Talk:Uncertainty reduction theory

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Huh?

This page makes no sense what so ever. The explanation is vague and complicated. This needs to be reworded...if only I could understand it! HereToHelp 01:36, 17 October 2005 (UTC)

I agree. It is a theory of... what? It might help to identify the field of knowledge it belongs to. Social Psychology, Communication, what? rodii 02:33, 19 October 2005 (UTC)

il help you out a little with the field of knowledge...... use the find tool... type in communication (31 matches) then try Social Psychology (0 matches) now take a guess... don't hurt yourself — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.151.130.151 (talk) 05:10, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

Hi!! I am a student at Georgetown University and I am working on a class project where I have to edit this page to make it better. I have reviewed your comments and made some edits. Please let me know what you think and if you have any more suggestions!!LangCar (talk) 23:49, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

University of Hull class project

Hello, myself and 3 fellow students are working on improving the Uncertainty reduction theory content on Wikipedia as part of a class project at the University of Hull. It appears there have been a number of changes made recently to the citations and referencing by MartinPoulter

However I was wondering if there was anything specific that you feel the page still needs; be it in terms of content or further referencing and cleaning up. --JPeachman (talk) 11:06, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Hi. I've only made some tweaks to make the article conform to Wikipedia's style. Some suggestions for content improvement:

• The section on Interactive strategies presents something as factual: is this one author's opinion (as the other sections are presented) or something broadly accepted by academics in this field?
• It's recommended against having "Critique" or "Criticism" sections: rather each section of the article should assess the evidence for and against that part of the theory, or there should be a single section assessing evidence for and against.
• The last few sections have Harvard-style references in the text e.g. "Planalp & Honeycutt (1985)" but there do not seem to be corresponding citations.
• There seems to be a missing layer of structure. There could be a section at the start setting out the theory, a separate section of applications and another section on variations or alternatives to the theory. See how a Featured Article such as Confirmation bias is structured around a few top-level headings.
• The lead (the paragraph at the top of the article) needs to be longer and to summarise more of the article's content. What are the most significant facts about uncertainty reduction that someone completely new to this topic would need to know?

I hope this is useful. MartinPoulter (talk) 12:01, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Thankyou Martin, the information and suggestions you've provided was very useful. JPeachman (talk) 20:07, 20 March 2014 (UTC)

Just to confirm, this is how our duties break down, team.

JPeachman will do the lead and fixing the layer structure.

StewedVision will do critique and criticism.

RStoakes and User:Dwatson251Dwatson251 will fix up the references and citations in the text and generally sort out credibility issues.

--RStoakes (talk) 14:37, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

I'm guessing we'll be planning to actually put our changes to the articles into effect today, so it's recommended that you say when you did it on the talk page and possibly say which sections you edited, just to avoid accidentally overwriting each other's work. It's unlikely, but you can never be too safe.--RStoakes (talk) 09:29, 24 March 2014 (UTC)

RStoakes - Defense and below

Just stating that I've made some amendments to the the lead section as suggested by MartinPoulter to contain more information and provide a broader introduction to the subject, including referencing some elements expanded on later in the article. --JPeachman (talk) 09:43, 24 March 2014 (UTC)

I like the lead improvements. Just need to tweak the grammar. "people are able to predict the others behavior" looks like it is missing an apostrophe. This is an enormous sentence: "There are three interactive strategies which people may use to seek information about someone, these are passive, active, or interactive furthermore the initial interaction of strangers can be broken down into individual stages, these interactional behaviors can be used as indicators of liking and disliking, the entry stage, the personal stage, and the exit stage." It looks like it needs to be punctuated as three separate sentences: that'll be a lot easier on the reader. The lead at present does a good job giving an overview of the theory, and maybe the next step is to say with what evidence the theory has been tested. Are there surprising predictions the theory makes that have been confirmed? Cheers, MartinPoulter (talk) 15:04, 24 March 2014 (UTC)

I edited the improvements so the sentences read better and aren't to long and edited so formatted Axioms and theorems section so parts can be identified easier StewedVision (talk) 19:11, 24 March 2014 (UTC)

Flow models?

Hi there,

I'm currently trying to create and add flow models to help users, who may not fully understand the theory explained in the text, gain a better understanding of the subject.

The theory itself, may be able to be explained alongside the text and I would like to attempt to do this. I was wondering if anyone could give me any advice on how this may be implemented. I will post up several different examples over the next few days as I finish them but I will need to implement them in the article. What examples in the text could be explained via a flow model or a paradigm? Any general advice would also be highly appreciated. Thank you

DDLancaster (talk) 15:34, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

Conceptual models

Hi there,

I did the above post to try and get some advice on which direction to take for this. In the process to aid two different sections of the theory I would like to propose these images to aid users getting a better understanding of the topic.

I have done a version of the conceptual model by Heath & Bryant (1999) which displays the process of communication (entry, personal, exit).

The other table shows the types of strategies implemented within the theory for communication.

Can any of these be used to aid the article? I'm also looking at copyright protocols for the Heath & Bryant (1999) image as I wouldn't want that to affect this. Any advice would be highly appreciated!

A table designed to show the different strategies implemented through the uncertainty reduction theory for human interaction

A conceptual model re-designed to aid the uncertainty reduction theory's process of thought (entry, personal, exit)

DDLancaster (talk) 15:15, 22 April 2014 (UTC)

Hello from Georgetown University

Hello All,

I am currently taking a class in Communication Theory & Framework at Georgetown University, and part of this class is to improve on a Wikipedia article related to one of the theories we are learning. I will be working on this project individually and I have outlined a contribution plan which mainly incorporates the following:

• Adding references to further enrich the article.

• Adding links to other Wikipedia articles.

• Incorporating some of the further reading to the article.

• Rearranging the order of content so the article is better structured in terms of flow between and within sections.

• Adding two subsections under Contemporary Use; uncertainty in online auction platforms and uncertainty reduction in the context of job hiring.

• Adding a new section on uncertainty reduction, self-enhancement and in-group identification.

• Adding a new video section.

• Editing minor typos and writing structure so the style of writing is consistent.

I am hoping my contributions will add value to this article and I am glad to hear any suggestions related to the improvement on this article.

Best Regards Dk802 (talk) 17:30, 18 October 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia Peer Review Paul Beasley

Hey Dur:

I think you've done an excellent job in your reflection outlining the changes that you're hoping to make in the article. I agree that it reads in somewhat of a confusing way and I can see that most of the article was done by other Wikipedians as part of a class project. I think that your ideas such as adding the YouTube video, and a video section are very necessary changes. I also agree that it would be helpful to change Interaction Strategies to Uncertainty Reduction Strategies because the latter title is much more specific and more appropriate for an encyclopedic article. I also don't think that the Defense section necessarily needs to be a separate from the Critique heading. Either the Defense section needs to be listed as a subheading under the Critique section or more in my opinion, integrated into the Critique section as a part of the overall discussion of the critique. I think you're definitely on the right track by wanting to include references based on computer-mediated communication because this might stimulate readers to do more further reading and is also a great opportunity to link to other communication articles which will definitely improve the quality of the article. Plb40 (talk) 02:00, 27 October 2014 (UTC)Plb40

Peer Review from Vision

Hi Dur, I have to say that you’ve got the hard bone. Although the page is graded as “C”, it is apparently well-developed than most other theory pages, which makes your work even harder. But I think you have come up with a thorough plan in your report. And I noticed that you have started to edit your page and added some interesting applications of the theory. I think they are very relevant and well written, so I do not have more suggestions about this part. However, just one tiny thought. As a reader, after reading the lead (introduction) I think what I want to see next is how the theory is constructed. Therefore, I personally think you might want to change the order of the section “assumptions” and “types of uncertainties”, or as they are the major content of the theory, you may want to have a parent section that covers both two. But this is very subjective, do whatever you think is proper. Other than that, I think the page is very clearly and logically structured, and the writing is coherent too. I am looking forward to your videos, as I don’t usually see videos attached to wikipages. Good luck! Vision Liao (talk) 01:58, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

Hello

Hi, this is Tong from Georgetown University. Currently I am taking a course on communication theories. I am very excited that our professor asked us to make contribution to Wikipedia entry so that we can learn a certain theory in a more interactive way. Personally, I found Uncertainty Reduction Theory very useful in predicting and explaining people's behavior in communication. I hope I can learn more about it from those contributions that are previously made and to be made on Wikipedia. Looking forward to it. Thank you.

Tlgu201533 (talk) 16:25, 6 October 2015 (UTC)Tlgu201533

Peer Review from Lina

Tong, great job with Wikipedia page! After reading through it, I think it covers the theory very thoroughly. From what I could tell, and taking into account what we've learned in class, I don't think that there was any part of the theory missing. Although the information in the page is very thorough, I wonder if some of the pieces of the theory could be explained more concisely and have a bit more flow from one heading to the next. There are many examples throughout the page which causes it to be very lengthy, and there are some examples that maybe could be merged to help with the length and clarity of the message. For example, under the Contemporary Use section, both the interviewing and job hiring example, I think, could be merged under one work environment subtitle and perhaps shortened. Both are very relevant and stuck out to me because of what I do, but I think there is an opportunity to merge the two together to show the full scope of how Uncertainty Reduction Theory can play a part in the entirety of the job seeking process.

Outside of that, I think the section of axioms is really well explained and clear, and I like how there was a visual too. Lastly, I would suggest going through the page with a bit more of an eagle eye as it pertains to grammar. There are a few spelling and tense errors and even a word or two missing from what I was able to see. For example, under the online dating example, I think that first sentence or two is supposed to say that non verbals cues cannot be communicated, but instead it says that non verbals can be communicated. Little things like that. With all of that said, there is a lot of information to go through in this page, so I think you did a great job of adding relevant information to what was already a very thorough page.

- Lina Lbm53gu (talk) 00:52, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

Peer Review from Sherrie

Hi Tong, excellent job at improving this page! It is a smart way to follow the structure of our textbook to introduce this theory, which is thorough and clear. For the background part, you made a good elaboration of the theory development, and you did a great job at identifying incorrect or redundant information. Also, I notice that you further explained the axioms of URT and added examples to illustrate them, which are good ways to help nonacademic readers to understand this theory.

For further improvement, I would suggest that some subtitles could be added to make a clearer outline of the theory. For example, with regard to Types of uncertainty, you may make "cognitive uncertainty" and "behavioral uncertainty" as two subtitles of this part. In this way, both the contents box and the text will be clearer. Similar changes could be applied to other parts such as Process of UR and Stages of relational development.

I also notice that there is a non-existed link of "Richard Calabrese" in the second line of the first paragraph. You may redirect it to its current page or simply remove this link. And I wonder if anything else could be added to the See also part to indicate the related disciplines and topics of URT.

Overall, comparing with the previous versions, the page is much better after your editing. Nice work!

Xh79 (talk) 02:14, 10 November 2015 (UTC)

Peer Review from Wei Xiao

This page is already great. I think in the Communication Accommodation Theory and Anxiety/Uncertainty Management Theory can be also added into "See Also" section, as they are also related theories.

Also, in the "contemporary use" sector, the application of E-health inquiry can be also included. Uncertainty reduction theory has been used to guide examination of the ways e-mail is used between doctors and patients to provide relevant information concerning health care diagnosis and treatment.

Moreover, I think this page can add a section to introduce who this theory can be examines in interpersonal relationship and relational uncertainty. Uncertainty reduction theory indicate a plenty of strategies people can use to restore certainty during interactions. (Wwwei x (talk) 21:28, 16 October 2021 (UTC))

Peer Review from Jenny Xu

A very detailed, well-written article! The only thing that I'd like to point out is that for "Theorems", the layout of text has a lot of same words, like "Amount of verbal communication", "Nonverbal affiliative expressiveness", and it makes the reading experience challenging because too many same texts chunked up together can make one feel dizzy and it is also not the best way to form and organize contents.--Rorogaga (talk) 03:12, 21 October 2021 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: Advanced Communication Theory

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This is a good page

9/10

KarsonKester (talk) 16:35, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: Advanced Communication Theory

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