Discussion of the Situational and Developmental Views in a Scene from Titanic
Discussion of the Situational and Developmental Views in a Scene from Titanic
Interpersonal communication plays a major role in everyone’s daily life. Because it is so important, theorists have developed two views about how to determine whether a transaction is interpersonal or not. We will be looking at the situational and the developmental view by applying it to a scene from a movie in order to determine which one is a better indicator. The particular scene that will be discussed is a scene from James Cameron’s Titanic. The scene takes place the day after Jack sees Rose hanging off the edge of the ship while she debates whether she should jump or not. Jack convinces her not to jump, and she agrees. But, her foot slips and Jack saves her. Her fiancé comes running to see what happened but Rose makes up a story about how she fell over trying to see the propellers. Jack remains silent and goes with the story. This particular scene takes place the day after. Jack and Rose are taking a walk around the ship as Rose thanks Jack for saving her life and not disclosing to her fiancé, mother and everyone else the real story of what happened that night (that she tried to commit suicide). What follows is a conversation that starts off as a very cordial and formal discourse, but as the day progresses their dialogue becomes more and more informal as they get to know each other better.
According to the situational view, it does not matter what one is saying or to whom he or she is saying it to, it just matters where. There are five criteria for determining whether or not a transaction is interpersonal or not. They are as follows: close physical proximity, small number of communicators, maximum sensory inputs, no intermediaries, and immediate feedback. Although the situational view does not specify how many communicators are considered a “small” number, the criterion is automatically met because there are only two people talking in this scene—Jack and Rose. Close physical
Interpersonal communication plays a major role in everyone’s daily life. Because it is so important, theorists have developed two views about how to determine whether a transaction is interpersonal or not. We will be looking at the situational and the developmental view by applying it to a scene from a movie in order to determine which one is a better indicator. The particular scene that will be discussed is a scene from James Cameron’s Titanic. The scene takes place the day after Jack sees Rose hanging off the edge of the ship while she debates whether she should jump or not. Jack convinces her not to jump, and she agrees. But, her foot slips and Jack saves her. Her fiancé comes running to see what happened but Rose makes up a story about how she fell over trying to see the propellers. Jack remains silent and goes with the story. This particular scene takes place the day after. Jack and Rose are taking a walk around the ship as Rose thanks Jack for saving her life and not disclosing to her fiancé, mother and everyone else the real story of what happened that night (that she tried to commit suicide). What follows is a conversation that starts off as a very cordial and formal discourse, but as the day progresses their dialogue becomes more and more informal as they get to know each other better.
According to the situational view, it does not matter what one is saying or to whom he or she is saying it to, it just matters where. There are five criteria for determining whether or not a transaction is interpersonal or not. They are as follows: close physical proximity, small number of communicators, maximum sensory inputs, no intermediaries, and immediate feedback. Although the situational view does not specify how many communicators are considered a “small” number, the criterion is automatically met because there are only two people talking in this scene—Jack and Rose. Close physical