Complicating Communication in Computer Mediate Environments

Building on the research produced by early and current computers and writing scholars, this chapter will look at the results of an analysis of both virtual- and classroom-based texts produced by nine first-year writers, five from composition I and four from composition II courses at a mid-sized, Midwestern, public university. The research included in this chapter explores the results of how blogging affected student writing in the first-year writing classroom. Specifically, this chapter focuses on the results of this study in relation to the explicit and implicit textual signals and how these textual signals complicate communication in computer mediated environments.