How many words is a picture really worth?

Subjects communicating in telephone and multimedia settings do not replace speech with visual images in the multimedia setting. Instead, they use more words in this environment. The authors discuss the trade-off between words and images, addressing this surprising result. Several factors are involved: use of redundant visual information; “meta-media” conversation; and a slightly greater amount of information conveyed in the multimedia setting. Suggestions concerning integration of a multimedia interface with automatic translation are made