A qualitative analysis of communication in consortial chat reference

This study aimed to identify relational behaviors and communication practices in an academic, consortial chat reference service, and compared chats in which the operator is paired with a local user and a non-local user. We qualitatively coded a sample of 374 anonymized transcripts in NVivo and developed key assertions about communication behaviors. Overall, use of scripts was high, and personalization was infrequent. Operators used a variety of politeness strategies, such as rapport-building, hedging, setting expectations, and using softening language. We found differences based on institutional affiliation: when dealing with a patron from outside their institution, operators used more scripts, were less likely to introduce themselves to the user, had more instances of repair, used different politeness strategies, impersonalized the speaker more often, and had more incomplete closing rituals. Across the service, operators strengthened relationships with users through self-disclosure and identity moves and weakened relationships through impersonalization. Based on these findings, we recommend that operators increase personalization and self-disclosure, limit the use of scripts, write from the perspective of the user's home library (using terms like us or we, rather than it or they), and complete closing rituals. These are relational facilitators that increase social presence, encourage rapport-building, convey authenticity, and communicate shared identity.