ABSTRACT

This chapter presents a procedure for examining interactional synchrony as a process that discriminates between satisfied and dissatisfied couples' communication. It examines why the behavior reciprocity framework in clinical studies of marriage has been limited for understanding positive communication in marriage. It also suggests that interactional synchrony is a useful framework for understanding the organization of positive nonverbal behaviors during marital communication and to identify processes of positive communication that discriminate between satisfied and dissatisfied couples. Clinical studies of marital communication have usually examined partners' nonverbal behaviors in their emotion-expression function. Synchrony takes place when there is coincidence between two or more partners' respective timing of changes in behaviors, regardless of similarities of behaviors or directions of behavior changes. The Procedure for Examining Interactional Synchrony entails collecting a database of partners' levels of immediacy behaviors. The development of the Immediacy Behaviors Rating System was based on a functional approach to nonverbal exchange.