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Claude E. Shannon (1916-2001) and Warren Weaver (1894-1978)

15 January, 2016 - 09:14

Claude E. Shannon received his B.S. from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and his Ph.D. from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Shannon worked for the National Research Council, the National Defense Research Committee, and Bell Telephone Laboratories, where he developed the mathematical theory of communication, now known as information theory, with Warren Weaver. Shannon went on to teach at MIT until his death in 2001. During his lifetime Shannon was awarded the Leibmann Prize, Ballantine Medal, Who's Who Life Achievement Prize, and the Kyoto Prize (“Claude Elwood Shannon”, 2002).

Warren Weaver received his B.S. and Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin. Weaver worked as faculty at Throop College, California Institute of Technology, University of Wisconsin, and served in World War One. Weaver was also an active member of the Rockefeller Foundation, Sloan-Kettering Institute for Cancer Research, Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, and Salk Institute for Biological Studies, serving in many leadership roles. He was awarded UNESCO's Kalinga Prize before his death in 1978 (Reingold, 2000).

Shannon and Weaver significantly contributed to the systematic approach to the study of communication. Both theorists were engineers who sought to explain information exchange through cybernetic processes. They were the first to effectively model information, as they sought to explain how to attain precise and efficient signal transmissions in the realm of telecommunications. In their theory of information, Shannon and Weaver (1949) showed that the need to reduce uncertainty motivates individual’s communication behavior. This concept was later extended by Berger and Calabrese (1975) in the development of URT.

Information theory provided the connections from information to uncertainty and uncertainty to communication that facilitated the development of URT. “Shannon & Weaver’s (1949) approach stressed the conclusion that information is the number of messages needed to totally reduce uncertainty” (Heath & Bryant, 2000, p. 145). Individuals have a desire to reduce uncertainty and they are able to fulfill this need by increasing information. Individuals increase information through communication (Shannon & Weaver, 1949). These concepts are further explored in the examination of information-seeking strategies in URT.