4 - DECODING AND RESPONDING TO AFFECTIONATE EXPRESSIONS

Summary

We may not return the affection from those who like us, but we always respect their good judgment.

– Libbie Fudim

The focus in the previous chapter was on the formulation of affectionate messages from the point of view of the sender. However, expressions of affection are provocative events for receivers as well. When individuals are the recipients of affectionate behaviors they are typically called on to make at least two assessments: first, are they correctly decoding these behaviors as affectionate messages, and second, how should they respond to them? This chapter will review research that has addressed each of these issues and will articulate new questions in this area that await empirical attention.

Decoding Behaviors as Affectionate

Competence in telling friend from foe is perhaps one of the most useful human abilities in terms of individual and group survival. Affectionate communication most assuredly plays a part in forming and maintaining pair bonds and other significant relationships, but only to the extent that one's affectionate overtures are decoded as such by recipients. As will be illustrated in Chapter 6, incongruence between a sender's intention with an affectionate message and a receiver's interpretation of that message is one of the major sources of risk in communicating affection in the first place. For these reasons, this section will discuss research on the decoding of affectionate behaviors.