Privacy Tendencies and Revealing/Concealing: The Moderating Role of Emotional Competence

In this study, alexithymia was tested as a moderator of the relationship between individual tendencies toward privacy (i.e., personal privacy orientation and anticipation of boundary turbulence) and the decision to reveal and conceal. Using structural equation modeling, results showed that both personal privacy orientation and anticipation of boundary turbulence were positively related to alexithymia. Alexithymia, in turn, moderated the relationship between personal privacy orientation and concealing, anticipation of boundary turbulence and concealing, and personal privacy orientation and revealing. Implications and directions for future research will be discussed.     

Commitment Messages Communicated in Families of Origin: Contributions to Relationship Commitment Attitudes

Despite the wealth of research on relationship commitment, surprisingly little has examined the contributions communication in families of origin makes to perceptions of commitment. Data from a survey of 145 individuals revealed three types of individuals based on reports of commitment-related communication in families of origin: optimist, structural-optimist, and cautious. Results revealed that these three types of individuals differed on their beliefs, models, and expectations about commitment and romantic relationships. The study contributes to our understanding of the developmental origins of perceptions of commitment in relationships and the contributions communication in families of origin makes to those perceptions.     

“Feminism Begins at Home”: The Influence of Mother Gender Socialization on Daughter Career andMotherhood Aspirations as Channeled Through Daughter Feminist Identification

Intercultural communication in contexts

Judith N. Martin and Thomas K. Nakayama, Intercultural Communication in Contexts. Mountain View, CA: Mayfield, 1997.

Communicating in the classroom

Kathleen Kougl, Communicating in the Classroom. Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press, 1997.

Relating: Dialogues and dialectics

Leslie A. Baxter and Barbara M. Montgomery, B.M., Relating: Dialogues and dialectics. New York: Guilford, 1996.     

Connection,Restructuring, and Buffering: How Groups Link Individuals and Organizations

Research examining the individual–organization relationship has largely ignored the linking role of groups. Grounded in Scott, Corman, and Cheney's (1998) structurational model of organizational identification, we analyzed data obtained from members of groups embedded in a large religious organization. Results revealed three primary ways groups link individual members and the organization via identification. The connection function provides members with local copresent linkages to the organization and an environment in which to express their connection/relationship to the organization. The restructuring function enables members to restructure conflicting individual and organizational identity structures. The buffering function enables members to disidentify with a portion of the organizational identity and still maintain a sense of organizational identification.     

Encountering the Ethics of Engaged Scholarship

This commentary offers reflections on the preceding articles and frames ethics of community engagment by (organizational) communication scholars in terms of broader issues about the enterprises of applied research. The brief essay considers how we approach and position ethics (writ large) in our work and then offers the following dialectics for consideration: openness versus protection, privilege versus equality, distance versus empathy, listening versus advising, and representation versus intervention.     

Military Wives' Stressful Disclosures to Their Deployed Husbands: The Role of Protective Buffering

This study combines the fever model with communication privacy management to examine the conditions under which military wives are likely to disclose their family stressors or engage in protective buffering with their deployed husbands. Military wives (N =105) whose husbands were deployed and who had at least one child completed a web-based survey about the communication of family stressors during deployment. Protective buffering was associated with negative health symptoms, and disclosure was related to marital satisfaction. Wives' perceptions that their husbands were in dangerous situations as well as their perceptions that husbands were supportive of their disclosures were both related to protective buffering and disclosure.     

Tsunami Warning Dissemination in Mauritius

Post-disaster communication surveys are important in order to improve future disaster warning efficiency. Mauritius, a small island nation in the western Indian Ocean, was in the path of the tsunami of December 2004 but experienced only minimal wave impact. This is fortunate because the results of this survey show very slow warning dissemination through the population. Television and radio were equally effective in disseminating the initial warning information, but television far exceeded radio's reach as regards mass awareness and information seeking in the hours after the danger had passed. The interpersonal communication of warning information was minimal, and the warning messages provided insufficient and, it seems, inaccurate information.     

Communication research on a broader age: An introduction to the special forum on funded research in communication

This essay introduces the special forum on funded research in communication. It briefly discusses the relationship of funded research with theoretical and methodological development in the communication discipline and the impact of receiving grant support on the professional life of an academic and on collegiality, resources, and university recognition for a department of communication. It also addresses the potential impact of funded research for strengthening the role and visibility of the communication discipline in the social sciences, and for increasing the impact of communication scholarship on policy.     

Crisis communication in racial issues

On November 17, 1998, three individuals were detained by local police in Lubbock, Texas for attempting a pigeon drop scam in a Wal Mart parking lot. The three suspects were the head coach, an assistant coach, and the husband of the head coach from the visiting Hampton University women's basketball team. The three were eventually proven innocent and released, but not before a crisis involving racial overtones had been initiated. The case study explores the crisis management responses of Texas Tech University and Lubbock, Texas and the implications for the study of crises involving race.     

Communication Skills,Social Support,and Burnout among Advocates in a Domestic Violence Agency

Intimate partner violence affects millions of lives annually. Domestic violence advocates work to alleviate this problem; yet the nature of the work leaves them vulnerable to negative outcomes such as burnout. This study examined the relationships between communication anxiety, communication competence, perceived social support, and feelings of burnout among domestic violence advocates. Results from a survey of 69 individuals recruited from a US domestic violence agency show the combination of communication anxiety, communication competence, perceived emotional support, and perceived informational support accounted for approximately 13% of the variance in advocates' emotional exhaustion and 21% of the variance in advocates' experiences of reduced personal accomplishment. Responses also differ with the advocate's position in the agency. The following recommendations are offered: develop scenario-based communication skills training programs to reduce communication anxiety and increase communication competence, hold regular debriefing meetings to help advocates process their experiences and to receive peer support, and develop formalized mentoring programs that can provide social support for new workers.