Judy Burgoon's Expectancy Violation Theory

Expectancy violation theory is a communication theory which was proposed by Judy Burgoon. This theory mainly looks at violating another person’s interpersonal expectations. This theory is all about the fact that people approach what they like or expect and avoid what they do not like or expect. First of all, Burgoon was influenced by scholar, Stuart Hall. Hall believed that spatial expectations is the key to getting people to like you. Hall came up with the idea of proxemics which studies personal space, which Burgoon studies a lot for the expectancy violation theory. Proxemics is heavily influenced by culture. It might be the norm is some cultures to be in close spatial distance to a strangers and in other cultures this could be against the norm. According …show more content…
Burgoon defines expectancy as a prediction of what will happen rather than what people desire to happen. Expectations are influenced by cultural norms, social expectations, and individual differences which include personality and biological sex. Violation valance is basically the value that people put on violations. It focuses on the behavior not the person behind the behavior. Communication violation valance is a mix of the positive and negative values that are based on the unexpected behavior with the outcome of a punishment or reward. This is basically describing a situation where somebody would size another person up or ask themselves “what’s in it for me?” Unsure or questionable violations get people to search for the context or background behind the behavior. This leads to the interactive adaptation theory which analyzes how people change their approach when the behavior is unexpected. Overall the expectancy violation theory seeks to show a link among the unexpected behavior and attraction, credibility, influence and