Interpersonal Communication in Daily Life

Lyndsey Burns
COM270-A
December 15, 2015
 Throughout the semester, we have studied the theories and characteristics of interpersonal

communication while keeping a journal of entries that reflect how this form of communication

impacts our daily life. These entries allowed me to apply what I am learning to real life situations

and to examine which theories and concepts I experience in my life. Learning about

interpersonal communication this semester has helped me gain knowledge on people and

relationships while forming my own perceptions of how people go about their daily interactions

and why they might do what they do.

After reading through all of my journal entries on the various topics covered in this

course, I noticed two very strong themes. I tended to write about what other people did wrong in

their relationships, whether with me or with somebody else. I also noticed that the majority of

my entries were discussions about negative events involving to my cross-sex relationships,

including male family members, friends, and ex-boyfriends.

When I first started rereading my journal entries, I was not expecting to find myself

writing consistently about what other people did wrong in their relationships. I was surprised to

learn that the majority of the experiences I reflected on focused on the negative aspects of my

interpersonal relationships or the relationships of others in my life. I say this because, despite

what my entries say, I can think of hundreds of positive interactions and relationships that have

come into my life and the lives of my friends. However, when I think of major turning points in

my relationships that have had either a long-term effect or a major impact on my life, what

comes to mind are the wrong doings of others that have caused turmoil in these interpersonal

relationships. When we discuss certain topics and theories in this class, it was easier for me to

apply the topic or theory to an event that helps explain why the situation turned out bad; for

example, I used the concept of obsessive relational intrusion in one of my entries to explain what
a former friend of mine had been doing wrong to cause me to cut him out of my life entirely.

Similarly, when discussing my friends broken off engagement, I focused on what her fianc did

wrong, rather than what she did wrong. Lastly, I wrote about a falling out with my roommates

after they blindsided me and reported my boyfriends fraternity to the police; this situation

strongly shows my tendency to talk about what the other people did wrong. When discussing the

situation, I focused on how they had to convince me to forgive them, while, considering the

context of the situation, I did some things wrong by swearing them to secrecy about such a

serious incident, as well as by keeping that information from the authorities.

I was not surprised that my journal presented a lot of situations involving my cross-sex

friendships because, when I think of significant relational events and interactions in my life, my

male friends and ex-boyfriends come to mind. Furthermore, the majority of my friends are guys

and I do not have any sisters. Within my journal entries discussing my cross-sex friendships, I

further noticed that I wrote multiple accounts of the same relationship, just in different contexts.

This specific relationship was a friendship that turned into a romantic relationship, and then

turned back into a friendship before it dissolved completely. I found myself writing about him a

lot because that relationship was, for a period of time, a huge part of my life and, coincidentally,

almost every topic covered in this course fit into this relationship. For example, I connected the

concept of fatal affairs to my friendship and relationship with him, and then I mentioned him

again when discussing the turning point approach; although, in my entry, I referred to him as my

friends boyfriend, the entry referred to my relationship with him. I chose to use my friend as

the person experiencing this relationship because, at the time, I did not want it to be know that I

was involved in such a bizarre situation with him. This relationship actually shows up one last

time in my entry regarding forgiveness; this entry was not about my specific relationship with
him, but rather about an event that occurred with my roommates as a result of my relationship

with him.

One theory that I strongly agree with it Social Penetration Theory, also known as the

onion model. This theory is based on the idea that all humans enter relationships throughout their

life, and these relationships gradually progress from superficial and casual to intimate and

personal. The way these relationships turn more intimate is through self-disclosure, which is the

intentional revelation of personal information to others. These basic principles of Social

Penetration Theory make sense to me in terms of explaining how we form close relationships

with one another; without self-disclosure, it is virtually impossible to create a relationship with

somebody past the superficial level.

The theory further elaborates on self-disclosure by identifying four levels of it. The first

level, the public level, includes the characteristics that you cannot hide, such as race; they are

always available to others. The second level, the superficial level, involves a small amount of

penetration, but it is easy for others to get to this level, as it only reveals simple, common facts

about oneself that do not give away any secrets or deep personal information, such as ones

name. The next level, the social or personal layer, is the level of self where friends and family

members are able to get to, essentially where the individual reveals more personal information

about their feelings and interests that people would not be able to see or guess about you without

getting to this level. Lastly, the core is the level that reveals all our deepest secrets and most

intimate details. This layer holds every detail about us, and is hardly ever revealed to anybody.

We only reveal our core self to people we completely trust and are comfortable with sharing

absolutely everything about ourselves with, which is why it is rare to allow somebody to

penetrate this level.

 I can apply Social Penetration Theory to my relationship with my best friend. I have

known her since ninth grade, but we did not become close friends until our junior year of high

school. Between our freshman year and sophomore year, my friend hardly knew anything about

me other than what I looked like and simple facts, like my name and age; these are all

characteristics that are revealed at the public and superficial levels, and, as the theory states,

these two levels of self-disclosure are relatively easy to penetrate, and the characteristics that fall

within these two levels are easy for me to reveal about myself. In this friendship, and with almost

all of my friendships, I would say that it only takes me a few weeks to begin disclosing

information at the social or personal level. Once somebody has established a friendship with me,

it is easy for them to learn about me beyond the simple facts that are evident on the surface.

Regarding the core level, as social penetration theory states, I cannot think of one time I have

revealed this layer; I believe that some of what lies in ones core self should belong only to the

individual and should be left unknown to the rest of the world. In my life, the layers of social

penetration theory correlate with the way I go about self-disclosure in terms of what I reveal and

when I do so.

On the contrary, one theory I believe has a lot of problems and missing pieces is the

Affection Exchange Theory. This theory is based off of the idea that people are motivated to

express affectionate communication to people who can help them meet survival and reproduction

needs. There are three main principles of this theory; the first says that affectionate

communication facilitates survival because it helps people develop and maintain relationships

that give them important resources. I do not find this piece of the theory to be entirely accurate;

while affection in our communication and relationships can be beneficial to a relationship, to say

that it facilitates survival by providing us with vital resources is an extreme exaggeration. While
our relationships are an important part of our lives, it is not necessarily through affectionate

communication that we obtain these benefits of relationships. The second principle states that

people who display affectionate communication are more likely to be perceived as having good

parenting skills. This may be true, but there is a lot more to being a good parents than showing

affection towards others; you could show as much as affection as you want, but, unless you teach

your children manners, common sense, and discipline, along with many other things, I would not

consider that to be good parenting. The third and final principle is, as I mentioned before, that

people are motivated to show affection to those who can satisfy viability or fertility needs, which

relate to survival and reproduction, respectively. Affection exchange theory goes on to state that,

according to research, giving and receiving affection is associated with greater well-being and

better physical health. While I agree that affection can have a positive effect on ones well-being

and physical health, I believe the main assumption of this theory is very limited and misses a lot

of factors that could explain why we show affection to others.

One reason I disagree with this theory is because, personally, many of the relationships in

my life that have given me valuable resources and have contributed to my well-being have not

included this aspect of affectionate communication discussed in this theory. Im not arguing that

affection is not important to have in our relationships and in our lives, but there are many things

that are more important to our survival and reproduction. One reason I say this is, in my life, I

would not say that I grew up with a father who displayed affectionate communication, but I

would never say that he has not been a good parent. This theory argues that people who display

affectionate communication are more likely to be perceived as having the skills necessary to be a

good parents. I argue that people who display affectionate communication are likely to be good

parents, but those who do not display affectionate communication are just as likely to be good
parents. Furthermore, if I apply the first principle of affection exchange theory regarding

affectionate communications ability to facilitate survival, I can argue that this is false, as my

father has been happily married for twenty five years, has a family, and has been able to earn

three degrees that have helped him form a successful career. While affection can provide benefits

to us, to say it is necessary to our survival and well-being is a farce that, in my opinion, gives a

false sense of what we as human beings need to survive and maintain our physical and mental

health. Our interpersonal interactions do not always need to incorporate a level of affection to be

effective and satisfying.

Interpersonal communication is an interaction, either formal or informal, between two or

more people that involves verbal and nonverbal communication. There must be some level of

interdependence between the people interacting, and, to be successful communication, there must

be some extent of shared meaning between interactants. People develop interpersonal

communication skills to achieve goals and to display a positive self-image to others.

Interpersonal communication is something that we, as humans, cannot escape; it is something

that we are constantly experiencing either through words or nonverbal cures such as facial

expression or gestures.

In this course, I have gained a lot of knowledge about how we interact and why we

initiate and react in certain ways. The areas of interpersonal communication that I personally

found to be the most credible were self-disclosure, interdependence theory, and uncertainty

reduction. Learning about interdependence theory has caused me to view a lot of my relational

breakups and formations from a new perspective, because I now understand the concepts of

rewards, costs, comparison levels, and quality of alternatives, which all come together to explain

why we stay or leave relationships. I feel as if I will evaluate the costs and rewards of
relationships more consciously and carefully in future interactions than I have in the past.

Regarding self-disclosure, I feel that I now better understand not only why we disclose

information to others, but why we sometimes do not; the fears of rejection and retaliation keep

people from opening up to others every day, as well as the concern for revealing too much too

fast to too many people. While disclosure can bring people closer, it can hurt the relationship in

any of those situations.

Uncertainty reduction theory was one I found particularly interesting and as having merit.

The theory tells us that, during initial encounters, we try to reduce uncertainty by finding out

information about the other person. The reason we do this is because we are more likely to be

attracted to those we know more about. Before learning about this theory, I never really thought

about how initial encounters work but, now I notice that people do tend to ask a lot of general to

form basic, stereotypical assumptions about others in an attempt to decide if there is any

potential for a friendship or relationship. Learning about the effects of uncertainty was

enlightening, as it never occurred to me that you may not be attracted to somebody simply

because you do not know enough about them; usually people say that they are not particularly

attracted to somebody because the other person does something that contradicts with their beliefs

or values, or because you simply are not interested. There is definitely merit to the idea of being

less attracted to people that you are more uncertain about, and the converse is also true; you have

a better chance of finding people you are attracted to if you get to know and understand them

better.

Interpersonal communication goes beyond two people interacting with each other. It is

the way we form relationships and create shared meanings. By understanding interpersonal

communication, we can better understand how people interact with one another and improve our
own relationships. The topics covered in this course are relevant to our everyday interactions and

can be useful in providing a new perspective on the way we initiate and manage relationships.