Ricerc@Sapienza

This work explores how humans manage the communication of a displeasing and face-threatening truth and how the communicative strategies of the sender and the reaction of the receiver are influenced by their attachment style. Two experimental studies demonstrate that the attachment styles of both senders and receivers can influence the communicative styles of the sender, the emotions that both senders and receivers feel or attribute to their interlocutor, and the reactions of the receivers. In Study 1, couples of participants played a bogus computer game, ostensibly to test their abilities.