Finds: (1) verbal aggressiveness negatively related to satisfaction and trust (supporting the destructiveness of verbal aggression); (2) teasing positively related to verbal aggressiveness; (3) sibling satisfaction positively related to being hurt on receiving verbally aggressive messages; and (4) women were more satisfied and reported using less…

Asks how apprehensions about communicating with others intertwine with self-perceptions about listening. Examines correlations between communication apprehension in four settings and four listening styles. Reveals that the listening style of people with few apprehensions prefers receiving complex information that can be evaluated before…

Develops a measure for operationalizing how employees verbally express their contradictory opinions and disagreements about organizational phenomena. Tests the Organizational Dissent Scale (ODS) in a series of studies designed to generate evidence of validity/reliability for the measure. Indicates that the scale measures how employees express…

Advances an "outsider within" perspective describing the ways that traditionally marginalized group members communicate in mainstream organizational settings. Explicates the process by which different cocultural group members come to adopt one or more communication orientations while interacting within dominant organizations. States the…

Utilizes a panel of graphic arts education experts to review suggested Food and Drug Administration label guidelines--if the participants thought that "graphic problems" existed in the guidelines, they were asked to make suggestions to indicate how food labels could be prepared more effectively, at no additional cost. (PA)

Surveys corporate use of voice message systems by interviewing employees in four different companies. Finds that all four companies viewed their voicemail systems as a supplement to personal contact (not a replacement) and provided training, but had no formal method to assess customer satisfaction with their system. Suggests business communication…

Identifies pediatricians' practices of next speaker selection when soliciting the problem presentation; identifies factors that bear on next speaker selection; and examines the consequences of physicians' selection practices for whom ultimately presents the problem. Suggests communication resources that may increase the child's participation in…

Examines whether presidential candidates who use informational briefing books when preparing for debates actually improve their debating effectiveness. Finds that higher rates of factual evidence are associated with "losing" a debate. Argues that this association arises from three common mistakes candidates make when using evidence.…

Examines volunteer hospital workers' evaluations of the effectiveness of regulative messages constructed by hospital staff in response to four scenarios. States that positive face support was not related to effectiveness ratings for volunteers with lower construct differentiation, but messages lacking face support were criticized. Notes that…

Assesses two versions of a content-based metric for coding and calculating composite verbal intensity values for naturalistic discourse. Demonstrates initial support for both face validity and concurrent validity of the metric, as measured via raters' perceptions of language intensity. (SR)

Constructs and tests two measures of audience response to performance of literary text. Finds that the first measure (analyzing audience response to open-ended questions) was useful in discriminating responses across performances, but needs further work in clarifying relative importance and interrelationships; and the second measure (a…

Reconstructs the social networks linking early personal computing pioneers in order to identify the social and political representations and images that defined these social networks. Describes the linkage between technical development and cultural representations, particularly those of the user, in the case of personal computers. (SR)

Tests a model of question answering called WHEN, which explains the answer descriptions that are generated when college students answer "when" questions. Finds that the answers given systematically varied as a function of temporal interval in a fashion that supported most of the production rules of the WHEN model. (RS)

Uses information from the 1994 Education and Research Professional Interest Committee Focus Group of the Society for Technical Communication (STC) and from questionnaires to outline educational goals and to suggest ways in which STC members and the Society can prepare undergraduate students for careers in technical communication in the next…

Examines communicative responses to romantic jealousy. Finds 12 superordinate categories and 67 tactics in communicative responses to jealousy. Develops measures for six types of interactive responses (integrative communication, distributive communication, active distancing, general avoidance/denial, expression of negative affect, and violent…