Expectancy Violations in Relationships with Friends and Media Figures

Abstract

Expectancy violations can have damaging effects in social relationships, but their comparative effects on relationships with media figures has not been explored. A questionnaire was given to 125 undergraduates, measuring anticipated reductions in closeness to friends and media figures as a result of three expectancy violations: moral, trust, and social. For both relationships, trust and social violations resulted in greater reductions in closeness than moral violations. Compared to violations committed by other types of media figures, respondents expected greater reductions in closeness for major violations committed by athletes and social violations committed by TV hosts. Women anticipated greater reductions in closeness than men. These findings shed light on how mediated relationships evolve and how they intersect with interpersonal relationships.

Keywords:

• Celebrity
• Expectancy Violations
• Friendship
• Parasocial
• Relationship Transgressions

I thank Cynthia Hoffner for her guidance on this project. An earlier version of this article was presented at the 2007 annual meeting of the International Communication Association in San Francisco.

Notes

Note. Means that do not differ significantly per a Tukey's post hoc test, p < .05, share a common subscript.

Note. Means that do not differ significantly per a Tukey's post hoc test, p < .05, share a common subscript.

Note. Means that do not differ significantly per a Tukey's post hoc test, p < .05, share a common subscript.

Expectancy violations were usually considered to be hazardous for the quality of close relationships primarily because they increased uncertainty, but Afifi and Metts (1998) pointed out that expectancy violations can often reduce uncertainty because they can actually clarify how a partner actually feels or behaves about something. Afifi and Metts further noted that expectancy violations can be very positive (e.g., an untypical expression of gratitude), thereby increasing relationship quality. However, because this study is primarily interested in factors that could have a negative impact on relationships, this article limits its examination to expectancy violations with negative relationship implications.

Audiences, of course, can respond to media figures as if they are actually interacting with them (e.g., talking back to the television set), but these responses do not suggest that they have any expectations for a response in return.

Because the questionnaire did not include any items that probed how respondents knew the famous person they identified, it is not possible to confirm that the person was actually known to them through the media. Nonetheless, extant research on the nature of fame suggests that media provide the primary means of information dissemination about most, if not all, famous figures (Braudy, 1986; Cathcart, 1994; Giles, 2000). As such, this study operates under the assumption that the famous people listed are, in fact, media figures.

Because changes in perceived similarity between friends is a commonly referenced expectancy violation in friendships (e.g., Johnson et al., 2004; Planalp et al., 1988) a three-item subscale was also included to measure reductions in closeness in expectancy violations of similarity. The items were as follows: “This person begins spending time with people that I disapprove of or dislike,” “This person adopts political or social views that I disagree with,” and “I realized that this person and I no longer share common values.” However, the scale's reliability for both friends (α = .59) and media figures (α = .54) was too low to be included in subsequent analyses.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Elizabeth L. Cohen

Elizabeth L. Cohen (MA, Georgia State University, 2007) is a doctoral student in the Department of Communication at Georgia State University.