Date Approved
5-3-2005
Embargo Period
4-12-2016
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
M.A. in School Psychology
Department
Educational Services and Leadership
College
College of Education
Advisor
Klanderman, John
Committee Member 1
Dihoff, Roberta
Subject(s)
Communication--Sex differences; Nonverbal communication
Disciplines
Educational Psychology
Abstract
The purpose of this thesis was to determine whether or not college students would respond with any communication to a stimulus of nonverbal communication of either eye contact alone or paired with smiling to the same or opposite gender. The characteristics of this study may have implications on how successful nonverbal communication can be.
One-hundred-sixty students, 8 groups within, were randomly stimulated by either a female or male with either a positive or neutral facial expression and their natural responses were recorded. The responses were coded on a Likert scale and analyzed with a 3 way ANOVA.
The data presented in this study allows this researcher to reject the second null hypothesis and accept the alternate hypothesis that a particular gender providing the nonverbal communication stimuli will gain more responses from the participants. A significant difference was found among the female providing nonverbal communication stimuli.
Recommended Citation
Hollingsworth, Kimberly R., "Communication responses to positive or neutral facial expressions between the genders" (2005). Theses and Dissertations. 1017.
https://rdw.rowan.edu/etd/1017
