of movement
state. This was done for each interview. Four of the
states that Dervin (1983) mentions are associated with a
block in movement. This includes problematic, spin out,
wash out and barrier states. The movement state called
passing time can generally be associated with those calls
that are primarily for enjoyment. Most of the descriptions
associated with those calls for enjoyment are not purpose
specific in the way that surveillance calls are associated
with a purpose of making sure everything's okay.
Surveillance calls may more appropriately fit into the
category of situation movement state called observing.
There are no particular blocks in the path but the person
is merely actively observing in order to be assured that
124
the path is clear and he/she can move freely.
Classification of
Table
Calls
6.2
According to Typology
Routine Calls
Type of Call Terminal Non-Terminal
I care 43 0
Social
Obligation
25 0
Getting
Information
4 26
Scheduling 0 26
SUBTOTAL 72 26
Non-Routine Calls
Type of Call Terminal Non-Terminal
Getting
Something
Done
1 73
Getting
Information
To Do
Something
10 34
Helping Hands 3 10
Giving 0 4
Problems 17 9
I care 46 0
Social
Obligation
17 0
SUBTOTAL 90 130
TOTAL 166 156
125
some routine calls are also associated with the
situation movement state that Dervin calls moving. Hence,
the path is unblocked. Although, in the case of the
telephone, generally this is really making sure that the
path will be unblocked for movement. The difference
between calls that might be associated with the moving
situation state as opposed to those that are associated
with the observing state are the intent to move in a known
direction within a specifiable period of time. I have
categorized these calls as movement because they do not
associate themselves with any perception of a problem or
barrier, they are merely facilitative of an action in the
future that is quite predictable and routine. Such calls
reported included scheduling babysitting which the elderly
person does quite often, making appointments such as
doctors appointments for people who see a doctor regularly,
scheduling meetings of regular clubs and so on. These are
also listed in Table 6.2 but they are found under
non-terminal calls. The primary difference between these
calls and other routine calls is the intent to act on some
information that is being sought through a telephone call.
All of this is not nearly so nice and neat as it
apparently seems. First, there is a high likelihood that
calls include more than one of these purposes. For
instance, one lady reported that she talks to friends who
are fellow club members about what they are going to do at
12 €
their next meeting (a moving, non-terminal call). In the
same call, however, there is finding out how the other
person is doing, thinking about what they did that day and
so on. Hence, because the relationships associated with
routine calls are close and interpersonal, they tend to be
multi-stranded and telephone calls between such people
reflect the multi-purpose orientation of the relationship
through combining many communication functions into one
telephone call.
One other type of situation movement state that can be
associated with routine telephone calls is waiting. As
Dervin (1983) has defined it, this is waiting for something
in particular to happen. This movement state associates
itself with calls between parents and children who live at
long distances. In Hawaii, the distance can best be
expressed as an airplane ride. Such calls show more open
verbalization of affection such as telling them I miss them
and I love them.
Nonroutine Uses of the Telephone
Many of the uses that are associated with predictable
use may also fall under non-routine use as well. There are
also uses that are categorized as nonroutine by our
respondents that will not be found, or will not generally
also be found, under routine uses. Table 6.3 is located on
the following three pages and sets out a list of
non-routine uses.
127
The uses that are mentioned as being non-routine as
Table 6.3
Non-Routine Telephone Uses Reported
Terminal Non-Terminal
calling for services
moral support
cheer you up, brighten the day
how they're doing, if they're
ill
talk to his friends
security
keeps in touch with children
keeps in touch with
grandchildren
bill paying
keep in touch w/Mother
keep in contact
they understand me, I
understand them
to see how they’re doing
rarely (club members)
mostly with friends
mostly daughter
' son'
pleasant things
everyday social life
gossip (not too much)
I just call 'em up
how's she doing
how's she feeling
is everything alright?
advise about sick niece
getting information on
cancer
subscribe to
keep up
keep in touch with family
how he is
health inquiry
sick friend, I talk to them
don't talk too much
check on them
what time to p/u wife
at work
make doctor's appointment
wanta buy something
find out why cable tv
picture is not so hot
information about social
doctors appointment
what time p/u children
about some sort of meeting
meeting notice
we gonna play bridge?
solicitors
scheduling events
to ask
make appointments
verify appointments
make appointment
taking care of rental
soliciting repairs
my phone is busy, so
I call the neighbor to
get through
looking for second opinion
to see if they have other
obligations (to schedule
visit)
to make a complaint
money matters
fix street light
appt. for sizer plants
schedule a visit
something going on
schedule product pick-up
unless it's really urgent
make appointment
in case wee need something
128
Non-Routine Telephone Uses Reported (cont.)
visiting p/u sick child from school
talk to friend searching for sons
only one (senior club member)
but hardly talk make appointment
how are you doing schedule visit
letting them keep in touch
with outside world p/u (daughter) the wife at
work
give them a boost of our calling in sick to work
interest p/u sick grandchild from
school
keeping in contact p/u at airport
how things going/need help? babysit
home life come over
how are you plan get together
reverse charges (son) checking library for
information
just to make sure they’re
still alive dental appointment
what has happened start time at golf course
expressing concern doctor appointment
something to say you want to buy something
something really to say need something, some kind
of help
talks to friends some kind of occasion
daughter funeral notice
special occasions recipes
ask me a question finding out costs of
materials
thanks for gift problem at work
get in touch if there's a problem
sick or something when I need call
cancel appointment when they need something
friendly gossip make appointment
when you lazy walk over find out information about
something
football, comparing points information pertaining to
community welfare
just chatting help with repairs/wiring
talks to sister for a little bit of info.
talks about everything
w/friends see if we're home to visit
calling fellows coming for operation
talks about everything
with children
call club members when I
have to getting information to go
own
get hold of them information about freezing
12S
Non-Routine Telephone Uses Reported (cont.)
trouble
keep up on family make doctor's appointment
health call first, then go if I
have to
personal things babysitting for
grandchildren
how's the family make doctor appointment
how are children club work
get opinion plans to travel
talk about trips get people to join
community association
brag about grandchildren doctor's appointment
keep up on family
checking on his kids
special occasions
they like to hear my voice
how are you
how are you
talk to son
advise about mail or something
in newspaper
how we do
health
special occasions
when sick
how are you
how are you
how are you
general
family
how's grandson
special occasions
talk to friends every now and
then
in general
may need to call
they look after me
special occasions
joke around
get in touch
senior friends like myself
for information
call waterman to fix
waterpipe
arrange get together
decide to do dinner
w/coworker
misbilling
exchanging a product
make appointments
something to give
soliciting
social functions
checking product
availability
solicitors
obscene calls
when tv goes on the blink
beauty shop appt.
when they sick, we take
to doctor
neighborhood watch
funeral notices
when necessary
appo intments
when necessary
doctor appointment
banking
bowling club
emergency or something
happens
when I get trouble
part of living/paying your
bills
p/u grandson from school
giving
13G
about their health
mother-in-law
friends
Non-Routine Telephone Uses Reported (cont.)
soliciting
when Mother falls down
want to know something
doctor appointment
fireworks violation
schedule appointment
doctor appointment
if sick, call daughter
advise on mechanic/elect,
doctor appointment
if there's a sale or
something
doctor appointment
solicitors
organize events
solicitors
want information about
business
appointments
special occasions
schedule appointment
tax office for information
about filing
to discuss something/for
some reason
appo intments
well as routine involve both terminal and nonterminal
calls. Terminal types of calls that are classified as
nonroutine generally associate themselves with keeping in
touch or making sure everything's okay with the other
person. It is just not perceived to be a regular thing but
more a case of when the perceived need arises. This is a
divergence from the original typology because many calls
that people say they make regularly but cannot estimate the
actual number in, a given time span are now classified as
nonroutine where the more lax definition of the original
131
typology would have included them as routine calls.
While there are occasionally some differences in the
situational context of the person in conjunction with such
a call, most of these calls take place with family and
friends just as those that are classified as routine. Some
that do exhibit a difference are associated with an unusual
situation. For example, one lady mentioned that she only
calls her friend on the telephone when her friend is sick.
This call is made to 'cheer up' the friend. Another
mentioned a similar situation in the case of a sick niece.
Many respondents also mentioned calling long distance to
friends and relatives for special occasions. This is an
instance of substituting telephone for face to face
communication. Special occasion calls (and they do occur)
made within the local exchange area are more typically
asociated with being a non-terminal call. The call is made
to schedule a get together.
Another interesting difference is the implicit
affective level associated with the words used to describe
the call when it was a terminal call but not routine. Some
examples are expressing concern, boosting morale, giving a
boost of our interest, brag about grandchildren, need
help?, and so on. While both routine and non-routine calls
that are terminal (i.e. an end in themselves) are sometimes
associated with more affective than cognitive
conversational exchange, the specific characterization of
132
the call in affective terms occurred in the non-routine
call descriptions more than twice as often as it did in the
descriptions of (cognitively) similar routine calls.
The greatest difference between routine and
non-routine calls is the sheer number of non-routine calls
that result in the person engaging in some other activity.
Some calls were routine and non-terminal. Many calls that
are non-routine are also non-terminal. While golf games
and club meetings, as well as doctor's appointments for
those who had chronic illnesses were classified as routine
and non-terminal, these types of calls are far more
frequently mentioned as something non-routine. Doctor
appointments are far and away the most frequent mention in
this category.
In this author's categories of nonroutine calls that
resulted in an activity, there were getting something done,
getting information to do something and problem calls. All
of these result from uncertainty arising in the person's
daily life. For instance, a son calls to request a money
loan, a grandchild gets sick at school and needs someone to
pick them up and take care of them, a need arises to buy a
particular product and they use the telephone to check
pricing and availability, or conversely, they are not happy
with the product and they use the telephone to negotiate an
exchange. Seniors are also crucial members of the
neighborhood watch program. Since most of these seniors
133
are retired, they are at Home during the day. Hence, they
are the people most likely to be available to keep a watch
out in the neighborhood. The telephone is used to reduce
travel and mediate problems in their environment and the
environment of close others for them.
One other aspect of nonroutine and nonterminal calls
is important here. These are calls associated with the
negative externality involved in the telephone, i.e., being
assessible to people that they do not want to be assessible
to. The calls of this nature that seniors mentioned
included soliciting (almost everyone gets those and most
seem not to like them), which interestingly, although they
talk about in terms of being bothered, they have often
(apparently) listened to the salespitch since they can tell
you what the salesman was trying to sell. Other mentions
of calls that were bothersome included one report of an
obscene caller and three mentions associated with getting
frequent wrong numbers. There were seven mentions of
soliciting calls but they are apparently also more
frequent. Mentions of soliciting calls were often
accompanied by descriptions of frequency such as 'too much'
and 'quite a bit1.
Generally, routine calls are made far more frequently
than nonroutine calls, although there are cases where
people can predict calls that they make only infrequently.
Nonroutine calls tend to comprise a far greater range of
134
actual content. Nonroutine calls are keeping life running
smoothly especially when something runs into a snag. They
comprise a much broader range of kinds of use as compared
with routine calls but they are much less frequent. They
also are calls placed to a wide variety of people whereas
routine uses are generally reported within a very small
number of close contacts with family and friends. The key
difference seems to be the affective orientation of the
routine call as opposed to the action orientation of the
nonroutine call.
Cognitive Information and Telephone Use
In Dervin's work on sense making, it is the cognitive
aspect of information seeking that she concentrates on.
Given that nonroutine calls are associated with movement
and action and routine calls are associated with caring and
contact, do telephone calls also exhibit differences along
strictly cognitive information seeking categories?
The tentative answer is yes, they do. Table 6.4 shows
the breakdown of calls by the type of situation movement
state that the 'gap bridging' (i.e. information seeking) is
associated with as depicted by our senior citizens. This
table shows how the calls reported are associated with
situation movement states as described by Dervin.
Although movement and passing time would not be high
need categories in the Dervin sense, they are most
associated with telephone calls. The explanation for this
135
isi T) the sense-making scheme is cognitively oriented but
the telephone uses in these categories are primarily
affective in content; and, 2) people monitor their
relational environment to minimize problems so the
observing category is basically one associated with this
monitoring activity. Most telephone use falls into
The Kinds
Table 6.4
of Situation Movement States Reported Bridged:
A Look At Telephone
Non-Routine Routine
Decision
Terminal
18
Non-Terminal
6
Terminal
4
Non-Terminal
0
Problematic 18 2 0 1
Spin Out 1 0 0 0
Wash Out 0 0 0 0
Barrier 23 3 3 1
Being Led 2 0 0 0
Waiting 0 1 0 3
Passing
Time 0 38 0 19
Out to Lunch 0 0 0 0
Observing 4 52 1 48
Moving 55 1 18 0
TOTAL 121 103 26 72
categories that are not intimately associated with a need
to move because some problem has been encountered.
However, many of the calls under movement, particularly
13 € |
“ those that are non-routine and non-terminal might be
classified as barrier or problematic. The reason they are
not is they are perceived as relatively ordinary and not
associated with any particular hindrance in the way they
are reported by seniors.
There are uses of the telephone that do associate
themselves with a need for more intensive information
seeking. Three categories that show some gap bridging by
telephone are decision, problematic and barrier states.
Predominantly, calls that are so classified have to do with
the telephone's facilitative role in moving. They are
nonterminal calls and they are also nonroutine calls, i.e.
they are not predictable.
Decision making involves negotiating face to face
visits and activities with friends. This is perceived as
both routine and nonroutine. Examples are: are we gonna
play bridge?; are you doing anything tonight?; planning a
family get together. These can be included in decision
making. Nonterminal decision making also involves calling
about products and sales at the store, finding out if there
is a need to go down to the City and County to take care of
my taxes, what are we going to do or discuss at our next
club meeting and so on.
Problematic, which Dervin defines as being dragged
down a road not of your own choosing, includes the calls
reported as soliciting, and basically calls that are
137
associated with something one has to do, even though they
might not want to. Barrier calls (calls used to remove a
block from your path from one time space to another)
include product exchange calls, calls from school to pick
up sick grandchildren and so on.
Another notable aspect of the relationship of
telephone use by our seniors with this scheme of situation
movement states is the lack of calls associated with the
categories of Spin Out, Wash Out and Being Led. Spin Out
and Wash Out tend to associate themselves with severe types
of blockage in movement, i.e. the path disappears
altogether and/or there is no path apparent. The person
can't see any direction for movement that will help. The
lack of such calls may be an artifact of the sample or it
may be that such things are so personal they are not
conducted on the telephone. One possible example from our
sample is the man who recently lost his wife. He reported
no use of the telephone for such things but he did note
that his friends came by in person, often as a group, to
visit him. Potentially, then, this lack of calls is also
related to the person's lifestyle and in the case of these
seniors, a relatively secure network of close interpersonal
contacts with friends and family that occur in person.
Another possibility is that these types of situation
movement states are relatively less frequent than others
and therefore they simply would not show up except in a
138
much wider sample. Since we have no information about the
probability of occurrence over people of the existence of
one situation movement state or another, we cannot suggest
that telephone is more associated with any particular
state. Common sense would suggest that these situation
movement states are not equiprobable among information
seeking activities.
Summary of Routine and Non Routine Use of the Telephone
In general, terminal calls and nonterminal calls do
not exhibit a great difference in their mention. However,
when associated with their content, they do show
differences. For instance, terminal calls are far more
likely to be routine than nonterminal calls. Nonroutine
calls are slightly more likely to be nonterminal calls.
This difference is accounted for by the fact that terminal
calls are associated with the communication functions of
monitoring and enjoyment (primary affective) which occurs
with friends and relatives while most nonterminal calls are
more generally related to getting something done or getting
information to do something that is not routine action and
cognition oriented.
The most extreme difference may be that between
terminal and routine which implies keeping things running
smoothly and nonterminal and nonroutine which implies
dealing with some change in their life that was unexpected.
However, telephone use both routine and nonroutine is
139
primarily associated with moving along a path which is
relatively unblocked. Hence, they occur as observing and
movement calls, when classified according to cognitive
situation movement state.
There is however, a great difference between routine
use and nonroutine use in terms of the kinds of different
contacts mentioned. Nonroutine use seems to be far more
diverse in the information activities the telephone is used
for. Routine calls still account for the greatest
frequency of calling but they are associated with
relatively limited kinds of communication and only occur
with people who are close to the respondents.
A Description of Situational Context
The community where this investigation was conducted
is a community of single family dwellings that are owner
occupied. Unlike many Hawaii communities it is not subject
to real estate speculation and most of the people who live
here have lived in the house since it was built. Only 3
respondents reported living there less than 10 years and
the average residence was 15 years. They know their
neighbors but they usually talk to them only outside.
There are agreements between neighbors to occasionally
exchange small gifts and to help each other in times when
they need it. An extension of this is the neighborhood
watch. Most of the members of the community actively
participate in a neighborhood watch program whose purpose
140
is to minimize the risics of theft. Senior citizens play a
vital role in this program because they are at home during
the day* Therefore, in a sense, they are providing a
community service since practically everyone who is not
retired is working, both men and women. Their telephone
plays an intimate role in this neighborhood watch since it
results in calls from neighbors to advise them they are at
home during an unusual period of time and it also
necessitates calls to the police if something happens out
of the ordinary. Another interesting thing about this is
that it presupposes a fairly intimate knowledge of the
comings and goings of the neighborhood since they do not
mention these calls between neighbors as routine calls.
The attitudes toward their community are very positive
in general. They extend this to include both the physical
area and the people who live there. Few had any specific
complaints and only two people mentioned anything at all
about relationships with the neighbors in terms of
problems. Most indicated that the people were part of the
reason it was a good community. Noise was the most
frequent complaint but this was associated with helicopters
and airplanes. The community is located near an airport.
Their relationships center around their family, in
particular, their grandchildren. Many of them watch their
grandchildren and this too plays a part in their telephone
behavior since they schedule babysitting, pick up and
141
delivery of children to school and, in addition they are
the responsible party if someone needs to be notified of
something amiss with the child.
Most of our seniors have a very positive attitude
toward their lives. They are comfortably retired and many
take great pleasure in their activities in the community.
The community itself provides a seniors’ club sponsored by
the City and County where they can get together, go on
excursions and find out about things. There is also a
Community Association which sponsors athletic and other
activities for its senior citizens as well as others.
Finally, there is a club that concentrates on crafts to
which many of the senior women belong.
Some seniors also belong to organizations outside of
the community. These include golfing clubs, crafts and
dance clubs, retired businessmen's associations and an
assortment of other diverse organizations.
Not all of our seniors are that active though. Some
do not belong to any formal organizations and spend most of
their time at home. These seniors reported watching
television as an activity, some work in their yard
frequently, but generally they are a more passive group.
Their attitude toward the community is still positive but
they are less involved in outside activities. For these
seniors, family is often the major center of their
attention, even more than for others. Because family tends
142
to be composed of younger people, especially their
children, who work, the telephone is very important for
keeping in touch. Often these people refer to their desire
not to bother others by calling because they perceive that
these others are busy working and they don't want to be any
trouble.
Several seniors do not live alone in the traditional
nuclear family but have children and grandchildren living
with them. Often these people note that their telephone is
busy but the calls are usually not for them. They perceive
a difference in the activity level of telephone interaction
between people their age and those that are younger.
The community is composed of people who worked most of
their lives at a regular job. There are three or four
instances of people who owned their own business but most
worked for someone else, in particular, the government.
The range of education extends from having only completed
the third grade to having gone well beyond a college
degree. The average educational level is 10th grade. There
is no discernible difference between the men and women at
the extremes. However, men were more likely to report
finishing high school than women. Basically, there were no
major differences. Almost all of the women worked too.
They were not, but in three instances, occupied as
housewives. They have children and grandchildren, but
their reports on immediate family indicated that most did
143
not have a large family.
Some of our senior citizens are widowed. Some have
health problems that prevent them from moving around too
much. Widows and widowers tended to be active in the
community, although some are not. People who are kept
from being active by health often mention the telephone's
ability to traverse distance for them in accomplishing
some necessary activity. None of these people were inval
ids although some are quite aged already (over 80). Their
incomes are relatively high. Although some live on only
social security where income is definitely a factor in
their lifestyle, most have other retirement income from
government pensions and so on that allow them to live com
fortably. One of the things they use their money for is
to help their children. Some have their children living
with them, others are maintaining separate houses for
their children. One of the few nonroutine calls mentioned
that occur with family is in the context of one of their
children seeking help. One specifically mentioned finan
cial help as a request that would occur over the telephone
rather than face to face first.
The key factors in their situational uncertainty are
therefore related to their health and their family,
particularly their children. More of them represent
telephone calls with their children as being calls
received. The exception to the pattern was that they would
144
call their children if they really needed something, or if
their children lived off the Island so that the call itself
would be charged. Not all parents perceived the routine
this way. Some call their children and some report such
calls as occurring both ways. One interesting thing is
they call their grandchildren, even the ones that are still
living with their parents. This may be an acceptable way
of negotiating a changing cultural expectation. Many of
the seniors are Japanese Americans. Traditional Japanese
culture would expect the child to take responsibility for
the parent. However, they live in an American context and
one that is extremely difficult to negotiate financially.
Hence, one makes allowances without seeming to diverge from
traditional mores.
Generally, except for a tendency toward calls being
received by Japanese from children, there are no
discernible ethnic differences. There are, however, other
differences across demographic and economic
characteristics. While there is a tendency for women to
make more terminal and routine calls, this difference is
not large. Women do tend to report longer durations for
terminal calls than men do. Men basically perceive their
calls as short and to the point. One male respondent noted
that calls whose purposes were primarily for the sake of
communicating would last longer (estimated 5 to 6 minutes)
than calls associated with some purpose outside the
14E
telephone call itseTf (2 to 3 minutes duration). Further,
men concur with women in their perception that women talk
longer. They also mentioned that the telephone was
important to women. One husband suggested that the
telephone was his wife's way of visiting, especially since
she does not drive. Another characterized the telephone as
being his wife's companion much the same way the television
was his companion.
Does importance differ between men and women?
Apparently yes, but the way in which it differs is somewhat
surprising. If emergency was specifically mentioned as a
reason the telephone was important, chances are good that
the respondent was a woman. Of the fifteen respondents who
specifically mentioned emergency as a reason the telephone
was important to them, ten were women (this accounted for
38.5% of the women respondents overall).
If contact was mentioned as a reason the telephone was
important it was more likely to be a man (34.5% of the men
mentioned this as opposed to 19.2% of the women).
Convenience seems to be evenly distributed however.
There is also a difference in according to household
size. As household size increases, the number of routine
calls reported tended to increase and the number of
nonroutine calls tended to decrease. The means are shown in
Table 6.5.
Education tends to increase the amount of calling
146
generally and also the amount of routine calls that are
reported made. There is an interesting divergence for those
respondents who have a high school education. Education
levels both above and below them exhibit higher average
total use and greater routine use of the telephone. One
possible explanation is that there are more males in this
category than the others (35% of the education category are
males as opposed to 15% females).
________
Mean Number of Telephone Calls Mentioned By Household Size
Household Number Mean of Telephone Calls Mentioned
Size of Cases Non-Routine Routine Total
1 6 2.50 1.33 3.83
2 28 4.00 2.68 6.68
3 or more 17 2.82 3.00 5.82
Although at first glance there is no difference
according to income, a difference becomes apparent when
subjects are separated across just two income categories:
below $1,000 per month and above $1,000 per month income.
Two differences emerge when we view income in this manner.
First, people in the lower income category perceive that
they make more calls and second, they report making fewer
routine calls on average than the higher income group.
There is a relationship to household size. Only one of the
lower calling level individuals lives in a nuclear family
household. Three of these respondents are widows and one
is a widower. Except for the widower, who lives alone, and
14';
one married female who lives with her husband, these people
are living with their children. There are a total of 12
widowed respondents in our sample. Of the four that fall
into the lower income category, there is almost no routine
use of the telephone reported.
In summary, if you have a higher than average educated
female with an income over $1,000 a month who is married
and lives together with her husband in a two person
household, she is the most likely heavy telephone user in
our group of seniors. Females generally value the
telephone more for emergencies and share its value for
convenience with her male counterpart. She probably talks
longer on the average call and she has a slight tendency to
use it more for terminal calls. The four most diverse
users (each reporting 10 or more kinds of calls) were all
female and they reported far more routine use than the
average, i.e. the increased total kinds of calls is
attributable to larger numbers of routine calls.
We can only conjecture why. Women seem to have less
mobility, if not in a physical sense, at least in a social
sense. They are more likely to belong to organizations
than men but the organizations are located in their
immediate community more often than those reported by men.
Therefore, they bridge farther distances by telephone
rather than physical travel and they use the telephone in
conjunction with activities in their community, thereby
14£
contributing to overall greater usage.
Two cases in these interviews are notable in this
respect in the extreme, i.e. there is no physical mobility
present for the woman. The first is a woman who reports
talking to her friend, whom she describes as her lady chum,
weekly on the telephone. They do not see each other more
than once a year, sometimes once in two years. She
describes her life as being pretty much around the house.
She doesn't go out very often. Her friend, on the other
hand, is very mobile. In a sense, our respondent leads a
vicarious life through the telephone calls of her lady chum
who describes what she's doing and often reports on how
others who are mutual friends are doing that she sees.
The second case is the most extreme. This lady is now
62. She retired from working outside the home when she was
3 0 in order to take care of her ailing Mother who is now
over 80 and still alive. She lives with her Mother and
four other siblings. She never goes out except to the
doctor with her Mother and to pick up a prescription at the
drugstore. These excursions are orchestrated in advance by
telephone. However, she has a lady friend with whom she
converses on the telephone about three times a week. She
reports the contents of these calls as follows. Her friend
tells her about her problems, about her tenants that she
has, and about personal things. Generally, her friend
shares an active life through telephone conversations with
14$
our respondent. These women live about fifteen minutes
automobile travel time apart. They have not seen each
other in at least ten years. The respondent thinks it1s
probably been fifteen years now.
The Perception of Importance Associated With the Telephone
Three things stand out in their perception of the
telephone's importance to them. The first is emergencies.
Fifteen of our 55 respondents mentioned emergencies
specifically as an important reason for having the
telephone. Eleven of them have actually used the telephone
in an emergency situation. Eight of these emergencies
related to their health or the health of an immediate
family member. Logically, our seniors are risk averse with
regard to health matters. This also shows up in regard to
making doctors appointments. They are not overly
preoccupied with illness but they are aware that they need
to take care of themselves.
The second area of concern related to telephone's
importance is the need for contact. This is expressed as
contact with friends and family, contact with the outside
world and for others who need to contact them. Some
suggested that without a telephone there is no good
communication. Fourteen respondents mentioned contact or
good communication as one of the reasons the telephone is
important to them.
The third major reason is convenience. Seventeen
150
people cited the telephone's convenience as a reason it was
important. Many include all three of these aspects of
telephone service and availability in their
characterization of the telephone's importance. Based on
the situational context of seniors this seems very logical.
First, they have more time but others are busy so they rely
of the telephone to keep them in contact when face to face
visits are at a premium. Second, they do not get around,
i.e. travel, quite as easily as they used to and having a
telephone saves them making extra trips. In fact one
described it as 'having an extra set of legs.' Finally,
the telephone is well suited to use in a medical emergency
(doctors all have night numbers and hospitals are open
around the clock). This was one of the earliest uses of
telephones in the U.S. and the system is geared to its use
in this manner. The 911 system for getting an ambulance
has been in effect for some time and the latest
technologies in communication are eagerly applied to such
public benefit aspects of telephone service.
Generally, all of these reasons why telephone is
important are related to its efficiency. Even contact
relates to the ability to short circuit physically getting
together either by substituting for face to face when it is
not possible to get together or, as one respondent puts it:
"without telephone would be more pleasant to see people but
it would be harder to get together". The telephone
151
actually facilitates getting together by allowing such
visitation to be scheduled. One may think of scheduling
pleasure visits as rigid. In fact, it is more flexible.
When they did not have a telephone there were certain rules
of thumb used to visiting. Now, they can get together when
it is convenient for both to do so. The telephone's
efficiency increases their productivity as individuals. The
specific comments of our seniors with regard to importance
of the telephone can be found in Appendix A. Generally, the
importance of convenience has more to do with the option
demand associated with the telephone. It is related to
getting things done or getting information to do something.
It is little used in terms of routine uses. The most
significant use (although little reported) in terms of
convenience associated with routine demand is bill paying.
Three of our seniors use the telephone to pay bills and
others mentioned it in the context of relating to paying
bills which was an activity that could be predicted, e.g.
about once a month when I pay my bills. Another aspect of
convenience is scheduling appointments. Most appointment
scheduling, however, was reported as nonroutine rather than
routine. The importance of contact is more dispersed
across use. Most mentioned contact in the context of
family and friends. However, contact use in this respect
is both routine and nonroutine. What then explains the
importance of contact? We're not sure, but one thing of
15:
interest is the relationship of the use of the telephone to
overcome a situation movement state that would be
classified as a barrier state. Nine of the fourteen people
mentioning contact specifically reported utilizing the
telephone for dealing with and getting past a barrier. In
the remaining population of our sample only nine others
have also reported telephone use in this context. While
64% of those citing contact as an important function of
telephone also reported using it to move from a barrier
state, that is almost twice the percentage of the sample
population as a whole (33%). Another aspect of these
individuals is that they are still actively involved in the
daily routine life of their family. For instance, the
school calling about a sick grandchild is an example of
using the telephone to negotiate a barrier. Hence, this
use may be far more prevalent in a population consisting of
other age groups whereas for seniors it is less likely.
Finally, the typology of telephone uses created by
this study were combined with the situation movement states
reported by Dervin in an effort to see how they are
related. These combinations, according to routine and
nonroutine uses are set out in Table 6.6 and Table 6.7
which are presented on the following two pages.
We have suggested that both the categories of this
author regarding typology of telephone use and the
categories of Dervin (198 3) indicating cognitive situation
152
movement state associate themselves with relatively more or
less impact. For Dervin's states those of greater impact
would seem to be those associated with a block in the road.
In the telephone use typology the impact is affective and
moves from getting information and getting something done
to I care calls which are highly emotional.
Hence those uses which are most important would fall
into both of these categories and then be followed by uses
that fall into one category or the other. Those uses that
might be perceived as least important would be found in the
lower level of this impact scheme. In Table 6.6 we see
that only one call falls into a high impact category, i.e.
it deals with a problem and it is problematic. The
majority of the calls in this table showing all routine
calls, would indicate that they are primarily high impact
on the affective side but not high impact for the situation
state. They fall into categories not associated with any
blocking. One call falls into the barrier state where there
is a cognitive movement state high impact but not an
affective one (getting information). Three routine calls
show up in what is a low impact state for both
categorization schemes. If there was a price placed on the
call, these calls might be the first to be reduced. In the
overall nonroutine scheme, we see that there are 8 calls
which fall into a blocked cognitive situation movement
state while also occurring in a high impact affective use
15 A
Table 6.6
The Overlap Between Situation Movement and
Routine Calls
Telephone Use:
1* 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 TOTAL
Decision 4 4
Problem
atic 1 1
Spin Out
Wash Out
Barrier 1 3 4
Being
Led
Waiting 3 3
Passing
Time 3 16 19
Out to
Lunch
Observing 3 1 28 17 49
Moving 18 18
TOTAL 0 4 0 0 1 26 31 36 98
* Legend of Use Categories is as follows:
1 - Getting Something Done
2 - Getting Information To Do Something
3 - Helping Hands
4 - Giving
5 - Problems
6 - Scheduling To Do Something
7 - Social Obligation
8 - 1 Care
15E
The Overlap
Table 6.7
Between Situation Movement and
NonRoutine Calls
Telephone Use:
1* 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 TOTAL
Decision 9 12 1 2 24
Problem
atic 7 6 1 2 16
Spin Out
Wash Out
Barrier 8 7 5 6 26
Being
Led 2 2
Waiting 1 1
Passing
Time 2 4 4 28 38
Out to
Lunch
Observing 1 5 3 6 14 27 56
Moving 41 8 2 5 56
TOTAL 66 41 14 5 20 0 18 56 220
* Legend of Use Categories is as follows:
1 - Getting Something Done
2 - Getting Information To Do Something
3 - Helping Hands
4 - Giving
5 - Problems
6 - Scheduling To Do Something
7 - Social Obligation
8 - 1 Care
156
(problems). There are 24 calls which fall into a situation
movement state associated with a blockage but are not very
affectively categorized. There are 56 calls that fall into
a high affective state such as social obligation and I care
calls but not in a blocked situation movement state. If we
assume that moving and observing are the categories least
associated with blocking and that getting something done
and getting information are the least affective then 55
calls would be classified as low impact for both the
cognitive and the affective state. These categories, then,
might be the first calls that people would try to reduce or
eliminate if they were paying by the call.
Reciprocity
All the seniors who answered the question whether they
make more calls than they receive either noted that it was
•about the same* or that they get more calls in (received).
The range of the kinds of use shows that more kinds of use
are calls reported as calls made. Calls received, in fact,
that were reported as kinds of use, were less than 1/2 the
calls made and calls that were both made and received were
slightly more than 1/2 the number of calls made by kind of
use. Overall (i.e., the number of calls reported as kinds
of use that were received divided by the total kinds of
use) accounted for only 35.2% of their kinds of use. All
calls reported as calls received except those associated
151
with the negative externality are calls from people they
knew such as family and friends. These calls are more
frequent and they are usually associated with terminal
kinds of use. They are, however, both routine and
nonroutine. Those calls from children are likely to be
calls received if they are local calls and calls made if
they are long distance. This relationship is shown
according to the number of calls that seniors mentioned in
Table 6.8.
_________
Reciprocity of Calling Between Parents and Children
Local Calls Long Distance Calls
__________ __ __
Calls Received 22 2
Calls Both Made
and Received 5 7
Calls that are nonroutine and nonterminal are more
likely to be calls made. 90% of barrier calls are calls
made. Most of the calls that fall under movement are calls
made. But calls that are decision state or problematic
state calls can be either.
In this author's earlier typology of telephone use the
only nonroutine calls received are problem calls and
helping hands calls. These are specific categories
associated with sociological and psychological levels of
relationship.
15S
Complementarity Between Routineness. Importance and Kind of
Call
Kinds of uses that would be associated with
convenience show up as predominantly nonroutine calls while
uses that are associated with contact are fairly evenly
split between routine and nonroutine. Remember, however,
that terminal uses tended to be more effectively verbal
when they were not routine than when they were. The
greatest number of calls is associated with contact
although fewer people actually mentioned contact when they
addressed the telephone's importance. Finally, emergency
calls, both those that could be classified as trivial
emergencies or crisis calls and the 11 major emergency
calls are classified separately, they are all nonroutine
and nonterminal. Table 6.9 shows the breakout of
importance by kind of call by routineness of the call and
indicates the number of calls that fall into each cell.
Nonroutine, nonterminal calls, i.e. calls where the
telephone call is merely an intermediate demand for
something else, and its importance is convenience comprise
a total of 98 calls. This represents a frequency of
approximately 31%. This category represents a potential
loss to other economic sectors rather than just to
telephone demand.
Those calls which are classified as emergencies and
trivial emergencies represent slightly less than 6% but are
159
Table 6.9
Complementarity Matrix:
Routineness/Importance by Kind of Call
Routine NonRoutine
Terminal Nonterminal
Contact:
(53%) social scheduling
obligation to do
(25 calls) something
(11 calls)
I care
(43 calls)
Terminal Nonterminal
social getting
obligation something
(17 calls) done
(11 calls)
I care getting
(46 calls) information
(10 calls)
Problems
(11 calls)
Convenience:
(42%) getting scheduling
information to do
(4 calls) something
(15 calls)
getting getting
something something
done done
(1 call) (62 calls)
getting getting
information info.
(10 calls) (24 calls)
helping helping
hands hands
(3 calls) (7 calls)
problems problems
(6 calls) (5 calls)
Emergency;
(5%) Real life
and death
(11 calls)
Problems
(4 calls)
Helping
hands
(3 calls)
16C
so important to the elderly that they are a separate
category of importance.
In addition to these nonterminal and nonroutine calls
associated with emergency we also have 15 routine, nontermi
nal calls that are associated with the importance of conve
nience (5%). Most calls associated with contact which are
nonroutine are terminal. These account for 23% of all
calls. Nonroutine, nonterminal represent an uses associa
ted with convenience account for only an additional 6%. All
together, the number of calls mentioned associated with nor
routine use (excluding emergencies) account for 66% of
seniors kinds of calls. Calls classified as contact repre
sent 45% of these; convenience accounts for 55%. If we
exclude emergencies, contact is 41% of all nonroutine calls
convenience is 51%, and emergencies are 8%.
A further look at the frequency of nonroutine use,
derived from subtracting the frequency of routine use from
an overall estimate of frequency indicates that the average
frequency of perceived nonroutine use is 77%. The range
among seniors on this was very wide, however. Some would
estimate routine uses as as much as 98% of their calls
while others would estimate only 2% of their calls as
routine uses. It would seem that kinds of use, range of
uses, and the frequencies of use are associated with
161
different perceptions regarding telephone.
The Second Interview
Two years later we have revisited four of the original
respondents. These four reinterviews were conducted with
two men and two women who represent four different ethnic
groups. All of these people reported high frequency of
telephone use during their original interviews. These
respondents originally varied in their ability to predict
calls: one could not predict the frequency of any
particular kind of call although the household's overall
frequency was estimated at 15 to 2 0 calls a day to one
respondent who could estimate very accurately the frequency
of use of the telephone by type of call with ongoing
relationships. The other two fell into the middle range of
ability to predict calls.
The range of calls were reexamined in the beginning of
this interview. A comparison chart for the first and
second interview is provided in Appendix B. Generally, the
range of use has declined for two respondents and remained
relatively stable for the other two respondents. For Mrs.
M there is still much activity related to senior citizens
and groups that are available to senior citizens in the
community. She has added Kokua Council to the local
seniors' group in her involvements. She is very active and
her telephone is also very active, although she has no idea
how frequently she uses it. Keeping in contact and keeping
162
in touch are mentioned both times in regard to seniors.
She mentions a cousin who calls her and a friend whom she
talks to regularly this time. Other calls included golf
related (her husband), checking the library, and making
appointments with the doctor. These are similar in content
and interest to calls mentioned in the first interview.
She also mentions getting too many soliciting calls. This
is an addition to the first interview.
The reason the telephone is important is in case of an
emergency. Its value is just to know it's there and it is
also very important for convenience. She and her husband
apparently still travel frequently.
She mentions that she has used the telephone for three
emergencies. The first is for a broken leg and the second
is for her husband. Both times she called the hospital so
that their records would be waiting when they reached
there. The third emergency she mentioned related to her
dog. She called Poison Control when he ate something wrong
but they couldn't help with animals. Now, she tells me,
there is an urgency for animals hotline for such problems.
She has eight telephones in the house. She believes
deregulation was a mistake (this attitude was expressed in
the first interview as well). She'd rather rent her
telephone and have it fixed when it needs to be but she
bought her phones. She does not see any need for new
services. She uses an ATM to get cash and she has a bill
163
paying service by telephone but she does not perceive this
as banking by phone and she isn't interested in doing so.
She does not have a computer, nor does she think she needs
it although some of her friends have one. Finally, she
feels uncomfortable with answering machines. Even though
her husband thinks they need one, she's not convinced.
Generally, this interview seems quite complementary to the
first. The pattern has not changed dramatically at all.
Another interview that exhibits this characteristic is
the one with Mr. C. His life seems to be much like it was
two years ago with the exception that he perceives his use
of the telephone is less now than he reported before. The
first time he estimated that he made 4 or 5 calls a day and
received 15 to 20. Now his estimate is 2 made and 3 or 4
received.
However, in terms of the range of uses that he
mentions, there is much similarity. He reports that he
talks to his friends, but not too often. In the first
interview he said they talked about all kinds of things and
that they did this once or twice a week. Now he describes
the calls with friends as "sometimes nonsense" and says
they do not occur too often. He now sees his friends in
person once a week as opposed to twice a week. Every
Thursday is his day to go out for a beer with his buddies.
He still calls relatives but not regularly. He would call
if they were sick or something. His sister keeps up with
164
that. He occasionally calls the doctor, but not very
often; he still gets too many soliciting calls which he
handles by saying he's not interested and hanging up.
Although the contact is mentioned as less frequent,
the kinds of calls are almost the same as two years ago.
He still travels and he likes to watch television. Around
the house, he waters his yard.
The next two interviews that we will describe differ
more from the two just compared. In the first interview
Mrs. H reported that she used her telephone all the time.
The frequency estimate was at least 12 times a day and it
was described as constantly ringing. In the second
interview, she cannot estimate the amount of calls but she
says that everybody's so busy, so she doesn't bother too
much with the telephone.
How has it changed? She still talks to her sister and
brother on the Mainland about once a month but instead of
describing these calls in affective terms she refers to
them as mostly concerned with business about the family
estate. While she mentioned two friends that she talked to
three times a week on the telephone in the earlier
interview, she now mentions only one lady friend that she
calls when her friend is sick and another whom she is doing
laundry for because she is sick now. She still keeps in
contact with the network of widows that she mentioned in
the first interview but she now says she calls to check on
165
them (she did not mention this before) and that she also
drives to see them. Her description of this group in the
earlier interview included getting together to go out and
have a nice dinner and a nice time. Now it seems more
routine business than enjoyment.
Overall the description is quite different. She
mentions that she has used the telephone in an emergency
twice but neither time was her own phone working. She had
to go somewhere else to call (in the neighborhood). She
has stopped going to school and she is now living alone
(her granddaughter apparently no longer comes there and
stays). She is still active with DAV (an outside
organization) but she has not been going to senior citizens
lately. She does a lot of baking which she enjoys and she
works in the yard. She describes herself as busy. She
often has friends come by in person, but they don't call
first. Before, school kept her away from her house most of
the day; now she is mostly home and she mentions that she
doesn't like to drive.
What has happened is that her lifestyle has changed
drastically in the last two years. The question of course
is why. The only clue is mention of emergencies and in the
context of talking about her baking she also refers to
taking things she makes to her doctor. Mrs. H (in this
interviewer's opinion) looks like she has aged 10 years in
the last two. Apparently her health is not as good. Also
166
members of her circle are also experiencing health problems
and the lifestyle has been curtailed because it is no
longer possible to maintain the previous level of activity.
With such changes, also comes a change in telephone
use and its importance. When asked about why the telephone
was important in the first interview Mrs. H said it was
important for business, to keep her Dad's rentals running
properly. Now she reports she hardly uses it for that and
she says it's important for emergencies. It's also
convenient.
Another interview that exhibits this sort of change is
that with Dr. M. Here, the difference is not in the calls
made so much as the perception of the telephone itself. In
fact reports on actual calls remains very stable. He calls
his daughter in Seattle twice a month and he talks to
friends on the telephone maybe ten times a week. These are
the exact numbers that he associated with these calls in
the first interview. There is some change in his report of
calls from his other daughter. The first time it was once
every 2 days and now it's described as at least once a
week. The content remains stable.
This time he mentions calls with his Hometown Club.
He is a member of the telephone tree for this Club that
serves to notify other members when there is a death among
their members. He has been a member of the hometown club
all along but it was not mentioned earlier. Other
167
additional calls that he mentions in the second interview
are calls from the doctor about blood tests, soliciting
calls and calls from old patients who call him at home
because they still want their appointment to be with him.
These last two kinds of calls he describes as being
bothersome. Dr. M still goes to work two hours every day
but he describes this activity as more to talk story with
the boys and drink coffee than to actually work. In fact,
he tries to discourage patients from relying on him.
Dr. M's life has changed though. He no longer golfs
every Sunday. He doesn't like to drive and it's usually
too far to go. This used to be one of his primary
activities. He still takes his wife out to lunch
occasionally, but he doesn't see his friends very often any
more. He likes television and he watches 1 or 2 hours a
day, mostly ETV and Japanese Karaoki on Friday nights. He
describes his aversion to telephone as "everytime it rings,
I jump, afraid another friend is dead". This attitude was
not present in the first interview. This change can also
be, at least in part, attributable to health. Mention of
calls to the doctor, changed activity level and general
appearance suggest health problems and advancing effects of
age.
What can we make of this? The stability of telephone
usage patterns leaves much to be desired if we approach it
from the perspective that in order to predict it ought to
168
remain the same. It doesn't because the life situation
changes. In two cases there has been a noticeable change
in the condition of the repondent's health. This has
associated itself with a change in activity levels and
correspondingly reduced telephone behavior in one case
while mainly impacting attitude in the other.
Also, as the senior moves further into retirement,
they seem to become less associated with many regular
acquaintances. Much of this change has to do with the
reality that their friends are getting sick, have more
trouble moving around and indeed, are beginning to die.
The one case where the attitude and the behavior remained
relatively the same is a younger senior (only 63) who is
till very active. Lessening mobility has correspondingly
reduced telephone activity in two cases.
This points up the complementary nature of telephone
calls to lifestyle which is associated with differing
activity levels. The range of kinds of use, however,
remained within the original classification scheme. The
importance of use was also characterized in the same manner
but the emphasis changed.
These seniors perceive no need to subscribe to new
services. They are aware of computers but they don't own
one. They read quite a bit: magazines, books and
newspapers. Only one reported watching a lot of television,
and he subscribes to cable. Two own a VCR.
169
Quantitative Analysis
While the qualitative analysis of our interviews gives
us insight into content and differences, a quantitative
analysis can help us to determine which, if any, of these
characteristics differ across subscriber groups. The
highest level of the typology created in the qualitative
analysis in this study was routine and non-routine use.
There is a general trend for a greater number of
non-routine uses compared to routine uses. Is this
difference significant?
The second level of our typology dealt with
terminal/nonterminal. Is this also significant? Are there
certain conditions under which it is significant? The
quantitative results are contrasted to the qualitative
resuls in each section to point up similarities and
differences.
T-Test
To answer this question a T-test (paired correlations)
was conducted to check the difference between individuals
on routine and nonroutine uses. Overall, there is a
significant difference between routine and nonroutine uses
across individuals. The result shows that nonroutine kinds
of use are twice as frequent as routine kinds of use
mentioned in the range of information sought.
The variable uses in this analysis represents kinds of
170
use described by respondents. Uses was operationalized as
each statement of unique content associated with telephone
calls multiplied by the number of contacts the kind of use
was mentioned as relating to, i.e. unique individuals the
person communicated with.
In addition to routineness, the second level of our
typology characterizes the call as terminal or nonterminal.
The difference between terminal and nonterminal is whether
or not the call's purpose is to facilitate some other
impending activity. Although the qualitative analysis
shows that there seems to be a tendency for routine calls
to be terminal, the range of nonroutine calls showed a
great many kinds of use for both terminal and nonterminal.
The second t-test analysis shows that the difference
between the kinds of terminal contacts and nonterminal
contacts are not significantly different in terms of the
range of different kinds of use. The statistical results
of the t-test for routine and nonroutine kinds of use is
shown in Table 6.10.
________
T- Test for Difference Between Routine and NonRoutine Use
Number Mean Standard Standard T-value df
of cases deviation error
Routine 55 1.91 2.36 0.32 -4.69* 54
Nonrout. 55 4.13 2.13 0.29
*p < .01
171
To further explore the differences between kinds of
use, a third t-test analysis was performed to examine each
possible combination of routineness and
terminal/nonterminal. The results are shown in Table 6.11.
Table 6.11
Differences Between Calls:
Categorized by Two Levels of the Typology
Variable # of Mean Standard Standard T-value Df
Cases Diff. Deviat. Error
Routine and
Terminal with
Nonroutine and
Terminal
Routine and
Nonterminal
with
Nonroutine and
Nonterminal
Routine and
Terminal with
Routine and
Nonterminal
Nonroutine
and
Nonterminal
with Terminal
and Nonroutine
Routine and
Terminal
With
Nonroutine
and
Nonterminal
* p < .02
When a call is terminal, the range of uses, whether it is
routine or nonroutine, does not differ. As we mentioned in
172
55 -.47 2.93 .40 -1.20 54
55 -1.75 1.53 .21 -8.46* 54
55 .93 1.81 .25 3.79* 54
55 -.35 2.27 .31 -1.13 54
55 -.82 2.54 .34 -2.39* 54
the qualitative analysis, terminal calls tend to he more
affectively oriented when they are nonroutine.
The kinds of use mentioned in the context of the
terminal routine calls differ from the kinds of use that
are routine but nonterminal. The range of use shows far
more contacts associated with routine terminal use than
with routine nonterminal use. Hence, the difference is
statistically significant.
Most of the kinds of use associated with nonterminal
use is also nonroutine rather than routine. This
difference is statistically significant. Hence, more calls
that are associated with moving or as a means to
facilitating some other activity are not predictable.
Summary
What does all this mean? For our senior citizens, the
range of kinds of communication over the telephone is
broad. Most of this range occurs as an available response
to change and is therefore not predictable. Of the
telephone calls that they can predict either making or
receiving, the purposes are more likely to be for the sake
of communicating itself, i.e. the calls are terminal calls.
Calls that are not predictable may be either terminal or
nonterminal. Although there is a difference, it is not
significant. However, if the call is nonroutine it is far
more likely to be nonterminal, i.e. it will lead to some
other activity.
173
The differences just explored represented the
differences among types of calls as developed in our
qualitative typology.
Relationship of Frequency and Range of Telephone Calls
Generally, the quantitative findings agree with
qualitative ones. There are differences between routine
and nonroutine use. However, the quantitative suggest that
the difference between terminal/nonterminal is not
significant unless it is tested under a furtrher
differentiation by routineness. This leads credibility to
the structural hierarchy of the typology where routine is
the highest level. However, how are they related to other
factors in the context of an individual? Looking at the
range of uses, not the frequency, what traditional
predictors of frequency of telephone use are also related
to the range of use? The traditional predictors of
frequency of telephone use are household size, income,
education, the presence of teenagers and children.
Pearson Correlation
A Pearson correlation was run among these variables,
the range of use and the perceived frequency. Table 6.12
records the results. Both routine and nonroutine use show
a significant correlation with household size. Increasing
household size suggests increased face to face contacts.
However, while routine use is positively related to
household size, nonroutine use is negatively related to
17^:
household size. '
The only other significant correlation between
demographics and routine versus nonroutine kinds of use is
with education. While education shows a tendency to
increase nonroutine use, it is not significant. However,
the relationship between education and routine telephone
use is significant. Neither routine kinds of use nor
Table 6.12
Zero Order Correlation Matrix
Income Educ HHSize Rout NoRout Term NoTerm Freq
Income 1.00 .10 -.13 -.12 -.10 -.28* . 02 -.15
Educ 1.00 .05 .28* .19 .26* .30* .06
HHSize 1. 00 . 39* -.31* .21 -.10 . 17
Rout 1. 00 -.22 . 66* .28 -.08
NoRout 1.00 .27 .57* . 23
Term 1.00 . 03 . 03
NoTerm 1. 00 .12
Freq 1.00
*p < .05
nonroutine kinds of use is directly related to income of the:
household for these seniors .
When the correlations are examined between the second
order of the typology, i.e. terminal and nonterminal use,
both terminal and nonterminal kinds of use are related
positively to education. Income is negatively related to
175
terminal use but showsno relationship tononterminal
telephone use. Again, the relationship between nonterminal
use and nonroutine use as well as the relationship between
terminal use and routine use is apparent.
Multiple Regression
While the correlations are interesting and useful, it
is more helpful to know what relative contribution each
makes to the explanation of nonroutine use — the option
demand.
A stepwise multiple regression was run entering, on
the first run, household size, education and income. The
results of this regression are set out in Table 6.10. The
first variable entered was household size. The F statistic
for the Beta weight of household size was 2.657 which is
not significant. Income is entered second and education
Table 6.13
Results of Multiple Regression for Nonroutine Use
Nonroutine Telephone Uses:
Cumulative Incremental
R2 R2 B
Household Size 0.11 0.11 -.38
Income 0.14 0.03 -.17
Education 0.15 0.01 .10
was entered third. None of the results add significant
explanation to the nonroutine use, our dependent variable.
The total R2 explained is 0.15. The standard error
176
was high. Often; communication variables exhibit an
exponential curve in their relationship. In order to check
this, the nonroutine uses variable was converted to the
natural log form and the regression was recalculated. This
reduced the standard error but not the residual. By
reducing the standard error, however, it increased the F
value of household size which then becomes significant at p
< .05. These results are shown in Table 6.14.
________
Results of Multiple Regression Using Log Transformation
Log of Nonroutine Use:
Cumulative Incremental
R2 R2 B
Household Size .13 .13 -.40*
Education .15 .03 .14
Income .20 .03 -.18
________
The relationship is still an inverse one. The larger
the household size, the less nonroutine uses of the
telephone are mentioned. None of the other variables
significantly contribute individually to the explanation of
nonroutine use. However, together they explain an
additional 5% of the variance. Added to household size,
the total variance explained by demographics in the
dependent variable nonroutine kinds of use is 15% using the
untransformed measure and 18% using the log transformation.
177
By reversing the prediction and using routine kinds of
use as the dependent variable, we find that education is
the only independent variable that explains a significant
portion of the variation. Household size enters this
regression and also income. Education explains 20% of the
variance in routine kinds of use while the addition of
household size and income contribute together another 13%.
Although household size is not significant, it is
interesting to note that it is positively related to
routine use while being negatively related to nonroutine
use.
Generally, these results agree with qualitative
findings but point up the effects of household size in
addition. The qualitative results, however, show a link
between education and gender (female) when predicting
routine use. The sample is too small to do a reliable
quantitative check on this.
Frequency of Use
Up to this point, we have been looking at a range of
uses and how it is related to traditional demographic and
income predictors of telephone frequency. The results of
the analyses suggest that frequency of use and the range of
nonroutine use is not explained by the same variables.
Frequency does show a correlation to nonroutine use.
Frequency was now regressed on nonroutine use to see if it
explains the range of nonroutine use itself. The results
176;
are shown in Table 6.1b. Frequency is not a predictor of
nonroutine use. A similar finding holds if we reverse the
prediction and regress frequency against routine uses
reported. This agrees with the qualitative finding that
the frequency of perceived calling does not predict the
amount of kinds of telephone use that are nonroutine and
therefore not predictable.
Table-6TT5
Results of Simple Regression of Frequency on Nonroutine Use
Nonroutine Use:
Cumulative Incremental
R2 R2 B
Frequency .0005 .0005 -.02
Terminal Use of the Telephone
We also examined the second level of the typlogy of
use, terminal and nonterminal, to see if demographic
characteristics would be better predictors at this level.
Education turns out to provide a significant amount of
explanation of terminal range of telephone uses. Income
and household size, however, do not add any predictive
ability when they are entered into the equation. The
regression summary is provided in Table 6.16.
When the same demographic and income characteristics
are regressed against nonterminal use none of them offer
any significant explanation of variation in the dependent
variable, nonterminal use.
17Si
The impact of education on routine calls may be
explainable by its relationship to terminal calls which are
more likely to be routine.
______
Results of Multiple Regression On Terminal Use
Terminal Use:
Cumulative Incremental
R2 R2 B
Education .16 .16 .41
Income .23 .07 -.27
Household Size .001 .001 -.04
Frequency and Terminal Telephone Use
Finally, as we checked the regression of frequency on
nonroutine use, we again checked the frequency on terminal
use. It turns out that frequency is not explained by
terminal use as the results of Table 6.17 show.
__________
Results of Simple Regression of Frequency on Terminal Uses
Terminal Uses:
Cumulative Incremental
R2 R2 B
Frequency of Use .04 .04 .21
Summary of Results
Overall, demographic characteristics are poor
predictors of the variety of information we seek over the
180
telephone. Basically, this reflects what the qualitative
analysis also suggested. The qualitative analysis did
suggest, however, that a complex combination of demographic
factors together might be a predictor of use. In order to
quantify such a finding, a larger sample would be needed.
Organizational involvement was dropped from the regression
on kinds of use because it interacts with household use and
causes a problem with multicollinearity.
The qualitative analysis also suggested that gender
and income have some effects. It is not possible to check
the gender aspect quantitatively because males show a
nearly perfect correlation with a household size of two.
Income, however, when regressed on kinds of use as a
continuous variable is not a significant predictor. The
only possible explanation of this is that income is subject
to a critical threshold level where use changes.
The way in which the importance of the telephone is
characterized varies by gender. Males are more likely to
mention contact than females and females are more likely to
mention emergencies as the main reason it is important.
Both talk about its convenience.
The reciprocity indicates that calls only received are
from children, generally and that this is more likley if
the parents are Japanese. Calls made are responses to
situational conditions in which some kind of movement is
needed to complete a task. These are generally ordinary
181
tasks tout some telephone use is geared toward overcoming
barriers which are not ordinary,, to facilitate solving
problems and to help make decisions. Calls that are made
and received are social calls that occur with family (more
often siblings) and friends.
Generally, the telephone is associated with
facilitating and complimenting the activities of everyday
life.
181:
-CHAPTETTT: CONCLUSIONS AND DISCUSSION
Demand for telephone has traditionally been
characterized as demand for use and demand for access. The
demand for access has generally been considered the option
demand. Most demand characteristics show fairly stable
relationships to certain demographics. The same preference
structures are operating in both demand decisions, the
demand for access and the demand for use. However, while
the same demographic characteristics seem to be important
to both usage and access, the actual relationships between
these demographic characteristics and the usage demand and
access demand are different.
This study attempts to verify both the actual
characteristics of information and the communication flows
over the telephone network among senior citizens, and then
attempts to compare and contrast this typology of use to
the theoretical and demographic characteristics that have
been historically utilized in telephone demand research.
The study relies on both ethnographic interviews and
quantitative analysis to examine the actual demand
structure for telephone use among senior citizens.
The framework for this analysis relies on two
hierarchical classification schemes within an overall
structure for reported telephone calls. The top level of
this hierarchy is routine calls and nonroutine calls. A
is:
routine call is one that can be predicted or anticipated
(either being made or received by the respondent) within a
given time span, e.g. one month. A nonroutine call is one
the respondent could not predict or anticipate. The seconc
level of the hierarchy deals with the classification of
content in our structural scheme. The two classifications
used are terminal and nonterminal. A call reported as
terminal by the respondent refers to a call where the
purpose or goal of the call was contained within the
information or communication exchanged during the call.
The calls that are classified as nonterminal refer to calls
made as part of achieving some other purpose or goal beyonc
the call or outside of the content of the call itself.
The results suggest that telephone demand for use and
demand for access are more accurately characterized as
routine and nonroutine use respectively. That which is
perceived as nonroutine use by our senior respondents is
unanticipated, i.e. it is option demand. However, this
option demand is two dimensional. One dimension that
occurs can be associated with an intent to use the
telephone, as prior theorists (Taylor 1980; Bethesda Group
1984; Dervin, 1983) have suggested. This demand is
associated with monitoring the environment to maintain an
acceptable level of uncertainty. Another perception of
telephone associated with nonroutine use is a perception
that it provides security in case of a problem in which
184
there is no intent associated with the use.
The nonroutine telephone use can be considered in
terms of intensive versus extensive search. Extensive
search associates itself with breadth whereas intensive
search is associated with depth, i.e. finding the best
price on a can of coffee is extensive search but
determinimg the quality of each kind of coffee, assessing
its characteristics and comparing this ranking with its
price is intensive search. The telephone is used primarily
for extensive search because it is far more efficient for
gathering this type of information.
In addition to being routine (anticipated) or
nonroutine (not anticipated), telephone calls also exhibit
a characteristic of being either terminal (the purpose of
the call is contained within the call) or nonterminal (the
call is a means to get some other purpose accomplished).
Calls are associated with different perceptions of
importance (an intensity variable) Ordinary use is
associated primarily with a contact need whereas nonroutine
use is associated with both the telephone as a tool of
convenience and a security device (emergency type use) in
our complementarity matrix (see Figure 6.9). Most
nonroutine telephone use is associated with nonterminal
use, i.e. it leads to other activities. If it is
nonroutine and terminal, it is very affective.
Finally, since demand is linked to pricing structures,
18E
we drew implications about the different uses in our ~~~
typology and their relative importance to understand the
implications of price for changing information and
communication flows.
Nonroutine Telephone Use
- *
Non-routine use, in this study, is defined as option
demand because it is not predictable. However, nonroutine
use can be further differentiated. It includes emergency
calls, calls made in response to the arising of situational
uncertainty and calls received from others that are
unanticipated. The qualitative analysis shows that
nonroutine use encompasses a much broader range of use than
routine use. This is the unpredictable uses that seniors
make of the telephone.
The model diverges from the traditional definition of
option demand by separating out only the calls that are
received that cannot be anticipated as part of the option
demand. Many calls that are received can be anticipated
because they are a part of ongoing relationships. This
follows the economic assumption that the externality of the
call is internalized because, over time, reciprocity occurs
between subscribers. In short, the concept of option
demand needs to be distinguished from the consumption
externality because the consumption externality involves
calls that could be anticipated as part of ongoing
relationships to maintain the social, economic and physical
186
functions of an interpersonal system.
One can argue that the benefits derived from calls
received that can be anticipated are part of the option
demand because these benefits were associated with the
perception of someone else's future intent to use the
telephone. What the study concludes is that people
perceive the additional benefit received from the
production externality in terms of nonroutine calls<— those
they cannot anticipate ahead of time whether they are made
or received.
The traditional literature on telephone demand further
identifies the benefits derived from option demand as
positive benefits associated with the intent to use the
telephone (in case of need). Seniors' perception of
telephone service differs from the traditional
conceptualization of option demand in two ways: 1) some
calls are associated with a negative value. These include
calls received from solicitors, wrong numbers and nuisance
calls. It is clear that the disbenefit associated with
such calls is appreciably less than the positive benefits
associated with nonroutine calls but it is not negligible.
It accounts for 6% of all calls reported by our senior
citizens? and, 2) the intent to use the telephone for
nonroutine purposes differs in its attributes along two
dimensions. The perception of 'in case I need it' really
encompasses a value that might be more adequately
187
represented by the statement 11 hope I never need it' and
another value that is explained by the perception of •I
might need it1. These attitudes differ. One is associated
with an extraordinary life situation. The other is based
on the historical experience of using the telephone to
mediate situational uncertainty associated with everyday
life--e.g. checking on a sale at the store.
These two nonroutine needs differ along a dimension of
intensity, the former operates as a separate category
associated with importance because it is so intense
(emergency demand) and is related to the need for intensive
search via the telephone. The latter, more closely related
to ordinary activities, involves more extensive searching.
The total perceived demand that could be assigned to
the option varies a great deal among people. In addition,
the demand associated with the attribute of 'I hope I never
need it' does not show any consistent relationship to use
of the telephone (i.e. the frequency of calls). What does
this mean for pricing? Two things are immediately
apparent. First, at least with respect to information
gained through telephone calls, the option demand is both
positively related to use and not related to use. The
option to use the telephone 'in case I might need it',
related to the telephone's ability to efficiently conduct
an extensive search is related to the intent to use the
telephone. The option demand related to the attribute of
188
•x hope I never need it' is not related to the intent to
use the telephone. In a sense, both Taylor (1980) and
Weisbrod (19 64) are right: in order to create an ideal
pricing structure, the criteria used to develop a pricing
structure should accomodate the value of both these
dimensions of demand to insure symmetry between the way
telephone service is priced and way subscribers interpret
their demand for it.
Situational Uncertainty and Nonroutine Use
Nonroutine use is far more likely to be a response to
some event in these seniors1 environment which they must
act upon. In other words, it is more likely to be
nonterminal than routine use of the telephone is, but not
all nonroutine use is nonterminal. There is a strong
correlation between nonroutine use and nonterminal use.
The specific relationships are set out in Figure 4.1 and
Table 6.2. The most likely unexpected event that will
trigger a nonroutine and nonterminal call by these seniors
is a change in health. The most frequently mentioned
specific use is making a doctor’s appointment. But changes
in health include responses not only to concerns about
their own health but also concerns about the health of
others they are close to. This community of seniors pick up
their grandchildren from school when they are sick, take
their daughter to the doctor, and run errands for sick
friends.
189
Terminal and Nonroutine ' "
Much nonroutine use that is terminal is also
associated with cheering up sick friends, or keeping in
touch with friends or relatives who are not well. Such
calls satisfy more social psychological functions than
physical or economic functions. Although these are not
predictable uses of the telephone, they are generally
perceived as part of everyday life and they are associated
with normal movement in the course of living. Hence, in
Dervin's (1983) typology of information seeking, they are
classified under unblocked movement unless it was perceived
as a problem; then it was shown as a barrier call.
Respondents tend to discuss terminal and nonroutine
calls in more affective ways than they refer to routine
terminal calls. There is a relatively high value attached
to the occasional call to keep in contact. The most likely
candidates for reduction of information seeking by
telephone are nonroutine calls that are associated with
ordinary movement that is not necessary. The high
•'affective intensity" with which these seniors report
telephone calls that are nonroutine and terminal suggests a
very inelastic demand for these types of calls.
Reciprocity
Another aspect of nonroutine use is that it is more
likely to be reported as a call resondents make rather than
one they receive. It is a response to a problem or an
19C
action — as one puts it, "a part of living." Overall,
frequency of telephone use does not predict percentage of
nonroutine calls; yet these calls are highly valued by
these seniors.
Crisis Use and Nonroutine Calls
The importance of emergencies suggests that in
addition to the characterization of option demand as a
demand associated with the attribute 'in case I might need
it1, there is an additional value, probably very high for
senior citizens, associated with the telephone's
availability for emergency use. It would be difficult to
estimate the actual value of this demand. Several
valuations of human life incorporated in social cost
benefit analyses might be a good starting point. However,
one senior lady did say she would cut off her telephone if
it cost over $3 0 a month. The reasoning is not that she
would make do without a telephone but rather that she would
use her neighbor's telephone. This suggests that a response
to rising prices might be to seek an alternative or
substitute for telephone service.
Demographic Characteristics and Nonroutine Use
Demographic characteristics do not show any simple
capability for predicting respondents' telephone usage.
Nonroutine use seems to be a major asset of telephone
service to senior citizens and it is subject to some
demographic and economic influences. First, larger
191
households and very high users exhibit more routine uses
than nonroutine uses. Second, those with lower incomes
exhibit more nonroutine use.
Summary of Nonroutine Use
The range of uses associated with nonroutine calls is
much wider than the range of uses reported for routine
calls. In terms of the perception of the range of
uses— i.ev its informational value— the telephone's
availability is approximately 66% of its value. In terms
of reported frequency of telephone usage, it is 77% of its
value. These figures clearly diverge from the structure of
usage-sensitive rates which, in Hawaii's case, have been
proposed to assign approximately 50% of the total cost to
access, as opposed to actual usage. In fact, about 34% of
respondents' option to use the telephone is associated witt
the perception that they would rather not have to use it —
in effect, they are paying for security. The other 32% of
kinds of use associated with nonroutine calling are part of
the individual's normal relationships with the environment.
Situational uncertainty is the primary cause of
nonterminal and nonroutine use of the telephone. However,
the number of calls that can truly be characterized as
producing higher information-seeking activity is limited.
Uncertainty in interpersonal relationships is not handled
by the telephone. It is handled face to face, although a
telephone call may schedule such a visit. In response to
192
some activities, however, the telephone can be used to
reduce interpersonal uncertainty. For instance, dealing
with the city and county was often facilitated by seeking
information by telephone first. One person who had a
terminally ill close family member used the telephone
extensively to try to get more information and more
emotional support for that family member.
Generally, however, telephone use seems to be
primarily associated with ordinary activities rather than
intensive information-seeking. "Getting information" and
"getting something done" are mostly categories of usage
that facilitate relatively straight-forward actions or
communications, rather than in depth-searches. Our seniors
use text media such as newspapers and magazines for more
intensive types of searching for information.
In the case of a matter associated with some urgency,
however, they may use the telephone for intensive
information-seeking. These seniors do use the telephone to
check on family and friends who are sick and they often
report that they use the telephone with their families for
satisfying some practical need, either their own need or
that of the family member they are communicating with.
Hence, in urgent situations they use the telephone to seek
information as a response to uncertainty. In less urgent
situations, they use the telephone to seek information to
reduce uncertainty, i.e. attempt to satisfy a need, if the
192
content is not something they perceive as being emotionally
controversial, by using the telephone to monitor the
environment. Finally, with business and government, they
use the telephone to reduce uncertainty about what to do
when something is wrong, i.e. complaining. These type of
calls are all associated with their nonroutine use (option
demand).
The total perceived demand that could be assigned to
the option demand varies a great deal among people. In
addition, it does not show any consistent relationship to
use of the telephone (i.e. the frequency of calls).
Theoretically, Taylor (1980) and the Bethesda Group (1984)
have related option demand (nonroutine use) with the
positive intent to use the telephone. For this group of
seniors, this is not the case. Their option demand is
based on an ability to utilize the telephone to respond to
situational change, particularly in their family situation
or with regard to a change in their health. This does not
mean that no part of their option demand is related to an
actual intent to use it. Those calls that are terminal and
nonroutine might well be characterized as having a positive
relationship with the intent to use it.
Nonroutine use is basically an interaction between the
individual and the environment. Hence, response to
uncertainty and reduction of situational uncertainty are
the primary functions that nonroutine use serves. From a
19 A
communications perspective these activities can be
categorized as surveillance and information-seeking
(Lasswell, 1971; Dervin, 1983).
Most nonroutine use is based on the efficiency of
telephone services the purpose is generally
straight-forward? involves far more extensive search
activity than intensive search activity? is usually not
high in emotional content; is purposeful and therefore is
associated with a tendency not to be reciprocal,i.e., it is
a call placed, not a call received. The primary
demographic characteristic with which it is associated is
low income. However, if the nonroutine use is
terminal,i.e., it occurs for the sake of communicating—
the communication is usually positive and affective.
Routine Use
The importance of contact is associated with routine
and nonroutine usage value. Those with whom these senior
respondents routinely communicate by means of the telephone
are central relationships in their daily lives, such as
children and friends. In fact, if we associate a contact
value with telephone use it seems to be more widespread and
all-encompassing than the need for convenience, even though
more people mention the telephone's convenience.
Demographics and Routine Use
This category of use, when combined with the second
level of our typology (terminal/nonterminal) also shows
195
that traditional predictors such as income, education and
household size are relatively weak in their ability to
differentiate by kinds of use. Education does have an
impact, particularly for women. These people use the
telephone more for communicating (terminal calls). That
certain demographic characteristics may predispose a person
toward a particular orientation toward others (some of whom
they might talk to on the phone) is possible. The facts
that being female can help to predict routine use and that
education predicts terminal use of the of the telephone
suggest that socialization processes may be important.
Household size helps predict routine use which speaks to
perhaps greater organizational and coordination needs when
many people are living together.
The best predictor, however, seems to be outside
activity that occurs face to face, such as involvement
(active) in clubs and organizations. For instance,
athletic activities (almost 100% golf) tend to predict use
for senior men. Volunteer work is another type of outside
activity. What this really reflects is the fact that their
telephone complements respondents' face to face encounters.
But there are exceptions, such as when the person is a high
user of telephone and does not go out very often.
Routine use most often is manifested as contact
between the caller and family and friends. Contact is
based on a pervasive perception that people are busy and
19€
therefore the telephone allows them to Jceep in contact when
they might not be able to see each other, or the telephone
allows them to schedule face to face meetings that might
not be possible otherwise. This is especially important
with their children; where telephone calls do not support
any other activity. Terminal use associated with contact
accounts for much of seniors' reported routine telephone
calls.
Reciprocity
Some seniors mention that they get more calls than
they receive although most think it's about the same.
Incoming calls that are associated with contact seem
particularly valued. One respondent noted that talking
nonsense on the phone with his friends was better than
watering his yard. Since most seniors have a lot of time to
spare, i.e., they have fewer pressing schedules than others,
communicating is one of their pleasures.
The one aspect of difference between ethnic groups is
the reciprocity with family (generally children) that can
differentiate our seniors who are Japanese from others.
This tendency to report calls as being received when they
are from their children is a concrete example of a
variation in cultural norms from mainstream American as
well as other cultures.
Summary of Routine Use
Generally, characteristics that are associated with
197
routine telephone use are more social-psychological in
nature than demographic, but characteristics of gender and
education can predict some routine use. Lifestyle
variables such as participation in organizations are better
predictors.
Unlike nonroutine use, routine calls are primarily
perceived as calls both made and received. They are
reciprocal. The one difference is the reciprocity with
family (generally children) that can differentiate our
seniors who are Japanese from others.
Routine calls serve primarily to maintain one's
personal environment. For this reason, they are primarily
oriented toward terminal uses, and the range of use is more
narrow than that of nonroutine use.
Implications for Pricing
What does all this mean for pricing? Two things are
immediately apparent: 1) at least with respect to
information gained through telephone calls, the option
demand is both positively related to use and not related to
use; and, 2) norms of reciprocity may be altered by
changing pricing structures.
In a sense, both Taylor (1980) and Weisbrod (1964) are
right. The option demand has at least two dimensions. One
dimension is related to the intent to use the telephone.
This demand is characterized by the monitoring of
situational uncertainty through the use of the telephone.
198
The second dimension of option demand is its crisis use and
is not related to an intent to use the telephone. The
differing relationship between usage and these dimensions
of option demand would suggest that these dimensions will
be affected in different ways by a change in a pricing
structure.
The reciprocity between children and their parents
does point up a second potential impact of pricing
telephone by the call. While seniors who were Japanese
tended to report that their children called them rather
than vice-versa (a non-reciprocal usage pattern), if their
children were located at a distance where the call would
cost money, the pattern did not hold. In fact, they are
likely to report such long distance use as calls made.
Hence, pricing calls in the local area may cause seniors to
make more calls to their children rather than relying on
their children to call them because price becomes the
issue, not distance. Thus, there are three potential
effects of pricing by the call on telephone use for senior
citizens.
First, they may make more calls to their children to
reduce the burden on their children of incurring the
charge. Second, they may make fewer calls that are
associated with convenience (nonroutine but relatively
mundane purposes such as calling the store to check
availability of a product). Third, because they can
199
anticipate the content of routine calls, they may make
fewer of these calls if there is a price imposed since they
can generally assess the value of such a call in advance.
This would particularly apply to calls described in
deprecatory ways such as "not too much to talk" and "just
talking story" or "nonsense" calls since these are
perceived as unnecessary.
What becomes important is not just continued access to
telephone service in seniors' households when a price
structure changes but the broad based ways in which it can
affect seniors' information and communication activities*
Such charges could have profound long-term effects on
social structure because communication is the way we
maintain that structure and the telephone is one of our
most efficient technologies for doing so.
General Summary of Telephone Use
Basically, the lack of significant socioeconomic
predictors, particularly with respect to differentiating
ethnic groups, would suggest that "sense making"
researchers are correct; the underlying system constraints
lead to differential usage indirectly, not demographics.
The lack of other major discernible differences may
indicate that in a society like Hawaii where everyone is a
minority, system constraints are more balanced across
groups or are mediated and that the reciprocity difference
that does occur is a real cultural difference. This does
20d
not eliminate concerns with differential usage patterns
across ethnic groups, it does suggest the necessity of a
more comprehensive approach that incorporates measures of
system constraints in addition to demographic
characteristics.
The purposes of telephone calls are different if they
are routine and nonroutine. A system analysis would seem a
better way to approach the study of telephone demand than
the application of traditional static economic models
because nonroutine use is primarily a link between the
individuals* system and the environment whereas routine use
is more a link among of a systems' components— in the
social sense, family and friends.
The reasons for telephone's importance to the
respondents are associated with the different functions of
the individual interpersonal systems operating and reflect
the very different purposes and goals involved in those
systems. Convenience is more oriented to the environment
whereas contact with close others is what is important
about routine calls.
Discussion of Content
When applying a usage based price, we might be
undervaluing access in some cases. First, in GTE's
philosophy, the application of a usage price must be
mandatory across the board. The rationale for this is that
individuals will act rationally and therefore those
201
customers who use it more will subscribe to a flat rate
under an optional structure. Ultimately, this leads to
ever-increasing levels of usage migrating back to flat
rate. However, the way senior citizens value their
telephone they might well value their access regardless of
use and continue to pay a flat rate unless their income is
low. Therefore, the idea that it must be mandatory doesn't
fit the actual way in which seniors assign value to their
telephone demand.
Second, when compared across the demographic
characteristics that predict usage, actual option demand is
not well measured. Hence, the construct that is operating
is something other than just demographics. It remains to
be discovered what actual characterstic can predict the
value of the option versus the value of use. One
possibility is lifestyle. We have seen that organizational
involvement (basically this could be characterized as a
community of interest variable) will predict usage of the
telephone (Lum, 1984). However, it does not do well in
predicting the option demand. It interacts with household
size. Organizational involvement can be thought of as one
aspect of lifestyle. Perhaps, the more active we are, the
greater amount we use the telephone and the more important
it is to us. Highly active individuals would then value
the telephone on the basis of its actual use, much as
theorists have suggested.
202
on the other hand, tne value of the option to others
is directly related to high situational uncertainty, which
presupposes a need for information that is unpredictable.
For instance, in the case of seniors, health matters are
one aspect of importance that is associated with the
telephone. Seniors are more vulnerable to illness (at least
they see themselves as being more vulnerable) and the value
of a telephone to access health care is therefore
important. Certainly, this is not associated with frequency
except in a very long term sense. Lower income is also
associated with nonroutine use. This too is possibly a
response or value placed on being able to deal with
uncertainty rather than on actual predictable usage.
Experience to date in other states that have an
optional measured service rate would suggest that the
importance of the telephone for such functions is very high
to many people. Only one percent to 7% of subscribers
chose a usage sensitive rate structure as opposed to the
remainder of subscribers who have chosen to stay with a
flat rate. Hawaii's people actually use the telephone
slightly more than people in the U.S. in general. However,
under a usage pricing scheme proposed, the Hawaiian
Telephone Company argued that over 60% of their customers
would actually pay less if they subscribed to U.S.S. While
this may be true, the assumption one would need to make to
arrive at this conclusion is that the change in price would
202
not impact demand characteristics.
The failure of subscribers in other states to migrate
to a usage-senstive price structure when given the choice
would indicate that measures of frequency do not adequately
reflect the value of demand for telephone use among other
groups as well. In a competitive market, pricing must
reflect the demand characteristics. That the option demand
is a way of pricing has already been demonstrated by AT&T
in their Reach Out America Plan for long distance telephone
service. The basic plan (this is an example of option
related to usage) allows the customer to pay for the right
to use the telephone one hour a month.
If price is based on frequency of telephone use, the
consequences will not only be changes in the way telephone
service is demanded, the consequences of such changes will
spill over and affect more broad-based social structural
changes in the long term. If we return to the social
equity model, we should expect that the benefits are
equitable over time.
First, reciprocity becomes very important here.
Seniors seem to perceive their children as busy. Hence,
more of them report that their children call them. In
addition, at least for Japanese respondents, there is a
social norm involved. However, when their children live a
long distance away and the call is charged, the pattern
reverses itself. Seniors in this situation more often
204
report that they call their children. This interaction
also takes longer but is less frequent. One might assume,
although not to the same degree perhaps, that charging for
local calls will move their pattern more towards the long
distance pattern and they will now make more calls to their
children in the local context but calling will be somewhat
less frequent. It is hard to say whether they will talk
longer. They may defer longer conversations to times when
they get together since they interact in a face to face
context as well.
Second, most calls that are nonroutine and associated
with a nonterminal use are reported as calls made. The
benefits of such calls are often shared, however. For
instance, when one calls the store to check availability of
a product, not only does the customer benefit but the store
also potentially benefits. A potential customer has no
available way to predict the success of such a call (i.e.
will they have it?). This activity may be reduced under
U.S.S.
This outcome is suggested on the basis of studies of
search in places where telephone service does not exist
(Leff, 1984). Search can be both intensive and extensive.
Pricing by the call will not eliminate this extensive
searching but it may reduce it.
The telephone provides access to sources of
information and it is a source of information. Much
205
telephone usage consists of calls to people we are familial
with and can assign a likelihood to our success for gettinc
a particular message from them. These are, in our seniors’
context, friends and family. Because we can evaluate the
probability of receiving a message in advance, we can make
contextual decisions about whether or not the call will be
worth it. Some of these calls are likely to be reduced or
the pattern changed under U.S.S. These are generally
social calls such as "social obligation" and "I care" calls
although they can also be "getting information" calls. If
a duration charge is applied, some calls may be transferred
to a different time of day. Most seniors make calls in the
evening because everyone works except other seniors. Calls
that now can occur during the day might be delayed until
evening. Some of them may not be made.
There are calls that seniors make with other seniors
that they describe in deprecatory terms. Some examples are
"just nonsense," "friendly gossip," "talking story,"
"bringing out history," "friendly chatter" and so on.
These are likely to be reduced if they are priced because
they imply longer length conversations and less important
content.
In cases where the message is not able to be evaluated
in advance, i.e. such as getting information from the
government, the call will probably be made if the context
is important and may not be made if the context is not
206
important. This is particularly true when the respondents
perceive that finding out what they need to know will take
several calls. An interesting aspect of this is the
transportation trade-off. if the call is charged but the
bus is free, will they go in person instead? This decision
will be based on their perception of how 'busy1 they are.
One thing that comes out of the study is the different
kinds of importance people attach to the telephone. This
suggests that different people will repress different types
of calls. Someone who feels that the value of their
telephone is primarily contact will be more likely to cut
back on calls not associated with contact whereas someone
who thinks its' most important because of its convenience
will cut back on contact calls.
Situation states as they were defined by Dervin (1983)
and used in this study as ways of coding, are primarily
cognitive categories of situations. Most of the actual
calls recorded in action states (moving, barrier, etc#)
related to actual actions or overcoming some physical or
economic barrier. Respondents usually report these calls
as calls placed, not calls received. Hence, to price the
call may change the balance used to evaluate the call
against the outcome of the call. There is no perceived
reciprocity.
Since women talk longer (Brandon, 1981) they may cut
back on the length of their calls under U.S.S.
207
Lower income people also make more nonroutine calls
than others according to the categorical breakout at income
under or over $1,000 a month. Since it has been shown by
other studies that these people also have a higher
elasticity than others with respect to access, it may cause
them to relinguish their telephone all together. The logic
here is that the nonroutine use, not the routine use is
more frequent for the lower income group. Hence, the value
of the increased use is associated with access, not with
actual usage. By decreasing the availability of nonroutine
calls by placing a charge on them, the value of access, not
the use per se, is reduced.
Why is social equity important in telephone calling?
The sense of social equity is derived from our ongoing
relationships. The potential value of a call will be
assessed in two ways. First, it will be associated with
the value of the relationship if it is a call taking place
between two people who know each other. Such calls are apt
to be terminal — i.e., they are an end in themselves. The
potential impact of a U.S.S. price structure in this case
is a reduction in the number of contacts that we maintain.
In particular, calls associated with social obligation
which are not characterized as affective may be reduced,
i.e. the call is associated with a low intensity level.
Second, because there are social norms involved in calling
patterns a price per call may cause these to be readjusted
208
to reflect a new balance, thereby changing the calling
pattern. If we compare long distance and local calling
between parents and children we see that such a difference
exists in the pattern when it is priced as contrasted with
when it is not priced.
On the other hand, we have convenience. Here the
value of the call is directly related to the value of the
product or service to which the call pertains. If the
product is not very valuable to the person, the person may
not inquire about it. If the product is not very
expensive, the cost of extensive search when a call is
priced may exceed the cost difference between buying from
one store or another. This may cause a shift in
responsibility for the cost of calling from the customer to
the store.
Finally, the value of time is basically perceived as a
function of 'busyness'. For those who are not busy, they
may trade-off free transportation for priced telephone
calls.
What this research shows is that the option demand for
service has two differentiable components. The first
component is the value of coping with uncertainty. This
value encompasses both reducing uncertainty when it arises
and (far more frequently) reducing the possibility of
unwanted uncertainty through monitoring and observing by
telephone those things and people which are important to
209
us; The second value is tne value of the positive intent to
use the telephone. This is related to terminal uses.
Unlike the value of the option to reduce uncertainty, this
value is more associated with consumption externality.
Even though more kinds of use are reported as calls made
because of the propensity for nonroutine nonterminal
telephone use to be perceived as calls made, almost all
nonroutine terminal calls are actually associated with
calls both made and received. They are part of the less
active relationships with friends and family (often
associated with a time link to the past) where the
reciprocity is a function of social norms aimed at defining
the people to each other much like routine and terminal
use.
Routine telephone calls are part of present time
ongoing relationships and activities associated with
maintaining our interpersonal network. These can be
anticipated and associate themselves with an actual usage
demand.
Access to information is an important part of American
society. Without it, we can neither guarantee an efficient
market nor an informed public. Much information seeking
via telephone is a direct response to a need to move; i.e.
to buy a product or evaluate a potential action. Different
groups have different needs for information. Rate setters
must insure that pricing structures do not limit or reduce
210
access. Access is not only physical access to the
telephone system but also access to information. Pricing
by the call can alter decisions to access information.
This information also needs to be integrated into our
attitudes and behaviors. Routine use (mostly "social”)
helps us achieve this goal.
Discussion of Methodology
The methodology employed in this study is basically
qualitative. Where it was possible, and offered the
potential for some insight, kinds of telephone use were
counted and quantified. But the research approach
primarily involved open-ended questions with follow up in
'native' language. This was necessary because of the lack
of available historical studies upon which to base any sort
of questionnaire. Further, we wanted to know how people
think about their telephone and what words they use to
describe their telephone use, its importance to them and so
on.
There are theories of telephone demand that indicate
the presence of an option value. An empirical effort to
measure the option demand utilized by Mitchell (1978)
defined the measures of option demand as the consumption
externality and emergency calls. We have no context for
understanding how it is understood by actual people.
Therefore this study developed a theoretical construct of
option demand based on information and communication
211
functions of telephone calls, called routine and nonroutine
telephone use. It needs modifying, and we need to know
more about what kinds of maps people have in their head
about it. We must ask them and we must trace their
responses. We cannot ask a set of questions that are
predetermined because we don’t know what they should be.
The empirical studies that have been done on telephone
use are basically associated with demographics, but there
is no theoretical basis for their inclusion or
noninclusion, other than telephone companies' historical
experience with variables that have been good predictors of
use in the past.
Another reason that qualitative research is valuable
in communication research is the inextricable relationship
of communication to context and change. Experimental
research, while it can give us insights into the
association of traits to communication behaviors, cannot
give us adequate information about the relationship of
context to communication. Things change over time and
communication adjusts to those changes and facilitates
them. Qualitative research is a valid way of identifying
change. Quantitative research often misses the causes of
change because it is looking for particular relationships
between particular sets of variables while change occurs
when a system interacts with its environment. Qualitative
observation and questions linking events in the person's
212
context, can identify the relevant changes in the
environment more effectively.
Ideally, if we use both tools together we get the
strengths of depth and insights which qualitative data
often offer, and linkages with the quantitative strength of
generalizability which qualitative research lacks. In a
case such as telephone use, it can help use develop
theoretical concepts into grounded theory that is
applicable more generally. In the field of communications
today, where technological change is imposing rapid changes
in its applications and relationships, qualitative research
is not only necessary, it is essential.
Sense-making
Sense-making is a very appropriate theoretical concept
for examining information-seeking as it relates to
particular contextual needs for information. It is a very
valuable approach to understanding the process of
information in negotiating movement. It alerts us to the
importance of the systemic nature of communication and the
impacts of situation on information seeking which is
important in taking a systems perspective.
Sense-making can potentially alert us to the
advantages of a particular medium over some other medium in
dealing with particular kinds of context. However, because
it is cognitive in its approach, it cannot give us insights
across media in terms of affective satisfaction. It also
213
limits the ability to understand the network as a whole
system of relationships. The problems orientation of sense
making can identify needs for information that are
situation based. Uses and gratifications can identify
gratification levels obtained through a particular channel.
Both are necessary to understanding the broad range of
communication needs and their potential gratification
levels. Neither approach is sufficient to do this.
Research Agenda
Many questions remain unanswered. The research
suggests that it may be better to approach a study of
telephone use in the context of all communication and
relate communication activities to lifestyles. Lifestyles,
while they show some relationships with demographic
characteristics may be the direct link between telephone
use and the way in which it is demanded and valued. This
would suggest that the link between age and telephone use
is more a link to life cycles than to real chronological
age.
The relationships of demand need to be further
explored with other groups. For instance, in Hawaii, the
18-to-24 year old population shows the lowest penetration
of any age group living independently. This suggests a
difference in the demand elasticity. What are the
characteristics associated with that difference?
As we move toward a universal information service
214
such questions take on renewed importance. Many new media
are interactive or have the potential to be interactive.
Some will replace telephone calls and others will use the
telephone as their vehicle. The demand for future use
which is the option demand is a very important concept to
be studied in this context. The option demand for new
services will help to provide a proper pricing structure
for their sale and diffusion. While the option demand for
telephone is associated with a certainty of future supply,
the demand for new services is not. It may be that this
demand then is in addition to the consumers surplus and
thus should be taken into account as an additional variable
in projecting future supply. Failure to do so could lead
to disparities in market provision of new services across
groups in the future. It could even lead to the failure of
services which might have been viable.
There are numerous other questions. One thing about
pricing is clear, we need more definitive research on the
relationship between particular pricing structures and
demand characteristics. This, in turn, has implications
for the viability and distribution of new services as well
as traditional telephone service. It is important to
concentrate on the product that flows over the conduit and
not just the conduit itself when considering both the
economic efficiency and the social welfare as it pertains
215
to telephone use, to new services use and to media
use in general.
Communication is inherently relational in its nature.
The value associated with information is a dependent upon
both the source and the receiver; it is valued in the
context of a network of relationships; it is dynamic. In
order to understand information as a product and its
relationship to telecommunications access and systems, it
must be approached as a system of relationships.
Generally, a systems model better fits the descriptior
of telephone demand characteristics than the traditional
economic models of utility. Any message affects both
parties involved in the exchange. Each must constantly
adjust his/her expectations for satisfaction based on
his/her assessment of the satisfaction of the other because
neither can maximize their gain independently.
There is a general consensus that we are moving into a
new society whose economic base will be
information-related. We must concentrate on understanding
the nature of information and its relationship to other
economic goods in order to successfully move into a new
social structure without endangering our social and
political values. Information is not just a product,
however. It is the means by which we gain access to all
products and activities that we need to function
effectively.
216
Historically, we have created many technologies which,
like the telephone, help us to get information to move
through life more efficiently. It is important to
guarantee access to both information inputs and information
outputs through media because the technological
infrastructure of the media are the means by which many
information products are moved. Information is also
involved in the transaction of other products. Informatior
cannot be valued in advance. Technology creates a potential
time gap in the consumption of information across consumer
groups if some have faster access. This is the case
between face to face and telephone. This is important to
information as a part of the transactions in other markets.
In an industrial society moving hard goods, a rapid
transportation system was necessary in order to minimize
the constraints of space. In an information society, a
communication system is crucial to minimize the constraints
of time. This must be recognized and provided for all
consumers. Only then can the "network marketplace" for
information products function as a free market.
217
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APPENDIX A: STATEMENTS ABOUT TELEPHONE'S IMPORTANCE
convenient, very convenient
because emergency, things like that
emergencies, maybe, no
grandchild sick at school
it's really inconvenient without telephone
would be a dead world without the phone
important to look after Mother
call ambulance
without the telephone no can do anything
especially for emergency
phone is essential, in case of an emergency and if took it
away would disrupt life because you couldn't get any
communication from outside
get emergency, like that you know, think if you're by
yourself then...
because, ah, when you have an emergency, like that it's
very convenient
very important— really when I have to
convenient
telephone is a must— not a luxury, it's convenience, it's
necessity
telephone communication is important. It maintains
everything it's a good communications device
save a lot ot traveling
My family is working so the phone, they call the place
where they work. They call when they can not go to
work. That is why we need the telephone.
Lately it's been working, now I no can do nothing
convenient
so you don't have to go in person...for convenience
convenience— necessary that it's there and it works.
Like to have in case I need it.
Without the telephone there is no good communication.
Life would be boring, also inconvenient— you'd have to go
places instead of calling. It's important for long
distance to find out how's the family, we hardly write
letters.
It's a necessity just like the automobile. (Without) less
communication with family and friends.
It's value is just to know it's there in an emergency and
it's very important for convenience
Emergencies; it's convenient, you need it; (without phone)
deprive friends and relatives from calling me.
It's easy, it's much easier and faster too (than going in
person).
Emergencies
If you don't have a telephone you cna't communicate with
anybody. Most important is I can't get in touch with
my friends and my son on the outer island.
Emergency and convenience.
223
Direct contact with people and to find out things you don't
know about.
Telephone is just a necessity. Communication with friends
and family.
That's an important for the phone. Find out how they're
doing. You give them,um, morale support in some ways.
When they're ill, when I'm ill then they'll call me up
and, uh, that will, uh, cheer you up you know,
brighten up the day...um-hum, that's pretty important,
contact with family and friends, get hold of them
Emergency, I guess that would be the most important
Social life, seeing people would be more pleasant but
without the telephone it would be very hard to get
together often.
For convenience.
Instant communication when the phone is available because
otherwise you won't drive, um, you know. If you have
a message, an important message to give, uh? And at
the same time for emergency purposes, the phone is
there.
Need to have, in case— (tells story of emergency)
If you don't have it it's like you don't have legs.
You got no contact with your family or the outside world.
Well, sometimes, emergency cases.
Chance to keep up on family.
224
Subj ect 1
Subj ect 2
Subj ect 3
Subject 4
APPENDIX B
COMPARISON OF CALLS DESCRIBED:
INTERVIEW 1 AND INTERVIEW 2
Interview 1
all kinds of things
just family
subscribe to
keep up
call to watch children
how are things
how things are
how's school
about activities
checking at library
dental appointment
call for golf
keep in contact
how's things going
planning get togethers
giving boost of interest
letting others keep in
touch with outside world
taking care of rentals
how's she/he doing?
how's she feeling?
how's everything, is
she alright?
scheduling to go out
pertaining to repairs
calling granddaughter
keeping in touch
catching up on news
giving information about
current events
Interview 2
sometimes nonsense
when sick
not interested,
just hang up
(schedule) go out
babysit
how is everything
to visit
call for appt.
Home town club
test results
soliciting
calling the library
appointments
golf club sale
keep in touch
checking on sales
enj oyment
misbilling
discuss business
about family estate
about a meeting
sick (when) she calls
meeting
checking on them
about favors
225

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Asset Metadata

Creator Lum, Patricia Janet (author)

Core Title Demand characteristics for telephone among a community of senior citizens: A communications approach

Contributor Digitized by ProQuest (provenance)

Degree Doctor of Philosophy

Degree Program Communication Theory and Research

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag Gerontology,OAI-PMH Harvest,Speech Communication

Language English

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c17-709843

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Legacy Identifier DP22405.pdf

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Document Type Dissertation

Rights Lum, Patricia Janet

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Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the au...

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