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Students from six countries--Australia, Japan, Mexico, Sweden, Taiwan, and the United States--recalled the extent to which their best or worst professors used various forms of communication that have been associated with effective teaching. Across cultures, best professors were perceived to employ more nonverbal expressiveness, relaxed movement, in-class conversation, and out-of-class communication than worst professors. Relative to Japanese and Taiwanese students, Australian and U.S. students perceived their professors to use more nonverbal expressiveness. Students from Australia, Sweden, and the U.S. also perceived their best professors to use more in-class conversation than students from Japan or Taiwan perceived their best professors to use. However, Australian and U.S. students also perceived their best professors to use "less" out-of-class communication than did students from the other four countries. There were also differences in the forms of communication that discriminated between best and worst professors in each culture. For example, nonverbal expressiveness and in-class conversation were the best discriminators for Australian and U.S. students, whereas out-of-class communication and relaxed movement were the best discriminators for Japanese and Taiwanese students.

This study investigates whether perceptions of maintenance behavior in cross-sex friendships vary as a function of romantic intent, biological sex, and uncertainty. Individuals recalled the maintenance behaviors they had used over the past month in a cross-sex friendship characterized by one of the following situations: mutual romance (i.e., both partners want the friendship to turn romantic), strictly platonic (i.e., neither partner wants the friendship to turn romantic), desires romance (i.e., the individual wants romance but fears the friend does not), or rejects romance (i.e., the individual does not want romance but thinks the friend does). Individuals in the mutual romance situation generally reported the most maintenance behavior. Those in the rejects romance and strictly platonic situations reported less routine contact and activity, less flirtation, and more talk about outside romance. Individuals in the rejects romance and mutual romance situations reported the most relationship talk. Sex differences were also found. Finally, individuals who were uncertain about the status of their cross-sex friendship were less likely to report using some types of relational maintenance. These findings underscore the dynamic nature of relational maintenance in cross-sex friendships.

Individuals in temporary task-oriented dyads or groups must manage conflict competently if they hope to be successful in reaching their goals. Thus far, however, research on the associations between conflict styles and communication competence has focused on acquainted dyads, such as relational partners and coworkers, rather than unacquainted dyads assigned to work on tasks. The present study tests the applicability of the competence model of interpersonal conflict to temporary task-oriented dyads. Dyads (N = 100) who had little or no relational history completed a simulated decision-making task that involved choosing two out of four employees to lay off in response to a company's need to downsize. Results indicate people generally perceived the solution-oriented strategy as appropriate and effective. Although people perceived their partners' use of the controlling strategy to be inappropriate, people rated themselves as more effective when they used the controlling strategy. People evaluated nonconfrontational strategies as particularly incompetent.

Explores the combined influence of nonverbal immediacy and verbal person centeredness in the emotional support process. Tests three complementary models in an experiment with participants who disclosed an emotionally upsetting event to a confederate trained to display different levels of nonverbal immediacy and person centeredness. Suggests that nonverbal immediacy and personal centeredness influence perception of what makes for good comforting. (SG)

Considers how various theories of nonverbal adaptation feature behavioral valence and degree of behavioral change as critical elements affecting whether changes in nonverbal intimacy are met with reciprocity or compensation among 100 undergraduate student romantic dyads. Makes comparisons across five conditions: very low intimacy, low intimacy, very high intimacy, high intimacy, and a no change (control) condition. (SG)

Provides a contrastive test of three immediacy-exchange theories: expectancy violations theory; discrepancy arousal theory; and cognitive valence theory. States findings from opposite-sex friend dyads (one of whom was an undergraduate student) failed to find unequivocal support for a single theory. Suggests existing immediacy-exchange theories consider incorporating elements from all three theories and from dialectics theory. (PA)

Finds that instructors who are viewed as expressive, warm, and involved are most likely to be judged (by students viewing instructional videotapes used in distance education courses) as highly competent and that, when instructors are expressive, warm, involved, and articulate, their course content is likely to be judged favorably, especially if they are not overly composed and fluent. (SR)

This study investigated associations among one partner's relational satisfaction and the other partner's style of attachment and emotional communication. Findings from a questionnaire study involving 581 couples showed that participants reported more relational satisfaction when their partners scored high in security and low in dismissiveness and preoccupation. These associations between one's relational satisfaction and the partner's attachment style were partially mediated by how the partner reported communicating emotions. Specifically, participants were less satisfied in relationships with preoccupied partners who reported expressing anger using destructive communication. Participants were less satisfied with dismissive partners who reported using detached emotional communication. Finally, participants were more satisfied with secure partners who reported using prosocial emotional communication. These findings suggest that the often-cited relationship between attachment and relational satisfaction is partially explained by emotional communication. Keywords: Attachment; Emotion; Emotional Communication; Relational Satisfaction DOI: 10.1080/03637750903300254

The Sourcebook of Nonverbal Measures: Going Beyond Words Edited by Valerie Manusov. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, 2005. x + 540 pp. Paper, $55. Scholarship on nonverbal communication has evolved since the [...]

A short-term longitudinal study tested predictions from Rusbult's (1983) investment model. In phase one, individuals in dating relationships rated the quality of their alternatives, as well as their levels of satisfaction, investment, and commitment. In phase two, those who had experienced a relational transgression (sexual infidelity, deception, or third-party dating/flirting) since completing the first questionnaire recalled the communication they had used about a week or two after finding out about their partner's transgression. In phase one, the bases of dependence--satisfaction, investment, and quality of alternatives--predicted commitment. These bases of dependence also predicted communication in phase two. Contrary to some previous work, commitment did not mediate the association between the bases of dependence and communication. Instead, results suggested that the components comprising commitment are directly associated with communication following relational transgressions.

Communication is critical for maintaining satisfying relationships. As Dindia (2003) put it, 'to maintain the quality of a relationship, one must maintain the quality of the communication' (p. 1). Research [...]

A recent set of studies demonstrated that people evaluate their own and their partner's social skills differently as a function of attachment style. The present study extends this work by examining attachment-stile differences in four conversational skills--expressiveness, composure, other-orientation, and interaction management--as rated by observers. To test for attachment-style differences, romantic couples were videotaped as they discussed relational problems or conflict issues. Based on a pretest, one of the romantic partners was targeted as representative of the secure, dismissive, fearful avoidant, or preoccupied attachment style. Two dimensions related to attachment--anxiety and avoidance--were also investigated in regard to their relations with conversational skills. Results suggest that the behavioral profiles largely reflect attachment theoretical assumptions for secures, dismissives, and fearful avoidants, and to a lesser extent, preoccupieds. Keywords: Conversational Skill; Attachment; Communication Competence

Two studies focused on attachment-style differences in people's social skills. Study 1 had a sample of 237 students who completed questionnaires assessing their own attachment styles and social skills (based on Riggio's six dimensions of social skill). Study 2, which focused on partner-reports, used data from 258 couples to determine whether people's perceptions of a partner's social skill would vary based on the partner's self-reported attachment style. The results revealed attachment-style differences in various social skills across self-and partner-reports; however, these differences were generally less robust for partner-reports. Differences in self-reported social skill were consistent with Bartholomew's two-factor conceptualization of attachment. Dismissive and fearful individuals rated themselves as relatively antisocial and unexpressive, in line with their negative models of others; preoccupied and fearful individuals rated themselves as overly sensitive, in line with their negative models of self. Preoccupied individuals were also perceived as the most socially sensitive by their partners, and across all the analyses, secures were ostensibly the most socially skilled. KEY CONCEPTS attachment, social skills, communication, emotion, expressiveness, sensitivity

This study examined observers' perceptions of nine different types of touch (including a 'no touch' control condition) used in cross-sex relationships between coworkers. Results showed that face touch sends particularly strong relational and emotional messages. A soft touch in the cheek area of the face was seen as signaling more affection, attraction, flirtation, and love than the other types of touch. Face touch was also rated as the most inappropriate and sexually harassing of the nine types of touch examined. Arm around the waist was also rated as showing relatively high levels of attraction and flirtation, as well as inappropriateness and harassment. No touch and handshaking conveyed the most formality. Observers rated women as more affectionate, trusting, happy, and composed than men across the touch conditions. Men, however, were judged to be more attracted to their cross-sex partners than were women. These and other findings are discussed to shed light on the multiple interpretations of touch within the context of relationships between cross-sex coworkers. KEY WORDS: touch, cross-sex relationships, coworker relationships, emotion, sexual harassment.