Oral responses of 180 male and female undergraduates to scenarios containing positive-loving, neutral-informational, and/or negative-rejecting male child communications were obtained. Responses were scored along 25 specific categories, as well as a global rating of acceptance/rejection of child. (Author/JMB)

This study examined the office hour consultation between teaching assistants (TAs) and undergraduates from the participants' viewpoints. A total of 40 consultations involving five TAs from the economics department of a major American university were videotaped and transcribed. After dividing the consultations into three sections, namely initiating…

Three-member groups were formed from students in an introductory college biology course. Each group undertook four problem-solving sessions which were tape-recorded. Transcripts were used to analyze verbal communication behaviors during the sessions. A category system containing four task categories, four negative social emotional categories, and…

Undergraduates (N = 96), divided into 12 groups, first engaged in self-disclosure and consensus exercises and then were required to exchange personal feedback. Feedback was positive or negative in nature and delivered publicly or anonymously. Positive feedback was rated as more credible and produced greater cohesiveness. (Author)

The generally held hypothesis that a client will be more verbally accessible if she thinks her interviewer is like herself was not supported. In fact, the opposite was significantly true. The authors discuss possible reasons for the unexpected results they obtained. (SE)

Ninety-six male students participated in an experiment studying the relationship between reciprocity and compensation in dyadic communication. The subjects were asked to solve a hypothetical problem and, depending on their pretest instructions, were given an orientation toward competition or cooperation with their partners. Time was used to test…

Undergraduates (N = 41) viewed a videotape of role-played problems and responded as though in face-to-face contact with the speakers. Half took the role of counselor and half the role of friend. Analysis of covariance indicated students serving as friends made fewer reflections and gave more advice than those serving as counselors. (Author)

Each of 76 unacquainted pairs of male-female college students was given a popular issue to discuss for five minutes. Self-perceived agency was significantly associated with verbal assertiveness: high-agency persons used fewer indirect statements and fewer passive self-references than low-agency persons. (Author/LHW)

Forty college students of second-year French were used to study the extent to which individual learners exercise initiative in structuring classroom talk. Textual outcomes of four typical tasks for pairs were examined. Interactions were coded in four areas (topic, self-selection, allocation, and sequencing); results showed variation in the extent…

Used a lexical statistics program to analyze conflict and nonconflict discussions of two different groups of college students. Found preliminary evidence for a pattern of greater redundancy and less vocabulary diversity for the discussion groups in conflict. (PD)

Studied one aspect of communication competency: how people express emotions through verbal behavior. Found, among other conclusions, that references to unpleasant emotions outnumber references to pleasant emotions almost two to one. (PD)

Traditionally, group research has focused on outcome rather than process. In order to provide an efficient means of data collection and analysis in group process, the Automatic Vocal Transaction Analyzer (AVTA) system was developed to generate an objective chronography of conversation vocalizations, pauses, turntaking, switching, and…

This study addresses three issues: (1) the influence of proxemic variables (distance, furniture presence) on dyadic interaction; (2) the consistency between measures of self-disclosure; and (3) the applicability of reciprocity and distance-equilibrium views of dyadic interaction. Dyads of male college students were randomly assigned to one of four…