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Riley Flint

Dr. Mclanahan

CMST 250

5 May 2019

The Effect of Anger on Communication

Communication is an essential part of relationships. It is hard to for a relationship to form

and maintain without proper communication. Communication has both negative and positive

impacts on relationships. There are many factors that influence the way people communicate

with one another. Emotions have a huge impact on how we communicate. Emotions are internal

feelings a person experiences in response to circumstances and mood. Emotions always have a

direct affect on the way we communicate, even if people do not realize it. Emotions can be

shown more accurately by facical expressions and nonverbal cues rather than the actual words

being spoken. Anger is an emotion that directly effects the way people communicate with each

other. The effects of anger on communication in relationships are very serious and can be

dangerous as well. It is important to study this issue to better understand why it happens and how

it can be fixed. Expectancy Violation Theory and Uncertainty Reduction Theory are wo

communication theories that are useful in studying the effects of anger on communication in

relationships.

Anger is an intense emotion caused by a variety of feelings all specific to the indivudal. It

can be a feeling of aggression, displeasure or built up frustration. “Anger is a powerful emotion

and if it isn’t handled appropriately, it may have destructive results for you and those closest to

you.” (Department of Health & Human Services). Anger is an emotion that strongly affects the
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way people communicate in a relationship. Anger is an emotion that sparks a “fight or flight”

reaction in the body. It is almost inevitable for a person to not think before they speak while

angry. People act irrationally when they are angry, therefore the words coming out of their

mouth might not be how they actually feel. Anger can cause a person to lash out and be verbally

abusive. Studying the effects of anger on communication in relationships is very important. It is

important to study because reoccuring verbal abuse is detrimental to the mental health of the

person involved in the relationship. By studying this topic, people can better understand why this

happens and how it can be solved. Verbal abuse is a form of emotional abuse. Emotional abuse is

any act that makes dwindles a person’s feeling of worth. Emotional abuse can occur in any type

of relationship and can ruin a person for the rest of their lives. “What Are the Short-and

Long-Term Effects of Emotional Abuse?” in an article written Ann Pietrangelo that discussed

the effects of emotional abuse. “Studies show that severe emotional abuse can be as powerful as

physical abuse.” (Pietrangelo 2015-2019) The author writes that people who have experienced

emotional abuse can develop anxiety, chronic pain, insomnia and intense feelings of loneliness.

(Pietrangelo 2015-2018) People get caught up in emotionally abusive relationships because the

person doing it to them is channeling their anger through communication in the relationship. By

studying this issue through the lens of communication allows people to understand why it is

happening and help put a stop to it. The short-term and long-term effects of emotional abuse are

extremely serious which is why it is so important to study this issue.

Expectancy Violations Theory is a communication theory that would be useful in

studying how anger effects communication in relationships. Expentency Theory attempts to

discern the unpredictable actions of human beings during an interation. (Griffin, et al. 81) When
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somebody predicts an interaction will go a certain way and it does not, there is either a postive or

negative reaction. More times than not the reaction is a negative one. Expectancy Violation

theory is made up of three main concepts. (Griffin, et al 86) The three concepts are expectancy,

violation valence, and communicator reward valence. (Griffin, et al. 86) Expectancy refers to

what action or behavior a person in predicting will happen. Violation valence is whether or not

we will have a negative or postive reaction to the specific unpredicted behavior. (Griffin, et al.

87) Communicator reward valence is a way to balance out the negative and positive reactions.

Sometimes people will tend to have a more positive reaction to the unexpected behavior if they

already have an existing postive opinion of the person. The three core concepts lay out the steps

a person goes through when figuring out why a behavior was unexpected.

In order to to study how anger effects communication, one must first study and

understand why people act the way that they do when they are angry. Expectancy Violation

Theory supports the concept that people tend to experience anger when something does not

happen they way they thought it would. When a person is angry they tend to communicate in an

unexpected way which causes the other person involved to have a negative reaction. This

negative reaction can then cause anger as well. Expectancy Violation Theory can be useful in

studying the effect of anger on communication in relationships by creating a survey containing

questions about eh cause of fights in relationships. The survey would include a series of

scenarios and possible reactions to the scenarios. The survey would be used to prove how people

react when an unexpected behavior occurs. This theory could be used to show how choosing a

different reaction to a situation can reduce the amount of anger experineced by a person.

Therefore, reducing the amount of people that experience verbal abuse.

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Another theory that would be useful in studying how anger effects communication in

relationships is Uncertainty Reduction Theory. “Uncertainty Reduction Theory focuses on how

human communication is used to gain knowledge and create understanding.” (Griffin, et al. 108)

The theory explains how when people interect for the first time there are certain things they will

do in order to feel more comfortable. As people learn more about each other, it is easier to

predict their reactions. Knowing what kind of person you are talking to decreases the amount of

uncertainty you feel about that person. There are three prior conditions that make people want to

reduce uncertainty.(Griffin, et. al 108) The first condition is anticpation of future interactionism,

which means that you know you will see that person again. (Griffin, et al. 108) The second

condition is incentive value, this means that the person has something that you want. (Griffin, et

al. 108) The final prior condition is deviance, which means that they act in a weird way. (Griffin,

et al. 108) People are drawn to people that they have less uncertainty with. If a person has high

levels of uncertainty they will do things to try and reduce it.

Uncertainty Reduction Theory can be used to study the effects of anger on

communication in relationships. Although this theory refers to an inital interaction with a person,

it can also be applied to existing relationships. When a person is angry they tend to act in a way

that does not truly represent who they are, raising a lot of uncertanity for the other person. It can

feel as if you do not even know this person anymore. Uncertainty Reduction Theory is a stepping

stone to creating a more intimate relationship with somebody. If a person repeatly lashes out

from anger it will be impossible for the two people to create an intimate bond. Uncertainty

Reduction Theory can be used to create a study for the effects of anger on communication in

relationships. One way to study the issue would be to find couples who fight more than the
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average people and give them a survey. The survey would contain questions regarding the core

of their fights. The survey would support the idea that if somebody acts out of character levels of

uncertainty increase. The survey would also show that if somebody constantly experiences a

large amount of uncertainty with another person their relationship will never be as intimate as

others.

If a relationship doesn’t contain healthy communication it will not thrive.

Communication in relationships is a very important thing. Emotions can effect communication is

many ways. Anger is an emotion that can have a negative and potentially dangerous effect on

communication. When people lash out at somebody when they are angry it can be considered

verbal abuse. Expectancy Violation Theory and Uncertainty Reduction Theory are two

communication theories that can be used to study this issue. It is important to study how anger

effects communication in order to reduce the amount of verbal abuse and emotionally abuseive

relationships.