Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Imagined interaction


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. Unanimously, if one ignores - as I have done - the wall of text by VirtualSwayy.  Sandstein  10:00, 24 June 2020 (UTC)

Imagined interaction

 * – ( View AfD View log  Stats )

Non-notable behavioural theory, once you look past the obvious COI editing. Fails WP:GNG on the following points:


 * 1) Significant coverage, so that original research is not required: Significant coverage does not exist (not even mentions on popsci sites, which is a low bar). We cannot write about the topic without doing original research, extracted from sources (ie the original paper, and derivatives thereof) written by the author.
 * 2) Reliable: failed
 * 3) Secondary sources: non-existent
 * 4) Independent of subject: It's either discussed by the author(s), or by parties directly linked to the authors (same department at the same university). Not independent.

WP:GNG certainly fails here. Also see AfD on the author: Articles for deletion/James M. Honeycutt. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 17:57, 16 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Behavioural science-related deletion discussions. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 17:57, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

-

Please remove the non-notability deletion flag on this article

THIS THEORY IS CLEARLY NOTABLE BASED ON WIKIPEDIA GUIDELINES WP:GNG Flagging this for deletion based on notability is completely without merit and would set a precedent for ridiculous applications of the notability guidelines which would go FAR beyond "what wiki is not: a collection of random information" and reduce Wikipedia to nothing more than the small portion of theories in any given field which are the most popular. Deleting this topic would harm many communication undergraduate and graduate students, the majority of whom are required to learn this in a Comm Theory course. See, for example, this widely used textbook by Communication super-star Leslie Baxter, in which Honeycutt's Imagined interaction Theory comprises an entire chapter. (<--- a secondary source; see below). 1. Significant coverage: PASSED. A wealth of clear evidence of significant coverage exists. The Wiki itself cites 20+ publications across MULTIPLE PEER-REVIEWED JOURNALS Many more (141 publications + 7 books cited 4100+ times) can be found with a university library search, including a lengthy Entry in the INTERNATIONAL ENCYCLOPEDIA OF COMMUNICATION, the flagship academic encyclopedia in the field (<--- a secondary source; see below). This topic CLEARLY meets the significant coverage and OR requirements, which specifically state: "Primary sources may or MAY NOT be independent sources... a scientific paper documenting a new experiment conducted BY THE AUTHOR is a primary source". Exactly like the majority of the 141 peer-reviewed publications listed on this authors CV; social scientific research studies. The reliability guidelines specifically say "PRIMARY SOURCES that have been reputably published MAY BE USED in Wikipedia" and that they are "are often accounts written by people who are directly involved." That guideline is common sense, if Wikipedia were to prohibit sources which are "the original paper, and derivatives thereof", as the flag says, that literally would exclude every scientific theory in every field, because ALL good research is derivative of the original. Academic papers have literature reviews specifically to link a given study to previous studies as a replication, an extension, an or an improved research design, for example. 2.Reliable: PASSED. The flag simply says "failed" which is not an actual argument. However, the reliability guidelines are also clearly met. It is comical to say these are unreliable! They guidelines state that "an article, book, monograph, or research paper that has been vetted by the scholarly community is regarded as reliable, where the material has been published in reputable peer-reviewed sources". So, here are but a few examples: This article in HCR, a well respected journal, won top paper when it was presented at NCA in 2012, this book won distinguished book of the year in 2006, also from NCA, the top acdemic association/conference in the United States for this discipline. In 2015, this study on imagined interactions was published in THE most prestigious journal in the field of communication. I could go on and on presenting evidence here, but then I would get accused of bludgeoning.

He meets this criteria in another totally independent way, not just the general notability, but this meets a context specific reliability criteria. Scholarship specific reliability guidelines say that we can "confirm that discussion of the source has entered mainstream academic discourse by checking what scholarly citations it has received in citation indexes. He has [| 4100+ citations on Google Scholar!!] That's a lot in this discipline. A lot! I give a detailed analysis of why this is a lot on the personal Honeycutt page linked above. 3.Secondary sources: PASSED. Again, the flag simply says "failed", and again, that's not an actual argument. Although many more exist, above I linked two secondary sources, the ENCYCLOPEDIA and the TEXTBOOK. They are clearly reliable under the reliability guidelines, which make plain that a researcher who publishes primary research can ALSO author their own secondary sources: [|Secondary does not mean "independent" or "uninvolved".]. Wikipedia guidelines bolded that, not me! The guidelines make it clear that the EDITORIAL PROCESS ALONE CAN ESTABLISH RELIABIITY REGARDLESS OF AUTHORSHIP, which is why the guidelines say AGAIN, on the page for secondary sources, as context specific as you can get, that "[|Secondary sources are not necessarily independent sources]" THE EDITORS OF THESE SECONDARY SOURCES SHOULD BE BEYOND REPROACH. The encyclopedia is published by ICA (THE TOP academic association for the discipline worldwide), and is "edited by an international team of the world's best scholars and teachers" The textbook, published by SAGE and edited by Leslie Baxter, a distinguished scholar of NCA as well as a Distinguished Professor at Iowa. who is held in extremely high regard by scholars in this discipline. 4. Independent of subject: PASSED. The independence standard is clearly met. The guidelines exclude citing works that are a) "produced by the article's subject" or b) "someone affiliated with it". Clearly, a) can't be violated because the subject of the article is a theory and theories don't produce works. The standard in a) isn’t applicable to theories and is meant to disallow things like Bubba’s’s Auto Shop using it’s own press release that says it’s “internationally known” as evidence of notability. Also, b) is also not violated, because the guideline isn't intended to prevent citing works of researchers that are "affiliated with" the theories they research (which all researchers would be if “affiliated with” was construed to include “published on”). The standard in b) is intended to limit things like "advertising, press releases, autobiographies, and the subject's website" as stated in the examples in the GNG:independence guidelines. Here the subject is an academic theory, so let's use an academic theory as an example; the Wikipedia page on the subject of "Evolution". Can we use Darwin? Not according to this deletion flag, Darwin is clearly "associated with" evolution so the standard the flag uses would disallow Darwin. What about establishing notability with something more modern, by citing H. Alan Orr, widely published on genetic adaptation? Nope. He is also "associated with" evolution so the standard the flag uses would disallow him as well, and so on, and so on, until we exclude every published expert on evolution from being used to establish that evolution meets the notability guidelines. Clearly, b) does not preclude citing James Honeycutt on the theory he published on for decades any more than it would exclude citing Darwin on evolution, and Darwin, or Orr, could write a review article that could be a secondary source for evolution, becasue AS LONG AS THE EDITORIAL PROCESS IS SOUND RESEARCHERS ARE ALLOWED TO AUTHOR THEIR OWN SECONDARY SOURCES. The guidelines literally say it in bold as the link above shows. Furthermore, as discussed above, this article’s many primary sources, which are published in reputable peer-reviewed journals, meet the OR guidelines, which specifically state: "Primary sources may or MAY NOT be independent sources... a scientific paper documenting a new experiment conducted by the author is a primary source". VirtualSwayy (talk) 01:37, 21 June 2020 (UTC) — VirtualSwayy (talk&#32;• contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

Let's just group these three because they are all the same. They are unexplained "votes" in the truest sense of the word. (2nd one is literally just a ditto).
 * 1) All of these completely punt on the issue that was flagged, notability. Hell, one flat out concedes it.  Deletion for an unflagged issue violates the discussion period requirement. participants can't choose to comment on a new issue brought up late in the discussion.
 * 2) None of these reference ANY specific guideline that is violated and so the claims impossible to objectively judge against a wiki criteria.
 * 3) None of these reference ANY portion of the page so we are forced to imagine what the violation might be. This is presumably why the admin instructions say "valid arguments citing relevant guidelines will be given more weight than unsupported statements"
 * 4) None of these "consider alternatives to deletion" as the admin instructions ask. Alternatives are especially important here, because...

MOST IMPORTANTLY, DELETION IS NOT APPROPRIATE HERE. MESSY/UNCLEAR CONTENT IS NOT ONE OF THE CLEARLY ENUMERATED REASONS FOR DELETION [|HERE].

This flag isn't even factually accurate. Even briefly Googling these authors shows that several of them are at different universities. For example, Honeycutt: LSU, Mapp: UL-Monroe, Ford: Chair at Montevallo, Keaton: Ashland University, Vickery: SUNY, Hample: Maryland, Hatcher: LA Tech, Madison: UL-Lafayette, Rold: Texas A&M. I stopped Googling there with a certainty this claim is false, but even if it weren’t, it would simply mean that the flag evidences a misunderstanding of how academic research and publication work. It is the norm for researchers in the same department to collaborate, and for Ph.D. students to publish on their advisor’s theories, both while they are students, and throughout their career as Professors.

Literally, so what? Why are "popsci sites" more definitive than textbooks, countless peer-reviewers and editors of multiple communication journals, and the edited, peer reviewed flagship academic encyclopedia of the discipline?

This is an obvious logical fallacy, called the forced-choice or either or fallacy. Things can be in textbooks AND ALSO students can benefit from supplement material, which is actually why supplementary material exist, you see? Wikipedia is usually quite accurate, at least in my discipline (communication). I don't allow citation to wikipedia in papers, but I encourage use of several wikipedia pages as supplements in intro comm. Also, there is no "IF" about it, its in textbooks, like the one I linked. — Preceding unsigned comment added by VirtualSwayy (talk • contribs)

'''see Admin Instructions. "commenting on other users rather than the article is also considered disruptive."''' And... If a statement could be more than 100% irrelevant to the discussion, this would be. It demonstrates another fallacy (non-sequitur) while simultaneously demonstrating one of the most intellectually lazy rhetorical techniques that exits, paralipsis, where you imply that I made false statements, but you don't actually say it, so you don't have to make any actual argument. — Preceding unsigned comment added by VirtualSwayy (talk • contribs)

Well if the ones I linked above didn't convince you, there are countless others, so...

HERE ARE MORE SECONDARY SOURCES ALL REPLUTABLE AND NOT BY HONEYCUTT:
* This textbook not written by honeycutt * Another textbook not written by Honeycutt * This Encyclopedia Entry not written by Honeycutt * This book chapter not by honeycutt * This review by Jim Abbot of Honeycutt's award-winning book

HERE ARE MORE PRIMARY RESEARCH STUDIES NOT BY HONEYCUTT:
There are A LOT more since he has been cited 4100+ times, but here is a sampling including this

recent article in the NCA's most prestigious journal.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10417940903006057

https://search.proquest.com/openview/e3db9d4595a9fe3984b3459cb084d84e/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=2029838

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01463373.2011.597273

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1041794X.2014.939295

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0093650212438392

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.2190/F760-0671-2402-K65N

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/08934215.2014.936563

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1041794X.2012.726688

https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-4899-2623-4_15

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.2190/IC.30.2.d

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.2190/IC.32.1.c

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1300/J082v53n03_04

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.2190/IC.32.4.b

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0276236616683897

https://proa.ua.pt/index.php/jdmi/article/view/913

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1348/014466610X524263


 * Delete – this is based entirely on primary sources, and there don't appear to be any reliable, secondary sources that discuss this subject. Fails WP:GNG. – bradv  🍁  01:10, 18 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Comment - The argument by User:VirtualSwayy that "Deleting this topic would harm many communication undergraduate and graduate students" is nonsense. Either the topic is discussed in Communication Theory textbooks, or it is not discussed in Communication Theory textbooks.  If it is discussed in the textbooks, it will still be in them after the article is deleted.  If it is not in the textbooks, then it is outside the usual scope of study.  If it is being studied because it is in Wikipedia but not in the textbooks, then it is original research, which is a misuse of Wikipedia, and is not notable.  I have not reviewed whether the article should be kept.  Robert McClenon (talk) 03:32, 18 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Comment - At least one statement by User:VirtualSwayy is clearly true. They say that they created an account to object to the deletion.  That is true.  Robert McClenon (talk) 03:34, 18 June 2020 (UTC)
 * REPLY: If a statement could be more than 100% irrelevant to the discussion, this would be. Thanks for lowering the bar even further with this 2 for 1. It demonstrates another fallacy (non-sequitur) while simultaneously demonstrating one of the most intellectually lazy rhetorical techniques that exits, paralipsis, where you imply that I made false statements, but you don't actually say it, so you don't have to make any actual argument. — Preceding unsigned comment added by VirtualSwayy (talk • contribs)


 * Delete a muddy mess. Xxanthippe (talk) 07:25, 18 June 2020 (UTC),


 * Delete. Xxanthippe couldn't have said it better: a muddy mess. – Majavah talk &middot; edits 17:31, 19 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Delete - The topic is probably notable, but significant portions of the article are incomprehensible. This is one of the clearer cases where an article should be blown up and started over.  The collapsed argument by the SPA and the article have more or less the same quality.  This does not mean that the SPA is a suckpoppet, but it may mean that the topic attracts this sort of rhetoric.  Robert McClenon (talk) 19:56, 19 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Delete I was drawn to this discussion by the related AfD on James M. Honeycutt.  The article here does not make a convincing case for notability.  I am skeptical that it does hold, and in any case WP:TNT applies.  Comment that the WP:BLUDGEON wielded by the SPA (and interaction with wikipedia software) is making the discussion a bit difficult to navigate. Russ Woodroofe (talk) 07:13, 21 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Strong delete. As best as possible I've put aside my primary gut reaction at these broadcast sprays of academic logorrhea, in the article and here and at James M. Honeycutt.  That reaction is impatience with my time being wasted which gradually ripens into mild disgust.  Just being real.  It reflects badly on LSU for one thing.  With more objective coolness I believe there might be a valid idea struggling to breathe under this suffocating pile of COI & broken ideas & undeveloped writing skills but it's nobody's job to go in there and rescue it.  --Lockley (talk) 19:16, 22 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Delete The very first sentence (Imagined interactions (IIs) are a type of social cognition and mental imagery grounded in symbolic interactionism in which individuals imagine conversations with significant others for a variety of purposes) is both the antithesis of clarity and a copyvio of Honeycutt and Ford (2001). Opaque copyvio continues with beneficial mechanism for operationalizing the study of intrapersonal communication. Then we get Honeycutt et al. (1989) discuss how IIs have their theoretical foundation in the work of symbolic interactionists and phenemonologists, including Mead (1934), Dewey (1922) and Schutz (1962). This is lifted from Honeycutt and Ford (2001), with the trivial substitution of "et al." for "and his colleagues". I'd fail a student who wrote a paper so dishonestly. A top-to-bottom rewrite would be necessary to save this article, supposing that the notability case can be made for it, which I doubt. XOR&#39;easter (talk) 22:59, 22 June 2020 (UTC)
 * delete this is a hot combo of really shitty original research and promo. Praxidicae (talk) 23:11, 22 June 2020 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.