Contends that subjective or perceived homophily is more important than objective homophily in determining communication outcomes since it is communicator perceptions that influence communicator behavior. (MH)

Discusses a study designed to investigate the relationships between vocal activity level and interpersonal attraction, perceived credibility, perceived homophily or interpersonal similarity and perceived power or ability to influence. (MH)

Discusses a study designed to measure the effects of message threat level, message quality, and initial receiver attitude on attitude change and evaluations of source credibility. (MH)

This study tested two primary hypotheses concerning the effects of mispronunciation on the ratings of source credibility. First, as the number of mispronunciations presented by a speaker increases, audience ratings of source credibility will decrease. Second, the effects hypothesized in the first statement will be stronger for audiences at a more…

In order to test whether constant eye contact, formal posture, and varied vocal inflection increase source credibility and listener comprehension, 144 college students in an introductory speech communication course were placed in groups of equal size that listened to the same informative speech. The speaker presented to each group a different…

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 15 titles deal with the following topics: factors affecting group decisions regarding attributions of responsibility; a model of message-attitude-behavior relations; effects of the communicative process on perceived source…

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 18 titles deal with a variety of topics, including the following: a comparison of mother/child and father/child interactions; state anxiety responses in high and low speech anxious subjects; variables that predict listening…