Maintaining and Restoring Privacy through Communication in Different Types of Relationships

Abstract

This investigation analysed the kinds of communicative acts that are considered privacy-invading, which communication strategies are used to restore privacy when it has been violated and how relationship type affects communication of privacy. A preliminary self-report survey and a pilot study employing open-ended interviews (n=43) led to the development of a questionnaire in which respondents (n=444) rated 39 possible actions on invasiveness and rated the likelihood of using 40 different tactics to restore privacy. Types of privacy violations formed five dimensions: (1) psychological and informational violations, (2) non-verbal interactional violations, (3) verbal interactional violations, (4) physical violations and (5) impersonal violations. Strategies used to restore privacy included: (1) interaction control, (2) dyadic intimacy, (3) negative arousal, (4) distancing, (5) blocking and (6) confrontation. Significant differences emerged across doctor-patient, employeremployee, teacher-student, parent-child, spouse-spouse and siblingsibling relationships.