Instructor Credibility as a Mediator of Instructors’ Compulsive Communication and Student Communication Satisfaction in the College Classroom

The purpose of this investigation was twofold: (a) from a dialogic pedagogy perspective, to determine the possible negative association between instructors’ compulsive communication and student communication satisfaction; and (b) using Expectancy Violations Theory as a framework, to test the extent to which instructor credibility mediated the negative association between compulsive communication and student communication satisfaction. We found that students’ perceptions of instructors’ compulsive communication is linked to lower levels of student communication satisfaction. Importantly, results also showed that instructor credibility tempers the negative association between instructors’ compulsive communication and student communication satisfaction.     

Instructor Privacy Management in the Classroom: Exploring Instructors’ Ineffective Communication and Student Communication Satisfaction

The aim of this investigation was twofold: (a) drawing from communication privacy management theory, we wanted to examine the associations between instructors’ ineffective communication (i.e., inappropriate conversations, amount of disclosures) and student communication satisfaction; and (b) we wanted to determine if students’ positive perceptions of instructor nonverbal immediacy mediated the negative influences of instructors’ inappropriate conversations and amount of disclosures on student communication satisfaction. Overall, students reported lower levels of communication satisfaction when instructors engage in inappropriate conversations and frequent disclosures. Based on results, we also concluded that instructor nonverbal immediacy maintains students’ communication satisfaction even when instructors engage in inappropriate conversations or disclose too frequently.     

“Why Aren’t You a Sassy Little Thing”: The Effects of Robot-Enacted Guilt Trips on Credibility and Consensus in a Negotiation

Robots are becoming increasingly popular in social applications and have demonstrated effectiveness in a variety of contexts such as education, health, task management, and other complex cooperative roles. The purpose of this study was to examine human–robot interaction in a nonassistive environment: a negotiation scenario. Specifically, the authors examined what effect message appeals (guilt trip, no guilt trip) and robot agency (principal, agent) had on the negotiation outcomes and perceptions of credibility. Results indicated a significant main effect of agency and an interaction effect between agency and guilt messaging on perceptions of robot credibility such that participants rated a robot agent employing no guilt trips as more credible than one negotiating as principal or one utilizing guilt trips. Neither guilt nor agency had a significant effect on the overall concession of the negotiation task.     

“And That’s a Fact!”: The Roles of Political Ideology,PSRs, and Perceived Source Credibility in Estimating Factual Content in Partisan News

Cable news schedule today is programed with a transition between objective reporting and subjective commentary. With this in mind, we address the question: to what extent does political ideology impact one’s estimation of factual content in the monologue of a partisan news host? Going beyond direct effects, we analyze two moderated mediation models, using news host as moderator and using parasocial relationship and source credibility as parallel mediators. Results show like-minded partisanship with a news host led to higher estimates of factual content, and this effect worked indirectly through credibility perceptions. Additionally, this process occurred more intensely for conservatives.     

Using a theoretical model of communal coping to understand changes in language brokers’ coping patterns: Implications for Latina/o early adolescents’ brokering stress and efficacy

Language brokering occurs when immigrant youth linguistically and culturally mediate for family and members of U.S. mainstream culture. Under some circumstances, brokering can be stressful. Based on a theoretical model of communal coping, this study utilized two waves of survey data from 342 Latina/o sixth- to eighth-grade students to identify different types of copers: (a) communal copers, (b) tentative copers, and (c) declined-ownership copers. Communal copers reported greater brokering stress than tentative brokers in the middle of the year, but not by the end of the year. Communal copers reported greater brokering efficacy than tentative copers in the middle and end of the year. Declined-ownership copers consistently had the lowest brokering stress and moderate brokering efficacy.