The Impact of Media Selection on Organizational Communication: Testing Information Richness Theory With Agent-Based Models

This dissertatin examines how messages are communicated throughout an organization using cutting-edge research techniques to simulate a large number of different organizations. Most organizational communications literature focuses on communications between individuals within an organization, without addressing how information moves throughout the organization as a whole. This dissertation focuses on communications at the organizational level by examining how a key communications theory, information richness theory, scales up to the organizational level from the individual level. The dissertation was written in a public affairs program, and some of the text and examples are focused in that direction, but the insights and the fundamental research has value to any manager of medium or large organizations who is trying to grasp how to keep their entire organization moving in the same direction or a student of these organizations.

Eric S. Metcalf, PhD was born in Longview, Texas. He holds a B.A. in Political Science from The Johns Hopkins University, a M.P.S.A. from Texas A&M University, and a PhD from the University of Texas at Dallas. He is currently employed as the Director of Technology for the Tarrant County Sheriff's Office in Fort Worth, Texas.