An Interpersonal Communication Perspective on Images of Political Candidates

Much of the research dealing with the relationship between candidate images and candidate preferences has attempted to assess dimensions of the candidate's image that are relatively “personal” in nature. By and large, most of this research focuses on static traits—for example, aspects of the candidate's persona relating to such dimensions as warmth, attractiveness, or dynamism. In contrast, the current study attempts to assess the degree to which candidate preferences are significantly associated with observable behavior. This was done by asking respondents to evaluate Ronald Reagan and Walter Mandate with an instrument normally used to assess elements of interpersonal communication. It was found that communication behavior ratings of Reagan and Mandate significantly predicted differential preferences for these candidates, even after controlling for the respondents’ political orientations.     

The Influence of Cultural Variability on Perceptions of Communication Behavior Associated with Relationship Terms

A framework for incorporating the influence of cultural variability into theories of communication in interpersonal relationships is presented and several hypotheses derived from the framework tested. Data from two studies conducted with samples from Japan and the United States revealed that variation along Hofstede's (1980) dimensions of culture are related to intimacy ratings of relationship terms, as well as perceptions of the degree of personalization, synchrony, and difficulty of communication associated with relationships anchored by six specific terms (stranger, acquaintance, classmate, friend, best friend, and lover). Implications of the framework and findings for developing cross-culturally generalizable theories of communication are elaborated.     

LANGUAGE INDICES IN THE MEASUREMENT OF COGNITIVE COMPLEXITY: IS COMPLEXITY LOQUACITY?

Within an accepted measurement system of the construct termed cognitive complexity, an analysis of the relationship between cognitive complexity scores and such indices of verbal complexity as number of tokens, type-token ratio, and noun-verb/adjective-adverb ratio was conducted. Writing samples used to measure cognitive complexity were obtained and analyzed for verbal complexity. Results indicate that number of tokens account for 33 percent of the variance in cognitive complexity followed by noun-verb/adjective-ad verb ratio (8 percent) and the type-token ratio (1 percent). Results are discussed relative to the potential for loquacity to impact the measurement of cognitive complexity.