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The current technological market displays a progressively increasing number of communication solutions in the form of tools and services (Riemer & Wulf, 2010). Although every solution may improve or solve one communication problem, its proliferation is also creating a new problem: how to identify and select the ideal service for each communication setting. According to Fuze (2017), communication tools should empower productivity, though it increases the need for organizations to analyse each solution, rejecting redundant apps and tools. As depicted, ‘IT leaders are battling a productivity threat in the form of application sprawl: workers navigating between tools and devices to share, connect, and communicate’ (Fuze, 2017, p. 11), which can lead to failed communications attempts, lost time, disruptive work interruptions and frictions in team collaboration (Riemer & Wulf, 2010). Furthermore, having to juggle between diverse modes of communication has been associated to interaction overload (when the level of interaction an individual needs to engage in exceeds his communicative and cooperative capacity) and communication deficiency (when a communication is established through an undesired mode of communication) (Ljungberg & Sørensen, 1998). Summing up, while a recipient wishes to be constantly accessible, the way in which a communication is carried out might not be desirable.
Also relevant in this context of research is the cognitive load theory (CLT). This theory is based on the notion of a limited working memory capacity related to an amount of information expected to be processed. Some research has been done in order to relate CLT to Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), mostly concerned with the development of educational interfaces (Chalmers, 2003; Hollender, Hofmann, Deneke, & Schmitz, 2010; Oviatt, 2006). As a usability goal and to succeed in the creation of an intuitive and usable interface, aiming to reduce memory load and decrease irrelevant load (extraneous) (Hollender et al., 2010; Oviatt, 2006), frees up mental resources that allow to perform main tasks better whilst remaining attuned to the surrounding context (Oviatt, 2006).