Attachment styles and the evaluation of comforting responses: A receiver perspective

The current study explored emotional distress and comforting messages from a receiver's perspective. This approach differs from most comforting research, which focuses on the sender's ability to provide comfort. After reading a scenario that depicted a major distressing event or a daily distressing event, subjects selected the Burleson and Samter (1985) comforting strategy that would most alleviate their emotional distress. In an attempt to explain a subject's perceptions of comforting, attachment styles, likelihood of seeking support, and level of emotional discomfort were also assessed. Results indicated that subjects desired a mid‐level comforting response regardless of whether they were distressed over a daily event or major event. This result is counter to the sender oriented comforting research, which suggests that providing higher‐level comforting responses is optimal. Subjects in the death scenario were more upset by the event and more likely to seek social support. Secure attachment subjects desired a significantly higher‐level comforting message than anxious/ambivalent and avoidant individuals. Additionally, females desired a higher level comforting response, were more likely to be upset by the distress, and were more likely to seek support than males.     

Doctoral dissertations in speech: Work in progress, 1952

Prior research on comforting communication from the constructivist perspective has employed a hierarchical system of message analysis to classify different comforting strategies; within this system, messages are scored for the extent to which they explicitly acknowledge, elaborate, and legitimize the feelings of distressed others. The present paper reports two studies assessing the extent to which naive actors' perceptions of comforting strategy sensitivity, effectiveness, and quality correspond with the formal analysis of comforting strategy sophistication embedded in the constructivist hierarchical coding scheme. In the first study, 73 female college students interacted with a female confederate who feigned distress over having recently been dropped by her long‐term boyfriend. These interactions were videotaped and content analyzed; in addition, both the confederate and an experimental observer rated participants' behaviors for sensitivity. Results indicated that participants employing a greater proportion of theoretically sophisticated comforting strategies were perceived as behaving more sensitively toward the confederate. In the second study, 148 college students were presented with lists of preformulated comforting strategies derived from the constructivist hierarchy and were asked to rate these strategies for “sensitivity” and “effectiveness” and to rank order them in terms of overall quality. Results indicated that respondents rated and rank ordered the strategies in a manner very consistent with the constructivist hierarchical ordering of comforting strategy types: The constructivist ordering of the strategies explained over 95% of the variance in respondents' ratings and rank orderings.     

Recipients' criteria for evaluating the skillfulness of comforting communication and the outcomes of comforting interactions

This paper reports on a two-part investigation of people's criteria for evaluating (a) how skillful comforting behavior is, and (b) the outcomes of comforting interactions for distressed persons. In Study 1, individuals were interviewed regarding their experiences in comforting interactions. These interviews, along with previous comforting message research, were used to generate items representing "skillful" comforting behavior and possible outcomes from comforting interactions. These items comprised the questionnaire used in the second study. In Study 2, participants reported on an interaction in which they had been comforted by a friend. Participants rated the comforting behaviors of their friends and the outcomes they experienced following the interaction. In terms of skillfulness of the comfort providers' behavior, five factors emerged: Other Orientation, Problem Solving, Relating, Refraining from General Negativity, and Different Perspective. Three distinct criteria emerged in evaluations of the outcomes of comforting interactions: the recipients' Positive Mood following the comforting, the Empowerment they experienced, and the degree to which they had Stopped Rumination about their problem. Multiple regression analyses revealed the utility of the skillfulness criteria in predicting the outcomes experienced by distressed persons. The results are discussed in terms of theories and research on coping, social support, and comforting messages.     

Effect of Primary Goal on Secondary Goal Importance and Message Plan Acceptability

Prior to speaking, a person may anticipate outcomes of a message. Such outcomes often pertain to the relevance of the message to secondary goals such as impression management or relationship maintenance. Based on expected outcomes, a decision is made to say, to edit, or to withhold a message. This study asks whether anticipating that a message would conflict with a secondary goal affects perceived message acceptability differently when different primary goals are pursued (e.g., comforting, providing feedback). Eight primary goals and four secondary goals were investigated. Findings show that secondary goal importance and the extent to which expected conflict with a secondary goal reduces message acceptability varies across primary goals.     

Media Marathoning and Health Coping

This study uses Grounded Theory to analyze interviews with a dozen individuals who media marathoned while going through a health struggle. The analysis addresses five major themes: engaging in escapism that enables emotional and avoidance coping, regulating cognitive expenditure by embracing challenging or comforting content, being still to heal the body, reducing emotional and cognitive strain by engaging a continuous narrative, and tapering from the marathon when feeling better. Findings suggest that media marathoning can offer beneficial cognitive, emotional, and physical regulatory opportunities for those dealing with health struggles. Furthermore, media marathoning when dealing with a health concern is a strategic and active coping strategy that has potential health benefits.     

A Comparison of Three Approaches to Electronic Media Diaries

This project compared the richness of reporting and reflection of three approaches to electronic media diaries. For 1 week, 145 students were randomly assigned to keep daily diaries about their media use and perceptions of media content using one of three methods: (a) a traditional daily journaling approach conducted online, (b) an experience sampling method (ESM) approach that combined daily journaling with multiple daily message prompts, and (c) an approach that combined online peer-group discussion with online daily journaling. The goal was to determine if the supplementary diary activities yielded more detailed, emotive, and cognitive responses. Diary content was analyzed using traditional manual content analysis and linguistic software. Results indicated that the ESM condition elicited less cognitive- and affective-oriented language than the other conditions. The group discussion condition evidenced some advantage over the diary-only group in terms of number of media channels and specific content mentioned.     

Keeping Our Research Up to Date: Is the Election Cycle Too Fast for Scholarship=

This research scrutinizes 5 background assumptions frequently overlooked by scholars working within the third-person framework. These include: the kind of media influence (general vs. specific) referenced by respondents, the use of general versus specific "other" groups, neglect of likely second-person effects, distinguishing the problem as portrayed from the problem itself, and the potential range of behavioral effects. The study probed the influence of racial cues contained in a news story on estimates of the story's influence on self and others. Participants (n = 152) were presented with a news article conveying information that prostitutes were operating in a local neighborhood and local residents were upset. The study varied 2 experimental factors: the race of the prostitutes (White vs. African American) and the racial composition of the neighborhood residents (minority vs. White). Several important findings emerged from the study. First, manipulated elements of story content had a direct effect on estimates of the portrayal's influence on others. Second, the range of effects attributed to the media included specific factors such as thinking, feeling, problem importance, and harmful impact of the content. In addition to considering media censorship as a possible corrective measure, the study explored the influence of first-, second-, and third-person effects on a broader range of suggested actions, including increased criminal penalties and interpersonal discussion. Third-person "perceptual" effects were found throughout the data; however, they had little discernable effect on intended behaviors. Second-person effects significantly predicted proposed remedial actions and opinion expression. Discussion centers on the prospect of reorienting the third-person framework toward an expanded view of media effects and closer integration with other approaches to mass communication.     

Surprise,Hurt, and Anger as Emotional Responses to Expectancy Violations Following Feedback Messages

ABSTRACT

Using expectancy violations theory, this study examined how the communication of unexpected feedback messages evoke emotional responses. A convenience sample (N = 309) reported instances of unexpected feedback within the last month. Results showed that receipt of the feedback message types were considered moderate-to-high violations. Violation expectedness and valence were negatively associated with the emotional responses, but violation importance was positively associated with the emotional responses. Finally, hurt and anger (but not surprise) were positively linked to perceptions of relational damage between the message sender and receiver. Taken together, our study demonstrates that expectancy violations are connected to emotions and relational outcomes.     

A model of empathic communication

This study examines a path model of empathic communication. Several empathie structures are predicted to influence the process of empathie communication. Results show that humanistic orientation predicted perspective‐taking, which predicted communicative responsiveness, which predicted comforting. Empathie concern and emotional responsiveness were eliminated from the model The parameter estimates and predicted correlations among the remaining variables were all statistically significant (p < .05). In addition, self‐rated comforting and independent ratings correlated at only .51, with the former exhibiting higher correlations with other variable.     

The effective use of fear appeals in persuasive immunization: An analysis of national immunization intervention messages

This paper reports application of a theoretical persuasive health message framework grounded in literature on fear appeals, message design logic, and health persuasion theory to assess the effectiveness of the materials used most frequently by national immunization organizations in the United States. The severity of the problem of inadequate preschool immunization with its associated target audience and barriers is identified. Analysis revealed that national immunization message designers are creating materials most likely to match what health communication research would recommend along the dimension of response efficacy (i.e., showing parents that attaining immunizations is realistic, available, affordable, safe, and effectively prevents specific diseases). However the materials were least likely to match along the dimension of self‐efficacy (i.e., building parents’ beliefs that they have the ability and motivation to perform preventive immunization behavior for their children). Implications for practitioners in developing more effective immunization fear appeals, and suggestions for future research in the area, are addressed in the Conclusion.     

Matching messages to the values underlying value-expressive and social-adjustive attitudes: reconciling an old theory with a contemporary measurement approach

Functional theory defines value-expressive attitudes as attitudes that are formed to aid in the achievement of one's values, and social-adjustive attitudes as attitudes that are formed from the desire to affiliate with others. The current investigation argues that both functions are based in a person's values, with the social-adjustive function being a specific form of a value-expressive attitude. Contemporary approaches to this theory have argued that these attitude functions can be inferred from scores on the self-monitoring scale, thus eliminating the need to measure the values underlying these functions. The current investigation argues that the success of studies using the self-monitoring scale to infer these functions should be due to the covariance of the other-directedness dimension of the scale with the values underlying those attitudes. Overall, the findings of the investigation indicate that the formation of these functional attitudes depends more on the match between the value-content of the persuasive messages and the extent to which the message recipients hold those values than their level of other-directedness. Other-directedness did not covary with the values that underlie value-expressive and social-adjustive attitudes, but did aid in the reception of the social-adjustive message. Thus, the research using the self-monitoring scale to infer functions cannot be fully reconciled with the conceptualizations of value-expressive and social-adjustive attitudes.     

Dichotomous and continuous views of deception: A reexamination of deception ratings in information manipulation theory

Several recent theoretical approaches, including Information Manipulation Theory (IMT), propose that deceptive messages are best understood as varying along two or more dimensions. At the same time, researchers have increasingly moved from dichotomous deception judgments to continuous deception ratings. This paper questions the validity of scaling degrees of deceptiveness along a single dimension, and argues that gradations in message features do not necessarily translate into degrees of deceit. Most conceptual definitions of deception treat deception as a binary construct, and the continuous scaling of perceptions of deceptiveness may confound perceptions of measure features, degrees of moral condemnation, and judgmental confidence with perceptions of deception. A study (N = 194) is reported that replicates previous tests of IMT with both continuous and dichotomous measures of deception. The results show that the data remain consistent with IMT when dichotomous judgments are examined. However, comparing the results from dichotomous and continuous measures, and examining of the distributions of continuous deception ratings qualify previous IMT findings. The implications for measuring deception are discussed.     

Let Me Tell You About My Success: The Implications of Attribution-Based Capitalization Response Messages for Discloser Affect

Capitalization attempts, or the sharing of personal good news, can have positive outcomes for disclosers when met with a skillful response. This study reports on a test of an attribution-based theoretical framework for capitalization response messages. Participants (N = 314) read capitalization response messages created by crossing the causal attribution dimensions of locus, stability, and globality. They rated messages for their anticipated effect on positive and negative affect. Results indicate that messages that make internal attributions for success are rated significantly higher on positive affect and lower on negative affect than messages making external attributions, as are messages making stable versus unstable attributions. The stability dimension moderates the impact of the globality dimension on message ratings. Implications for attribution and social support theories are discussed.     

Abstracts of theses in the field of speech and drama,VI∗

Two studies tested the assumption that relational contexts affect the way people react to messages that hurt their feelings. In the first, the range of responses people have to hurtful messages was explored, and underlying dimensions reflecting the responses were identified. Participants’ reactions were characterized by three broad dimensions: active verbal responses (e.g., attacking the other, defending the self, asking for an explanation), acquiescent responses (e.g., crying, apologizing), and invulnerable responses (e.g., ignoring the message, laughing). Analyses indicated that people who felt extremely hurt tended to react more often by acquiescing than those who were less hurt. Abo, those who felt the impact of hurt on their relationship was relatively low responded more often with invulnerability than those who felt the impact was high. In the second study, the association between people's reactions to hurt and the quality of their relationship with the person who hurt them was examined, as was the influence of particular types of relationships (e.g., those between family members or romantic partners) on individuab’ responses to hurt. Among other findings, the results suggested that relational satisfaction was positively associated with active verbal responses and negatively correlated both with the degree of experienced hurt and the perceived impact of the hurtful message on the relationship. Further, hurtful messages from family members tended to elicit greater feelings of hurt than those from other people—regardless of the closeness, similarity, amount of contact, or level of satisfaction reported by respondents. By comparison, messages from romantic partners had a greater effect on participants’ relationships than did those from individuab involved in family or non‐family/non‐romantic relationships.     

Planning Intercultural Interaction: Extending Anxiety/Uncertainty Management Theory

This article responds critically to a recent article by Lemieux and Tighe (Communication Research Reports, 21, 144–153, 2004) in which the authors conclude that recipients of comforting efforts prefer messages that exhibit a moderate rather than high level of person centeredness. It is argued that an erroneous assumption made by Lemieux and Tighe about the status of “receiver perspective” research on the comforting process led to faulty interpretations of the data and unwarranted conclusions about recipient preferences regarding comforting messages. Alternative interpretations of Lemieux and Tighe's data are presented; these are guided by the extensive previous research that has assessed evaluations and outcomes of comforting messages.     

The cruel optimism of casual games: neocolonialism,neoliberalism, and the valorization of play

Casual games disrupted the games industry, but not in ways commonly believed. What if we left behind the hardcore vs. casual games dichotomy to reveal that casual gameplay and casual game development have extended the neoliberal and neocolonial logic of the industry? Casual games, in terms of design and industry practices, remind us that there is nothing inherently liberating about play. Rather, the design and development practices of casual games should be understood as an extension and acceleration of neoliberal and neocolonial logics. Casual gameplay and casual game development pull us within processes of cruel optimism. These deeply political economic processes endanger free play and creativity and therefore are obstacles to the flourishing of gamers and game developers as free subjects. In this neoliberal and neocolonial game market, cruel optimism is enticing because casual gameplay and game development emerge as powerful actors and practices in a context where the state has globally failed in the distribution of hope.     

An assessment of methodological options for investigating the development of persuasive skills across childhood

This study compared two fundamentally different approaches to assessing the development of persuasive skills in children: asking them to generate messages versus having them select from preformulated messages or strategies. Also investigated was the approach of asking children to indicate their rationale for choosing a particular message. Using criteria of showing a developmental progression with age and positive correlation with social cognitive measures presumed to be relevant to persuasive skills, the present study suggests more success with message generation than with selection of preformulated messages. Elicitation of the rationale may prove a useful supplement to either of the former approaches.     

A study of the factors relative to the incidence of cleft palate births from 1945 through 1949 in San Bernardino county

This study investigated the influence that speaker characteristics other than dimensions of source credibility may have in the formation of listeners’ impressions of speaker credibility. It was found that the responses followed a simple information averaging model in about 80% of all cases. For the remaining 20% of the listeners, however, there was a significant interaction between traits. This mixed effect suggests caution in the interpretation of results of credibility studies. It was found further that all positive and negative source credibility dimensions can be treated safely as equal in weight, except for the negative pole of the Trustworthiness dimension; an untrustworthy speaker, regardless of his other qualities, was viewed as a questionable message source.     

Effect of verbal aggressiveness on the perceived importance of secondary goals in messages

In face‐to‐face interaction, speakers often pursue secondary goals such as not hurting the other's feelings. Two studies investigated the effect of trait verbal aggressiveness (VA) on the importance of such goals. In both studies, persons higher in VA were relatively less likely to judge messages unacceptable for the reason that the message would offend or hurt the hearer. Study 1 also found that high VAs are less likely to consider messages unacceptable because the message conflicts with their principles and less likely to report chronic secondary goals to be supportive or maintain a positive relationship. In Study 2, the effect of VA on the situated importance of a goal to not offend or hurt the other depended on the situation. The implications for the manner in which high VAs anticipate the outcomes of message are considered.     

Anger,fear, uncertainty,and attitudes: a test of the cognitive-functional model

The cognitive-functional model of discrete negative emotions and attitude change (CFM; Nabi, 1999) attempts to bridge the theoretical gap between “emotional” and “rational” approaches to persuasion by focusing on how emotions motivate attention to and processing of persuasive messages. As a first test of the CFM, this study explored the effects of 2 emotions, anger and fear, and 2 levels of expectation of message reassurance, certainty and uncertainty, on attitudes toward domestic terrorism legislation. Results supported a main effect for emotion type, suggesting that anger promotes deeper information processing than fear, and a main effect for reassurance certainty level, with uncertainty promoting deeper information processing. The expected interaction between emotion type and reassurance expectation level was not found. Implications of these findings for the model and persuasion research generally are discussed.