Email has become a common form of interaction between both individuals and groups in the online environment. Based on Buzzanell et al.'s (1996) research of politeness accommodation with telephone messages, this study has investigated politeness accommodation in email. Response rate was high at 81% (n=121). Results indicated that subjects accommodated to verbal markers in the body of a message, and to greetings. Responses to those email messages that included either verbal politeness cues or

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... ctural politeness cues were significantly more polite than responses to those email messages that did not include such cues. This research provides a foundation for explaining issues of relationship forming, communication accommodation in an electronic environment, and discourse analysis in online interaction. Over the course of history, modes of communication have changed drastically. Before widespread literacy, society depended on oral history. With the emergence of new technologies such as the printing press, the telegraph, or the radio that enabled newspapers, the distribution of information sped up considerably. In the last few decades, a rapid diffusion of electronic media has led to a significant field of study: computer-mediated commtinication (CMC). CMC "refers to person-to-person communication . , , over computer networks"