The mobile telephone has become the device for true ubiquitous computing: it allows people to communicate anytime and anywhere. Mobile telephones are pervasive; they are seen everywhere in society, in public and private places, and used by different demographic groups. Mobile telephones allow office workers to work outside the office and extend the workplace. They allow family members to keep in touch at all times during the day. They allow children to constantly communicate with their friends and family through voice calls, email, text messaging, and chat. Mobile telephones allow parents to perform multiple tasks in parallel, juggling the duties of home and work. What are the sociological implications of mobile telephones for a household?

This paper is an attempt to answer the question by providing an ethnographic study of parents or other primary caregivers in families with children. Palen and Hughes study five families and their use of the mobile phone for a full week. First, they use a qualitative interview to gather information about each family’s background and activities, schedules, and technology use. Second, they conduct an experimental sampling: at certain intervals during the day, the primary caregivers complete a survey that asks about their current activity, setting, emotion, and use of the mobile phone. Third, a voicemail diary is used, where primary caregivers provide daily anecdotes. Fourth, to quantify mobile phone use, a daily log keeps incoming, outgoing, and missed voice calls.

The paper does not appear to bring any novel contributions or results; it appears to be an extension of previous work from Rakow [1], which Palen and Hughes acknowledge. In fact, most if not all of the results are common sense to the average reader. The work is very qualitative and lacks quantitative analysis to provide some scientific evidence behind its claims. It would have been nice to see some of the statistical analysis of the data from the experimental sampling method (ESM) survey and phone logs that would provide a quantitative characterization of the calling patterns and behavior of primary caregivers and how they differ by role.

The data results could be much better organized qualitatively using tables, as it was difficult to read them. If results were presented in tables, it would be easier to present and compare them with other results of primary caregivers, and similar themes could emerge.

The paper lacks a section about future work meant to extend the current research. Palen and Hughes do not explain what other interesting research problems they want to address within the framework of this work. They also neglect to specify applications of their research and how their ethnography work could be applied to improve communications between the members of a household. One possible line of future research could be to examine the messages that are sent and received through the short message service (SMS) protocol, to find communication patterns that characterize the different types of primary caregivers and their roles.