Healthy Communication

topic

Healthy communication in close relationships encompasses the interrelated skills of emotional expression (articulating internal states accurately and vulnerably), empathic listening (attending to the emotional content as well as the informational content of what others communicate), assertion (expressing needs, preferences, and limits directly rather than passively, aggressively, or passive-aggressively), nonviolent communication (expressing observations, feelings, needs, and requests without blame or criticism), and repair (recognizing communication failures and actively working to restore connection following them).

Role

Communication skills are the most immediately modifiable relational health factors — with most relationship dysfunction being substantially addressable through the development of specific, teachable communication competencies that most people were never explicitly taught. John Gottman's research identifying the 'Four Horsemen' of relationship apocalypse (criticism, contempt, defensiveness, stonewalling) as the behaviors most predictive of relationship dissolution provides both the diagnostic framework for identifying dysfunctional communication patterns and the implicit treatment target: their antidotes (gentle startup, building culture of appreciation, taking responsibility, physiological self-soothing). Yet most people enter their most important relationships with the communication patterns they absorbed from their family of origin, without any formal training in the skills that would improve them.

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