About to email a tirade flaming your co-worker for the rude, abrupt message he just sent you? Wait. The New York Times reports on the psychological reasons why email is so easily misread and misunderstood:
Face-to-face interaction, by contrast [to on-screen interaction], is information-rich. We interpret what people say to us not only from their tone and facial expressions, but also from their body language and pacing, as well as their synchronization with what we do and say.
Most crucially, the brain's social circuitry mimics in our neurons what's happening in the other person's brain, keeping us on the same wavelength emotionally. This neural dance creates an instant rapport that arises from an enormous number of parallel information processors, all working instantaneously and out of our awareness.
Sounds like a lot of psycho-speak for something we already know: talking face to face, you're 100 times more likely to get your message and tone across than via email. So what do you do about it? Stop emailing the guy down the hall and get up and walk down there. Distributed teams? Set up occasional face to face meetings to anchor email communication. Simple enough.
E-Mail Is Easy to Write (and to Misread) [NYT]
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