Interpersonal Communication Theory

Historically, public relations has been closely associated with mass communication in part because until the 1980s, most public relations practitioners were educated and worked as journalists for traditional news media (daily or weekly newspapers, network-operated television, and radio) before entering public relations. Also, public relations frequently targets such news media as a popular channel to carry its messages to various publics, placing emphasis on noteworthy activities for publicity and media relations. However, public relations commonly employs interpersonal communication in carrying out its research and planning functions and executing strategies, tactics, and evaluation processes. Practitioners might well study interpersonal communication theory and master interpersonal communication techniques to enhance their best practices.

Traditional news media—as well as newer forms of Internet-based mass media—provide [Page 477]glimpses of socially constructed reality, projecting “pictures in our heads” synthesized from the real world as expressed in Walter Lippmann's terms from his seminal book, Public Opinion. The news media acts as the public's window on the world, according to Gaye Tuchman (1978). Mass communication influences the way people relate to one another interpersonally and vice versa. This assessment is appropriately applied to public relations: in many instances, public relations influences the way people relate to one another interpersonally. Since about 2005, when practitioners began in earnest to use interactive, Web-based online strategies and tactics, such as social media, to engage in dialogic relationships with target publics on behalf of their organizations, there has been a growing recognition of the importance of interpersonal communication in public relations.

As early as 1955, interpersonal communication was described as an intervening variable between mass communication and behavior change, when Elihu Katz and Paul Lazarsfeld introduced the two-step model of mass media effects. This model depicts interpersonal interactions as channels of mass media information in which individuals engage in interpersonal communication about mass media content, exchanging information and influencing each other's opinions. Public relations campaigns frequently work to facilitate the two-step model, which depends on word-of-mouth amplifications of public relations’ mass media publicity placements in traditional news media and now online via websites, posts on web-blogs, and social media, such as Facebook, Twitter, and dozens of other emerging digital platforms.

Theories dealing with individuals in relationships or the relationships themselves, especially— but not limited to—dyads, described, explained, and predicted interpersonal communication contexts. Public relations theory and practice might well serve as a bridge between interpersonal and mass communications, since public relations contexts often include communication between dyads as well as broader societal interactions.

Weighing similarities as well as differences between interpersonal communication and mass communication, Jennings Bryant and R. L. Street, Jr. (1988) suggested that interpersonal and mass communication differ in (a) theoretical focus, with mass communication being preoccupied with receiver-oriented and interpersonal, both receiver- and source-oriented, with an emphasis on the latter; (b) nature of the communication process, with mass and interpersonal communication each having varying active, recursive (involving feedback), interactive, and transactional patterns, depending on respective theoretical perspectives; and (c) outcomes of message perception in relation to receiver cognitions and attitudes: interpersonal research assumes cognitions and attitudes to be comparatively stable; mass communication assumes they are dynamic and subject to influence by the mediated message. Bryant and Street concluded that studying each other's models and sharing findings can enrich both interpersonal and mass communication domains. The same assumption applies to interpersonal communication and public relations at least as well. Elizabeth Toth, Timothy Coombs, and others argued for “pluralistic” studies and applications in public relations, involving rhetorical, relational, and systems perspectives from interpersonal communication theory.

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