Expectations
The theory views language expectancies as enduring patterns of anticipated communication behavior which are grounded in a society's psychological and cultural norms. Such societal forces influence language and enable the identification of non-normative use; violations of linguistic, syntactic and semantic expectations will either facilitate or inhibit an audience's receptivity to persuasion. Burgoon claims applications for his theory in management, media, politics and medicine, and declares that his empirical research has shown a greater effect than expectancy violations theory, the domain of which does not extend to the spoken word.
LET argues that typical language behaviors fall within a normative "bandwidth" of expectations determined by a source's perceived credibility, the individual listener's normative expectations and a group's normative social climate, and generally supports a gender-stereotypical reaction to the use of profanity, for example.
Communication expectancies are said to derive from three factors:
- The communicator – individual features, such as ethos or source credibility, personality, appearance, social status and gender.
- The relationship between a receiver and a communicator, including factors such as attraction, similarity and status equality.
- Context; i.e., privacy and formality constraints on interaction.
Read more about this topic: Language Expectancy Theory
Famous quotes containing the word expectations:
“It’s important to remember that feminism is no longer a group of organizations or leaders. It’s the expectations that parents have for their daughters, and their sons, too. It’s the way we talk about and treat one another. It’s who makes the money and who makes the compromises and who makes the dinner. It’s a state of mind. It’s the way we live now.”
—Anna Quindlen (20th century)
“Our children do not want models of perfection, neither do they want us to be buddies, friends, or confidants who never rise above their own levels of maturity and experience. We need to walk that middle ground between perfection and peerage, between intense meddling and apathy—the middle ground where our values, standards, and expectations can be shared with our children.”
—Neil Kurshan (20th century)
“In a virtuous and free state, no rewards can be so pleasing to sensible minds, as those which include the approbation of our fellow citizens. My great pain is, lest my poor endeavours should fall short of the kind expectations of my country.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)