Emotional Support – Methodological Aspects of Measuring the Quality of Comfort-intended Communication
Emotional Support – Methodological Aspects of Measuring the Quality of Comfort-intended Communication

Summary/Abstract: The aim of this article is to present methodological aspects of research on comforting language skills, evaluating the quality and sophistication of supportintended messages, and explaining key factors underlying the potential effectiveness of emotional support in case of “emotional conflicts”. Research proves that the core of support-intended message is “person centeredness”, defined as the ability to explicitly acknowledge and elaborate, legitimize the subjective perspective of a distressed partner [Burleson 2010]. Empirical operationalization of this concept underlies the development of hierarchical coding system for sensitivity of comforting strategies, which nowadays is one of the most popular tools to evaluate the quality of supporting communication. The main assumptions of this coding system have been presented, together with its structure and criteria of analyzing the potential comforting effectiveness. At the end, cultural stereotypes and misconceptions descending the quality of support-intended behaviours were addressed.

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