Week Four Post: Chapter 9

One part of this weeks reading that interested me was the stages of relational escalation. The authors of the text offer five stages of relational escalation. The first step is initiating which one could consider as a man asking a woman for her phone number. The second stage is experimenting, which includes gathering information in detail about the person, such as "when is your birthday?" and "Are you a vegetarian?" The third stage is intensifying, which is just a more extreme version of experimenting, like learning how a person thinks and reading body language. The fourth stage is integrating, which is when the two people become more similar as they discover their partner, and their own likes and dislikes. The last stage is bonding which is something that proclaims the two people's affecion, like a wedding.

Week Three Post: Lecture#3

In reading the week three lecture, the most interesting section to me was on chapter eight, defending the self. In this section, it discusses ways that people try to protect the way other people perceive them. A lot of people will say things about how they don't care what people think and some mean it, most don't. There are many different parts to impression management, that includes accounts, facework, and equivocation. Accounts are excuses or justifications made to paron yourself from poor behavoir. Facework is a strategy people use to present themselves to others, such as looking a certain way, or like a certain type of person. Equivocation involves working with others to present yourself a certain way.

Week Three Post: Chapter Eight

In chapter eight’s reading, I thought the section on justification was the most interesting. Justification is when a person doesn’t admit that something was wrong and does not take responsibility. Instead, they try to claim that there were positive affects of the incident. The author provides a few examples, one of which being “I was talking to my ex, but nothing happened so it’s fine.” This is an example of direct minimization justification which is downplaying the incident, like trying to brush it off.

Another example was “I stopped by the hospital to visit my father” as an excuse for being late. This is an example of principled justification which seems to me a sort of “for the greater good” kind of thing. Justifications like this are difficult to be upset about, because if they are valid, who could be mad at someone for being late because they had to visit someone in the hospital?

Week Three Post: Chapter Seven

In chapter seven, I really felt that the concept of sex differences was hit right on the nail by the authors. Sex differences is listed under factors affecting the manner of self-disclosure and the points the authors bring up really rang true for me, and probably everyone who read it. Everybody knows that females like to talk to each other, it’s bonding and advice and a shared sense of womanhood and girls love that sort of thing! My boyfriend once said that a good party has more girls than guys because both guys and girls, like talking to girls. And it’s totally true! The author’s state that women tend to place prerequisites on people they share their feelings with, for example people who are trustworthy and discreet. Men on the other hand, use a status-assertive disclosure style which hides weakness and emphasizes successes. Both of these are really interesting factors and I encourage everyone to think about that next time their in a mixed setting.

Week Three Post: Chapter Six

This week, I thought the concept of ingratiation in chapter six was really interesting, probably because we all know the types of people that showcase these behaviors. There are two types of ingratiation, authentic and illicit. Authentic ingratiation occurs when a person’s primary motivation is to meet the demands of the situation and the desire to be liked, though important, is secondary to other goals. Illicit ingratiation on the other hand is targeted solely at getting something from another person and occurs when people act friendly because they want to attain some instrumental goal, such as a donation or a favor. In everyday life, we often call these type of people “fake.”

A good example of ingratiation, for those of us that like reality tv, are the types of people that are on those shows. There is always someone who says things like “I am not here to make friends, I am here to win.” Those people would be considered authentic ingratiators. The people who are trying to create alliances and who may be sneaky and two faced would be considered illicit ingratiators.

Week 2 Post

In chapter 14, Spitzberg and Cupach describe adaptability as the ability to change behavoirs and goals to meet the needs of an interaction. I think that this really is an important part of communication, and perhaps why a lot of people with poor communication adaptability come off as "weird". When you are talking to someone and what they are saying is irrelevant or not appropriate for the time or place, poor communication adaptability is probably to blame. A good example of this is when young people are with parents, or some older group of people, and sya inappropriate things or use swear words that can offend adults. Another example would be someone who talks about things that are completely irrelevant to the group, especially when they do it in excess.

Week 2 Post

One reason that I wanted to explore the field of interpersonal communication was so that I could argue better. Chapter 14 mentions a few things along those lines, and the one that really caught my attention was communication apprehension. This is defined as having high levels of anxiety over how they may be evaluated in a given situation or how they might behave. I have definitely experienced this before because when I was having relationship problems, I stopped talking about it to my best friend because I felt like she was going to judge me. This only made the situation worse because I didn’t have anyone to talk to.