The history of communication research in the United States is reviewed in this paper through an extensive look at the lives of four men who made significant contributions to the field: Harold Lasswell, Kurt Lewin, Paul Lazarsfeld, and Carl Hovland. The pattern of institute formation in the social sciences is briefly reviewed to explain the…

Because of the varied interests of the people involved in intercultural communication, there is little agreement over the definition of that concept. For this reason, no theories of intercultural communication exist; rather, the focus of recent writings in the field has been on a number of "sensitizing concepts" that provide a framework…

A study to determine the communication needs and activities of a variety of organizations was conducted by interviewing representatives of ten organizations ranging in size from a staff of two to an international staff of 25,000 persons. The in-depth interviews were designed to gain information about the nature of the organization and the…

The 29 editorial board members of three communications journals were asked to indicate what criteria they used to evaluate and select the manuscripts submitted to their journals for publication. The 16 people who responded indicated six things that they require in manuscripts: a strong introduction that clearly and concisely states the conceptual…

This paper provides a comprehensive overview of the "state of the art" of communication research in Asia. An analysis of the problems of communication research reveals that growth in the field is slow, due to such factors as lack of professionally trained researchers, absence of financial, human, and physical facilities to support…

This study reports on two investigations designed to determine the generalizability of source credibility scales for immediate superiors across organizational contexts. Semantic differential-type scales that have been found to load on factors of course credibility in previous studies were combined to provide an item pool for this investigation. In…

Argues against the laws-system-rules trichotomy which Cushman and Pearce use to organize theoretical options in the communication field, and offers in place of the laws-rule-systems trichotomy a multilevel analytic framework for organizing theoretical alternatives in communication. (Authors)

Concepts basic to designing and implementing change (including instructional change) are defined. A model for analyzing these concepts is presented which involves four variables: (1) configurational relationships between innovator and adopter systems; (2) linkages between them; (3) environment of the change situation; and (4) resources available…

Provides strong support for the hypothesis that as communication reticence increases, expectations of success in communication situations decreases. Investigates the predictive utility of employing multiple measures of reticence as compared to single operationalizations. (NKA)

Using "talk time" measures of spouse/stranger interaction styles, tested models of communication. Concluded that (1) a spillover interactionist model best represented the talk time data; (2) sex had no apparent effect on speaking with either a spouse or a stranger; and (3) few personality variables predicted talk time, though relationship…

Presents a critical discussion of some contemporary literature on the language development and communication problems of persons with severe handicaps. States that for meaning to be transmitted from one person to another, a social-interactive context is required. Draws implications for care givers and therapists. (Author/JDH)

Notes that the primary arbiters of acceptable behavior in informal social conversation are authors of works on etiquette, and that their rules and taboos reflect and shape conversation in the social era in which they appear. Describes behavior books for adults and children in the first half of the eighteenth century in the United States. (SKC)

Describes two narrative techniques revealed in a chamber theatre production of Grace Paley fiction in order to argue that chamber theatre, by forcing the audience to attend to particular types of narrative issues, functions as a critical methodology. Substantiates the claim that performance functions as criticism. (SKC)

Presents a brief overview of the most significant models of the communication process, evaluates the communication models of the greatest relevance to business communication, and establishes a foundation for a new conception of that process. (JC)

Indicates that couple type was significantly related to communication about marital conflict, but that there were neither any clear overall sex differences in communication nor sex differences within couple types. Also indicates that conflict styles are so strongly reciprocal that mutual influence within conversations tends to remove individual…