Joint attention requires co-presence, excluding algorithm-mediated influences

Evidence

Attention ecology would nevertheless benefit from a more precise definition of joint attention. In order to distinguish joint attention from collective attention, the following pages will concentrate on situations of PRESENTIAL CO-ATTENTION, characterized by the fact that several people, conscious of the presence of others, interact in real-time depending on their perception of the attention of the other participants. This excludes all forms of influence between anonymous individuals mediated by algorithms, trends or media broadcast, and it restricts the effects of group convergence to situations of co-presence limited in space, time and by the number of participants involved. — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 246

Categorization

• DEFINE: Core theoretical distinction for the book’s whole project: presential co-attention vs. collective attention, sharply defined by excluding algorithm mediation.
• QUESTION: Where exactly does algorithmically-recommended content stop being ‘mediated by algorithms’ and start being joint? Netflix suggestions vs. a friend forwarding a link is a fuzzy boundary worth probing.
• XREF: connects to: Shared physical co-presence enables the cognitive harmonizations that build subjectivity — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 72; Presential joint attention differs in kind from media-captured attention by its participant-limited scale. — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 304; Shared attention to a contemporaneous event grounds intersubjectivity without needing shared content of experience — Karin Knorr Cetina & Urs Bruegger, Global Microstructures: The Virtual…, 65 (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• Presential joint attention differs in kind from media-captured attention by its participant-limited scale. #complicates (0.75) — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 304
• Shared attention to a contemporaneous event grounds intersubjectivity without needing shared content of experience #complicates (0.72) — Karin Knorr Cetina & Urs Bruegger, Global Microstructures, 65