[2] Research on social presence theory has recently developed to examine the efficacy of telecommunications media, including SNS communications.
[5] Wiener and Mehrabian identified immediacy as nonverbal communication behaviors such as eye contact and body movements that can enhance closeness in interactions.
[12] Definitions of social presence are inconsistent, as scholars attempt to pinpoint what the phenomenon encompasses, and how it can be adapted as new media of interpersonal communication arise.
[13] We have developed multiple non-verbal intimacy behaviors in the online community that enhance our relationships with people when we communicate in a medium where there is no real-life contact.
[17] The most basic of interactions are done face-to-face; and the participants exchange, in addition to verbal communication, a set of non-verbal cues, such as facial expression, direction of gaze, posture, dress, and body language.
[34] Social Presence Theory provides a foundation for communication systems designers and serves as a main principle in computer-mediated-communication studies.
[35] Gorham & Cristophel (1990), Tu & McIsaac (2002), and Aragon (2003) place high importance on using engagement tactics, in online classrooms, geared towards increasing social presence and reducing distance.
[9] Depending on the technology used, synchronous sessions can provide both audio and video connections, allowing an interchange involving both sight and sound, and all the rich nonverbal communication inherent in tone of voice and facial expressions.
[40] They use social communication tools to enhance the student experience and to overcome the challenges of forming interpersonal relationships in a virtual space.
Their study describes how important it is for journalists to be active on social media in order to create a bond of trust with their audiences.
He stated "researchers and practitioners alike will have to consider a new host of things related to social presence with the continued blurring of boundaries between classroom and fully online courses as well as between course bound communication tools (e.g., discussion forums) and non-course bound tools (e.g., Facebook and Twitter)...."[48] Social presence is critical in improving instructional effectiveness in any setting, especially in distance education.
[28][24][19] As an example, when a conversation is task-based and public without a sense of community being in place, the perception of social presence is low and affective filtering (a communication blockage brought about by negative emotional feelings) is high.
These impressions developed into visual interpretations of the other, and a sense of intimacy and identification between participants, which led to greater perception of social presence.
Courses or conferences that rely heavily on such a system for communication should begin with light and casual conversation in areas that the user has familiarity with, which helps them in gaining a comfort level with the technology.
[14] Later work by Palloff and Pratt, in 1999 and 2003, validated Gunawardena's recommendation, and they called for establishing learning communities among online users at the very beginning of courses.
In both a quantitative and qualitative analysis of the interactions of 51 volunteers, Tu and McIssac found that social context was more qualitative (a learned skill-set rather than a prescriptive set of actions) to achieve positive impact, online communication was more strongly related to quantifiable and organizational skills of participants, and that interactivity constituted skill sets and communication styles used in combination.
As a result, Tu and McIssac identified the following variables that had strong positive effects on the fueling or perception of social presence.
By building trust online, providing social "hand holding" support up front in any course using computer-mediated communication, and promoting informal relationships, teachers and instructors can provide a strong sense of social presence, increase a sense of community, and in turn increase interaction among participants.