How categorization impacts the design of requests

Asking for email addresses in call-centre interactions

Datos Bibliográficos

ID2897451
AutoresMarie Flinkfeldt (0000-0003-1751-1918, Uppsala University, autor de correspondencia), Sophie Parslow (Loughborough University), E Stokoe (0000-0002-7353-4121, Loughborough University)
Año2022
Volumen51
Número4
Páginas693-716
Fecha de publicación2022-09-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaLanguage in Society (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0047-4045 • E-ISSN: 1469-8013
EditorialCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0047404521000592
OpenAlexW3193369736
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas11
Referencias citadas46

Marketing research shows that organizations tailor communication for particular customer 'segments', but little is known about the live design of interaction for different categories. To investigate this, we examine telephone calls to a holiday sales call-centre (for 'seniors') and a university admissions call-centre (for 'young' students). While topically different, call-takers in both datasets requested callers' email addresses in order to progress service. Using conversation analysis, we examine how these requests were designed, where and how 'age' was made relevant, and how subsequent service provision was handled in a way that matched callers' presumed age categories. Contrastive to the static notion of 'segments', we show how recipient design is bound up with categorial considerations while being responsive to the live unfolding of actual interaction. The article demonstrates how a comparative collection-based approach can be used to analyse the relevance of social categories in situations where this is implicit or ambiguous. (Membership categorization, customer segmentation, conversation analysis, recipient design, requests, age

Business · Call centre · Categorization · Conversation · Conversation analysis · Customer care · Customer service · Linguistics · Political science · Relevance (law) · Service (business) · Telecommunications · World Wide Web · Artificial Intelligence · Communication · Computer Science · Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies · Linguistic Variation and Morphology · Marketing · Psychology · Psychology of Social Influence