The power of touch during communication within heterosexual married dyads

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2007-01-01
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Seeman Smith, Joann
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David L. Vogel
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Psychology
The Department of Psychology may prepare students with a liberal study, or for work in academia or professional education for law or health-services. Graduates will be able to apply the scientific method to human behavior and mental processes, as well as have ample knowledge of psychological theory and method.
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Abstract

The literature on sex differences in nonverbal behavior is mixed. Some studies find differences in intimate relationships whereas others do not. One reason may be that no study has examined different measurements of touch in intimate couples and examined sex differences based on who chose the topic. The present study was designed to fill this gap in the research in regards to the assessment of touching behavior within married dyads and their possible expression of power moves by measuring seven different measurement of touch (i.e., overall touches, power touches, supportive touches, hand touches, non-hand touches, touches while talking, touches while listening) across a problematic topic chosen by the wife and a topic chosen by the husband. In partial support of the hypotheses, the results of mixed-model ANOVAs showed that women engage touches while talking than men during their own discussion while no differences were found on the man's discussion. A trend for significance was found for women engaging in more overall touch and power touches then men on the females' discussion then on the males' discussion. For touches more thought of as support (supportive touches and touches while listening) females engaged in significantly more of these types of touches than males regardless of whose discussion. Contrary to predictions, hand touches were found to have no differences based on who choose the topic, although women were found to engage in more overall hand touches than males. Also contrary to predictions, women engaged in more non-hand touches; however, they were doing so only during their own conversation. Implications of these results and suggests for future research on nonverbal behaviors associated with power are discussed.

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Mon Jan 01 00:00:00 UTC 2007