Relational Uncertainty and Relational Information Processing

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Bibliographic Data

ID23339916
AuthorsL K Knobloch (0000-0001-9300-1536, Department of Speech Communication at the University of Illinois), D H Solomon (0000-0001-5535-0137, Department of Communication Arts and Sciences at the Pennsylvania State University)
Year2005
Volume32
Issue3
Pages349-388
Publication date2005-06-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueCommunication Research (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0093-6502 • E-ISSN: 1552-3810
PublisherSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/0093650205275384
OpenAlexW2134179500
LanguageEN
Citations received53
References cited73

This article seeks to understand how relational uncertainty coincides with people’s ability to process relational information. The general premise is that individuals experiencing relational uncertainty should have difficulty deriving inferences because they lack the knowledge necessary to identify and interpret relational cues. The authors use this reasoning to deduce hypotheses about how relational uncertainty may correspond with people’s perceptions of relationship talk, judgments of relational messages, and evaluations of the difficulty of interaction. They conducted a study of conversations between romantic partners (N = 120 couples). As predicted, relational uncertainty was negatively associated with people’s perceptions of relationship talk after controlling for the perceptions of third-party observers. Relational uncertainty was negatively associated with the extremity of people’s judgments about relational messages. Furthermore, relational uncertainty was positively associated with people’s perceptions of the difficulty of interaction. They conclude by discussing how these findings illuminate the connection between relational uncertainty and relational information processing.

Data mining · Epistemology · Perception · Premise · Process (computing) · Relational calculus · Relational database · Relational model · Relational theory · Statistical relational learning · Attachment and Relationship Dynamics · Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development · Computer Science · Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies · Psychology · Social Psychology