WORKSHEET : COMMUNICATION THEORIES

1. Expectancy Violation Theory

1. Assumption – people make predictions about nonverbal behavior.

2. Territoriality – person’s ownership of an area or object.

3. Personal distance - spatial zone of 18 inches to 4 feet, reserved for family and friends.

4. Arousal -  increased or attention when deviations from expectations occur.

5. Interactional expectations - an individual’s ability to carry out the interaction.

2. Social Exchange Theory

1. Dispositional matrix – the beliefs you have about relationships.

2. Behavioral Sequence – a series of actions designed to achieve a goal.

3. Outcome – whether people continue in a relationship or terminate it.

3. Uncertainty Reduction Theory

1. Reactivity searching – a passive strategy involving watching a person doing something.

2. Disinhabition searching – a passive strategy involving watching a person’s natural or uninhabited behaviour in an informal environment.

3. Relational uncertainty – a lack of certainty about the future and status of a relationship

4. Uncertainty avoidance – an attempt to avoid ambiguous situations

4. Social Penetration theory

1. Social penetration – process of bonding that moves a relationship from superficial to more intimate.

2. Orientation stage – stage of social penetration that includes revealing small parts of ourselves

3. Personal idioms – private, intimate, expressions stated in a relationship

5. Group think

1. Task-oriented groups – sets of individuals whose main goal is to work toward completing jobs assigned to them

2. Problem solving group – sets of individuals whose main task is to make decisions and provide policy recommendations.

3. Concurrence seeking – efforts to search out group consensus

4. Illusion of invulnerability – belief that the group is special enough to overcome obstacles.

5. Belief in the inherent morality of the group – assumption that one group members are thoughtful and good; therefore, the decisions they make will be good.

6. Closed-mindedness – a group’s willingness to ignore differences in people and warnings about poor group decisions.

7. Out-group stereotypes – stereotyped perceptions of group enemies or competitors.

8. Collective rationalization – situation in which group members ignore warnings about their decisions.

9. Pressures on dissenters – direct influence on group members who provide thoughts contrary to the group’s.

10. Whistle-blowing – process in which individuals report unethical or illegal behaviors or practices to others. Conscientious objectors – Group members who refuse to participate because it would violate personal conscience.

6. Symbolic Interaction Theory

1. Self-fulfillng prophecy - a prediction about yourself causing you to behave in such a way that it comes true.

2. Looking-glass self - our ability to see ourselves as another sees us.

3. Pygmalion effect - living up to or down to another expectations of us.

4. Role taking - the ability to put oneself in another’s place.

7. Spiral of silence theory

1. Public opinion - attitudes and behaviors expressed in public in order to avoid isolation.

2. Quasi-statistical sense - Personal estimation of the strength of opposing sides on a public issue.

3. Pluralistic ignorance - mistaken observation of how most people feel.

4. Hard core - group(s) at the end of the spiral willing to speak out at any cost