Examining condom use self‐efficacy and coping in sexual situations

This investigation involves the examination of college students' condom self‐efficacy (knowledge and skills regarding condom use) and coping strategies in sexual situations. Results indicate that although students report high condom efficacy, efficacy is weakly correlated with actual condom use. Overall, efficacy is weakly correlated with coping styles in sexual situations. In general, students are opting for non‐communicative ways of coping (e.g., avoidance) in sexual situations as opposed to communicative ways (e.g., discussion with partner) of coping. However, those who report “always” using a condom use communicative coping strategies more frequently than non‐communicative coping strategies. Efficacy is positively related to communicative coping styles versus non‐communicative coping styles. Marital partners differ from unmarried couples in that they use more “planning ahead” coping strategies. Discussion and implications follow.     

非语言交际行为略论

作为人际交往的一种手段,非语言交际行为是跨文化交际研究的一部分。外语课堂教学是教师与学生之间展开语言与非语言交际的双向互动过程,教师的体态、语调和情感等非语言交际行为对外语教学具有独特的作用,其恰当的运用可以使课堂教学更加生动有趣,富有艺术魅力。本文将着重阐述非语言交际的行为特征与交际功效及其在外语教学中的应用实践。     

Yer Doin’ it Wrong: How NOT to Interact with Vendors,Publishers, or Librarians

Three librarians who have extensive experience working in libraries or for publishers, vendors, or consortia presented an informal discussion on librarian–vendor relationships. The audience was encouraged to participate. Problems were articulated; speakers and audience members contributed suggestions for better approaches or behaviors when handling difficult situations.     

Communication as a Distinct Mode of Explanation Makes a Difference

This study introduces the communicative ecology model of successful aging (CEMSA). The CEMSA is predicated on the belief that individuals have agency over the aging process and, through communicative practices, construct ecologies within which they are able to age more successfully. According to the model, uncertainty about aging stimulates affective and communicative responses, and, in turn, perceived efficacy to manage growing older. These feelings of efficacy are hypothesized to determine the judgment that one is aging successfully. Hypotheses were tested via structural equation modeling using data from 458 middle-aged and older New Zealanders. Three of seven communicative behaviors investigated had significant indirect effects on successful aging via affect and/or efficacy. This study concludes by suggesting a future research agenda and theoretical refinements relating to the role of uncertainty which, although predictive of affect and efficacy, was less effective as a predictor of communicative behavior.     

Beverly LaHaye and the double bind: Rhetorical strategies on a conservative women's radio show

All female speakers must deal with the societal “double bind” that insists both that they be feminine and that they be effective speakers, when effective speaking is usually defined by masculine norms. The conservative woman speaker feels the double bind most acutely, because she generally has even less option to appear unfeminine. This paper examines the rhetoric of one conservative woman rhetor: Beverly LaHaye, president of Concerned Women for America. LaHaye's daily radio show is the focus of this examination, which explores the rhetorical strategies she uses to deal with the double bind and some potential implications of those strategies.     

Implicit theories of communicative competence: The semantics of social behavior

Observers evaluating the competence of communicators use both observed behaviors and traits inferred from these behaviors in their evaluation. In order to understand the process by which these evaluations are made, the manner in which the beliefs about trait/behavior relationships that underlie this process must be understood. Based on analysis of judgments of prototypical “communicators” of different skill levels and of actual people, trait/behavior relationships are, with one exception, similar across competence level and communicative situation.     

Getting others to help: The effectiveness of professional uniforms in charitable fund raising

This research contends that prospective donors to charitable organizations impute topic specific expertise to spokespersons who wear professional uniforms. The attribution of topic specific expertise, in turn, strengthens intentions to assist charities. In three experiments, prospective donors listened to public service announcements in which a female spokesperson solicited donations to a crime stoppers program or a leukemia research fund. In study 1, the spokesperson wore either topic relevant uniforms or a generic business suit. Participants in the uniform conditions reported stronger intentions to help than those in the generic conditions. In study 2, the spokesperson wore either topic relevant or topic irrelevant uniforms. Participants in the topic relevant conditions reported stronger intentions and larger monetary pledges than those in the topic irrelevant conditions. The effects of topic relevancy on intentions were more pronounced for the leukemia research fund than for the crime stoppers program suggesting that the nurse's uniform may have been more appropriate for female speakers than the sheriff's uniform. In study 3, the spokesperson who wore topic relevant uniforms was rated as more knowledgeable and socially attractive than the spokesperson who wore topic irrelevant uniforms. The communicative import of uniforms and the utility of developing institutional clothing for charitable organizations are discussed.     

An Examination of Relational Uncertainty,Romantic Intent,and Attraction on Communicative and Relational Outcomes in Cross-Sex Friendships

This investigation explored the impact of relational uncertainty and its correlates (i.e., attraction and romantic intent) on cognitive, communicative, and behavioral outcomes in cross-sex friendships. Participants included 352 people who reported on a current cross-sex friendship. Hierarchical regression analyses indicated that social attraction increased relational satisfaction while relational uncertainty decreased relational satisfaction. Further, social attraction decreased topic avoidance while romantic intent and relational uncertainty increased topic avoidance. Finally, social attraction increased the use of relationship talk, routine contact and activity, and emotional support maintenance behaviors, while relational uncertainty decreased the use of these maintenance behaviors. This study provides researchers with a starting point for understanding the consequences associated with interpersonal attraction, romantic intent, and relational uncertainty in cross-sex friendships.     

The significance of humanistic rhetoric in British public address

This study sought to answer the following questions: (1) What specific verbal and nonverbal behaviors are associated with the initiation of communicative interactions; and (2) Do these verbal and nonverbal behaviors vary according to the degree of acquaintanceship of the participants in the greeting situation.     

How Students Research: Implications for the Library and Faculty

This paper presents qualitative findings about the search behaviors and research habits of students interviewed at six college and university campuses in the US. Our findings suggest that students’ strategies are influenced by both their non-academic search experiences as well as the broader academic context of their research tasks. Their behaviors suggest an on-going negotiation of these influences, evidenced by the ways they incorporate Google into their research strategy while still closely adhering to faculty instruction for using library resources. Students bring a strong sense of self-reliance to the research process, yet they still experience many barriers and pain points accessing library resources. We have included recommendations for librarians and faculty who, by better understanding the journey of an academic researcher, can work in concert to reduce the barriers and increase the success of students’ research efforts.     

Doctoral dissertations in speech: Work in progress, 1962

Human communication research has identified and investigated numerous aspects of interpersonal transactions, but has largely ignored the process by which people terminate these encounters. Through controlled observation and laboratory testing, this study sought answers to the following questions: (1) What specific verbal and nonverbal behaviors are associated with the termination of communicative exchanges; and (2) Do these verbal and nonverbal termination behaviors vary according to the situational and relational constraints that bind two communicators. Twenty‐five behavior styles were scrutinized during eighty interviews. Results indicated that behavioral regularity attends leave‐taking—signalling inaccessibility and signalling supportiveness.     

The selection and preparation of university of Chicago round table participants

The amount of improvement that takes place in stutterers’ speech as a result of a two semester therapeutic program was objectively evaluated by means of tape recordings. The results indicate that the stutterers did not show improvement either in the fluency of their speech nor in the overall severity of their stuttering. Whatever the reasons for this lack of improvement it seems reasonable to propose that it is by using such objective criteria as tape recordings that scientifically minded speech pathologists will be able to accurately estimate the worthwhileness of a particular stuttering therapy program.     

“I never felt more uncomfortable in my life”: University students' discursive constructions of “the lesbian convention”

In this paper, we draw from the body of theories on the discursive construction of prejudice to examine the communicative strategies that university students employ to manage their talk about lesbian women who visited their campus during a women's music festival. We found that, although students used a number of strategies that communicate heterosexism subtly, the students relied more often on strategies that communicate heterosexism in blatant ways‐a finding that contradicts much of what has been written about the discursive construction of prejudice. We theorize that these findings are, in part, due to the methods we used to gather data: No researcher was present during the discussions. We conclude that this methodology may be useful for teaching students the powerful nature of discourse in the perpetuation of prejudice.     

Bullying as a Display of Social Dominance Orientation

The study employed Social Dominance Theory in a communicative assessment of bullying in secondary education. Participants were 189 college students who completed a survey about their bullying perpetration in secondary school (physical victimization, verbal victimization, social manipulation, and attacks on property) and their current propensity to accept social hierarchy myths (social dominance orientation). Social dominance orientation was correlated positively with all four types of bullying behavior. Moreover, bullies’ sex moderated the relationships between social dominance orientation and physical forms of bullying (physical victimization, attacks on property). For communication scholars assessing bullying, these findings propose that this single variable (social dominance orientation) be included when addressing the psychological underpinnings of bullying behaviors.     

Stereotype reduction through humor and accommodation during imagined communication with older adults

Ageism can generate conflict and harm well-being. Our paper integrates the Aging Stereotypes in Interaction model with intergroup contact theory to predict how communicative elements mediate the effect of intergenerational contact on warmth and competence stereotypes of older adults as a group. Students (N?=?288) were randomly assigned to imagine having a conversation with an older adult in one of six experimentally manipulated contact conditions: a competent/incompetent older woman, a sociable/unsociable older woman, or a moral/immoral older woman. Participants’ stereotypes of older adults were affected by the characteristics of their communication partner, and this effect was mediated by specific communication behaviors imagined by the participant for two of the three trait dimensions. For perceptions of competence, overaccommodation was the key mediator. For perceptions of sociability, the key mediator was humorous communication. These mediators represent an expansion in how we understand not just the outcomes of intergroup contact, but also the communicative mechanisms through which it occurs.     

Mediator communicative competence

In this paper we report on a research program investigating a model of mediator communicative competence in a divorce mediation context. The theory holds that more successful mediators quickly define specific role relationships during mediation through the use of distance, coherence and structuring mediation strategies, and they use these strategies at times that encourage constructive, and discourage destructive, interaction patterns. Data from sessions of actual divorce mediations (in ten of which agreement was reached and in ten of which no agreement was reached) indicated that structuring and reframing strategies and tactics discriminated most between the two conditions, particularly in response to disputant bolstering and integrating negotiation strategies.     

Self‐handicapping orientation and tendencies toward verbal aggressiveness

This study explored tendencies toward verbal aggressiveness by individuals who differ in the extent to which they engage in face saving strategies. Two‐hundred ten participants completed the Self‐Handicapping and Verbal Aggressiveness Scales. Results indicated that differences exist between high and moderate, and law self‐handicappers on their tendencies toward verbal aggressiveness. Participants who reported using more self‐handicapping behaviors (highs and moderates) reported higher levels of verbal aggressiveness than low self‐handicappers. The results suggest that verbal aggressiveness may be considered as a self‐handicapping strategy for those higher in self‐handicapping orientation.     

What Structures?

This article examines how the topic of an ethnically diverse workforce can become an organizational problem (or not) in private media companies. The study is based on interviews with Human Resources managers and persons responsible for diversity issues at these companies. This article favors a communicative approach by relating structures to agency through the concept of expectation. This is in contrast to the bulk of media research, which considers structures as something fixed and objective in determining organizational action. By exploring the expectations structures we can see which expectation patterns condition organizational communication. As a result, the main pattern of migrant background as adding value to the organization (or not) could be revealed as a guiding distinction in organizational communication about diverse workforces.     

Patient and Partner Strategies for Talking about Lifestyle Change Following a Cardiac Event

Heart patients are frequently advised to make lifestyle changes and communication with a romantic partner can help or hinder adoption of heart healthy behaviors. However, talking about lifestyle change can have both positive and negative meanings and this can create dilemmas for couples. We engaged in an interpretive analysis of interviews with 25 patients and 16 partners to identify the ways they managed the meanings of lifestyle change talk. Their communicative strategies included rationing talk, saying it nicely and framing it cooperatively. Each strategy had advantages and disadvantages as well as optimal conditions. We also identified interpretive lenses that shaped the meaning of talk, including legitimacy, patience, emphasizing the positive, moderation, benefits for both people, and perceived compliance. Finally, environmental resources (such as household patterns and communication with the social network) contextualized the meaning of talk. We proposed a model of the interrelated influence of communication, interpretation, and environment on the meanings of talking about lifestyle change.