Rendezvousing at Familiar and Unfamiliar Places

Abstract

This paper reports a diary study of rendezvousing as performed by university students. The study compares students' performance when meeting at familiar and unfamiliar rendezvous points. It reports various findings that help to set goals for the development of personal navigation and related services at appropriate levels. For example, when meeting at novel rendezvous points, students: (i) fail to meet as initially agreed more frequently; (ii) report more stress and lost opportunity as a result of rendezvousing problems; (iii) change plan during the rendezvous more often; (iv) communicate more about the rendezvous, particularly using text messaging; (v) attribute rendezvousing problems to lack of geographic and travel information more often, and to additional, spontaneous tasks such as ‘popping to the bank’ less often. Meetings at novel rendezvous points are also more likely to include acquaintances and strangers.