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Interpersonal Communication (Reasons for creating relationsships…
Interpersonal Communication
Key terms
Context
: Where communication takes place. How you know the person. Family, job, school, religions, sports etc. This isn’t a useful category alone for interpreting if the relationship is interpersonal.
Time
: We measure the quality of the relationship often by the length of time we spent together and the length of time we CHOOSE to spend together. I might spend 40 hours a week in a cubical with someone but wouldn’t choose to do that with that person if I had to.
Intimacy
: Intimacy refers to the closeness of a relationship. There are four kinds of closeness/intimacy.
Intellectual
intimacy is about idea exchange. Have you ever felt energized and turned on by the banter or conversation you had with someone? That closeness that comes when you share ideas is intellectual intimacy.
Spiritual
intimacy is when we share a connection beyond ourselves. Perhaps it comes through religion or perhaps it is through nature or any assortment of ways we feel a greater connection to the world around us.
Physical
intimacy involves physical contact, hugging, kissing, dancing, sexual, etc..
Emotional
intimacy is when we share our feelings with another. This includes the wide range of feelings, the degree to which they are significant to you and the depth to which you share them.
Affinity
: This is the degree to which we like each other or appreciate each other. We might love our little brother but not like him very much.
Control
: This is the degree to which parties have power to influence each other. We could have conversational control (who talks, who interrupts, who decides what is talked about) and who makes the decisions. We also have power distribution within the relationship.
If it is a
complementary
distribution that means that one person has power and the other is more subordinate. Doctor/patient, teacher/student are examples of this.
Reasons for creating relationsships
Appearance
Similarity (we do tend to like people who are like us)
Complementarity (opposites attract)
Reciprocal Attraction (we are attracted to people who like us)
Competence (we like to be around talented people)
Disclosure (revealing things about yourself can help build liking)
Proximity (being near someone frequently often builds liking)
Rewards (a somewhat economic model called the social exchange theory which suggests that we seek out people who can give us rewards that are greater than or equal to the costs we encounter in dealing with them).
Goals we which to seek with our communication
with examples
Instrumental Goals
You console your roommate after he loses his job (asking for or giving support).
You ask your friend to help you move this weekend (gaining/resisting compliance).
You ask your coworker to remind you how to balance your cash register till at the end of your shift (requesting or presenting information).
Relational Goals
You make breakfast with your mom while you are home visiting (spending time together).
You organize an office party for a coworker who has just become a US citizen (celebrating/honoring accomplishments).
You post a message on your long-distance friend’s Facebook wall saying you miss him (checking in).
Self-Presentation
Goals by adapting our communication in order to be perceived in particular ways. Just as many companies, celebrities, and politicians create a public image, we desire to present different faces in different contexts.
As your boss complains about struggling to format the company newsletter, you tell her about your experience with Microsoft Word and editing and offer to look over the newsletter once she’s done to fix the formatting (presenting yourself as competent).
You and your new college roommate stand in your dorm room full of boxes. You let him choose which side of the room he wants and then invite him to eat lunch with you (presenting yourself as friendly).
You say, “I don’t know,” in response to a professor’s question even though you have an idea of the answer (presenting yourself as aloof, or “too cool for school”).
Personal Paragraph
For me learning about interpersonal communication after learning about the differences in the way that men and women communicate is rather interesting. And for me I find this interesting because of the similarities and accuracies that can be found in both types we learned about. Because when learning about the goals of interpersonal communication a few of the goals are simply just objectives or styles of communication of either men or women, or both. I personaly can relate with the self-presentation goal that is found in interpersonal communication because at least for me, I do tend to change the way I present myself when I am around different groups of people. I probably should not do this, but this is how I am.