An interesting direction of practical and theoretical research in communication would be an examination of the extent to which the human mind relies on copying to make sense of things. For example, it’s common to see people repeat things they’ve heard in the news or on talk radio, it’s common for musicians to borrow from the music which influences them in their own compositions, or even for researchers to borrow ideas or methods of other research (perhaps this already is acknowledged in psychology and I just don’t know it). Certainly borrowing and outright copying are different things, but under some circumstances (like in my interest area of copyright and perhaps others) only a small amount of copying can be punished.
If it is true that we as humans naturally engage in borrowing and copying in order to make sense of our world, it would seem that it would open up numerous avenues of research. Finding this strong tie might give greater arguments to the strength of media messages (be they slanted news or violent video games). If we need to borrow in order to enhance our creativity, it would seem that strong owner rights in copyright may hinder future creativity (thus giving firmer grounding to the arguments of Lessig). If we now have greater power to choose the kinds of messages we’re exposed to, and these messages are increasingly numerous, how would this affect the strength or direction of our ideas?
Many questions for a hopefully interesting idea, however certainly in need of research to back it up.