Compare And Contrast Adam And Kyle's Relationship

To begin I’m going to expand on the bullet point about Adams relationship with his friend Kyle. At first glance Adam and Kyle could look like complete opposites but when taking a deeper look into their friendship it is obvious why these two have been friends since childhood. The word that comes to mind when trying to describe Adam and Kyle’s friendship is balance. Adam possesses level headed and vigilance. While, Kyle has the tendency to be more free spirited and go with the flow type of guy. This is where the seesaw effect takes place. When one of their characteristics gets to extreme the other one is there to keep them in check. This is why the word interdependence applies to Adam and Kyle’s relationship. The textbook states interdependence being defined as “rely on each other and exert mutual influence on
communication episodes.” A few examples to help support this definition are the night before Adam’s surgery Kyle happened to get wasted. Instead of Adam getting angry with Kyle he walked Kyle back to his apartment and made sure he was safe and sound before he left to walk home.
This shows how Kyle depends on Adam to keep him in line and make sure his wildness doesn’t get out of hand. Another example of interdependence in Adam and Kyle’s relationship is the situation where Adam lashed out in Kyle’s car. Adam had a breakdown but Kyle didn’t just walk away from his friend instead he waited for Adam to calm down. This shows that Adam and Kyle’s relationship has a great deal of loyalty intertwined in it. Therefore, that is why Adam and Kyle’s relationship resolved during the movie. It is obvious that Adam and Kyle’s friendship is strong and one fight isn’t going to ruin what they’ve built over the years. My second bullet point I’m going to go more into depth about is the term cultural display rules. This entails “interpreting subtle cues and responding to them appropriately.” A fantastic example of this is Adam’s relationship with his therapist Katie. At the beginning of the movie Adam was hesitate about the whole therapist ordeal. This was evident because Adam would make rude remarks to
Katie. Also, when Katie tried to touch Adam he felt crept out instead of comforted. This could have been a problem that ended their professional relationship but instead it made their relationship grow. Going back to the cultural display rules it takes individuals a great deal of experience to understand individuals “personal preferences and expectations.” A step in Katie and Adam’s relationship is when Katie offered Adam a ride home. During the ride Adam had Katie pull over so he could clean her car. In some cases, this could offend individuals but yet again this was just another step into their relationship growing stronger. The final example, of cultural display rules is when Adam has his major breakdown and instead calling his ex girlfriend he calls Katie. This shows how Adam and Katie’s relationship has bridged the gap of professional to casual or in Adam’s head crush like. Again, this situation could have crossed the line in various ways because it could be seen as unprofessional and such. Instead, Adam and Katie know each other’s cultural boundaries and keep expanding them as time goes on. As one can see cultural display rules can bridge extraordinary gaps as two individuals get to know one another.