The document discusses intimacy and affection in close relationships. It defines intimacy as including immediacy, or openness to communicate, and affection, which conveys warmth and closeness through verbal and nonverbal messages. Intimacy requires high levels of nonverbal involvement over time, including warmth and physical closeness like touch. People have different attachment styles like secure, anxious, or avoidant styles, which can predict relationship outcomes. The capacity for affection is innate, though feelings and expressions of affection don't always align. Affection promotes health by reducing stress, but people vary in their tolerance, and receiving unwanted affection can stimulate a nervous stress response.

1. Intimacy and
AffectionCOMM 415 4.16.2013

2. What is Intimacy?
• Intimacy is a very broad term that
has been used to describe
attitudes and behaviors related to
close relationships.

3. What is Intimacy?
• Immediacy: The difference between content (digital)
and relational (analogic) messages.
 Signals openness and willingness to communicate.
Must be
• Continuous
• forming a spectrum or range of behaviors
• sustained and prolonged

4. What is Intimacy?
• Affection: verbal and nonverbal messages that
convey “warmth, positive regard, safety,
support, comfort, relationship satisfaction, and
closeness” (p. 226)

5. Adult Attachment
Styles
•Secure
•Insecure
Anxious/Ambivalent
Avoidant/Dismissive
Fearful/Avoidant

6. SO WHAT DO THESE PREDICT?

7. Stability and Outcomes of Relational
Closeness• Why? Because intimacy is interactional and usually dyadic.
 Implies certain levels of coordination of intimacy between partners
 Expectations quite often coincide , but sometimes do not.
• Some Indicators:
 Touch – Most powerful way we display affection
 Time – Time spent with another is the highest indicator of immediacy
 Males experience intimacy through tasks and activities
 Females experience intimacy through conversation
• Regardless of gender, both men and women both agree that affective skills are important in close
relationships

8. A Note About Touch
• Researchers studying the importance of touching found that a brief period of physical
contact (including massage) significantly enhanced participants’ oxytocin levels
– 34 couples participated in the experiment
– Half of the couples were trained in “listening touch” designed to relax their partner while
speaking (e.g., simple neck massage) and were then trained in basic massage techniques
– The remaining couples were monitored for several weeks
• One month after training, couples in the massage condition experienced significantly
higher levels of salivary oxytocin than the control group

9. …Putting it all together
Intimacy requires three elements of nonverbal behavior
Higher levels of nonverbal involvement and immediacy
Warm, immediate nonverbal behavior over time in a
variety of situations
Affection and physical closeness, particularly touch.
*Secure attachments reflect healthy and sustained levels
of each of these requirements

10. Affection Exchange Theory
• The need and capacity for affection are innate
• Affectionate feelings and affectionate expressions are usually, but
not always, correlated
• Affectionate communication promotes health and reproductive ability
• Humans vary in their tolerance for affection
• Expressing or receiving affection that violates our tolerance
stimulates the nervous system to react
• .

11. The need and capacity for affection
are innate.
• Tend-and-befriend theory: Affectionate behavior is intended to fortify personal
relationships and is beneficial for health because it ameliorates the physiological stress
response.
 Tending – soothing behaviors meant to alleviate stress (hand holding, caressing, use of soft
tone)
 Befriending – Creating and maintaing social relationships that provide resources, support
and protection.
• Necessary for the survival of our genes
 Preservation of our offspring
 Preservation of ourselves

12. Affectionate feelings and affectionate expressions
are usually, but not always, correlated
are innate
• Strength of a feeling and display of a feeling can covary, but usually do not.
 Could be due to temparment
 Could be due to upbrining
 Could be due to cultural norms

13. Affectionate communication
promotes health and reproductive
ability
are innate
• Lower levels of cortisol
 Floyd (2008) conducted a study to on 20 spousal couples in which 1 spouse
(either husband or wife) was asked to measure initial cortisol levels via saliva sample
and report on their amount of stress.
 Couples were then asked to report on their affectionate communication behaviors (both
verbal and nonverbal).
 Findings showed a correlation between lower cortisol levels and higher amounts of
reported affectionate communication.

14. Humans vary in their tolerance for
affection
• Cognitive Valence Theory (Andersen) argues that changes in intimacy produce changes
in arousal
– Based on biological temperament
– Changes in intimacy produce changes in arousal:
• Small changes in arousal go unnoticed
• Large changes in arousal stimulate fear and protection
• Moderate changes in arousal are ambiguous

15. Humans vary in their tolerance for
affection
• Evaluative Measures of CVT: Schemata
 Cultural Schema
 Self-Schema [fixed personality/psychological predisposition]
 Communication predisposition
 Trait communication behavior
 Interpersonal Schema [Liking, attractiveness, homophily]
 Relational [How is the relationship defined?]
 What is it? (Definition)
 Where is it going? (trajectory)
 Situational [environment, context, situation]
 State [Mood, temporary state of mind]

16. Humans vary in their tolerance for
affection
• Positive Relational Outcomes
• CVT predicts three positive outcomes in relationships if all of the valences are positive:
– More positive feelings toward relational partner
– Reciprocal increases in intimacy
– Greater levels of closeness and intimacy

17. Expressing or receiving affection that violates our
tolerance stimulates the nervous system to react
are innate
Mi Scusi

18. Expressing or receiving affection that violates our
tolerance stimulates the nervous system to react
are innate
*Behavioral Activation
System (BAS)
*Behavioral Inhibition
System (BIS)
*Fight-or-Flight System
(FFS)