his assignment will ask you to compare and contrast the various applied approaches
taken by the authors in Part II of your text book (Matsumoto, Frank, & Hwang, 2013).
This paper should be 4 double spaced pages or 2 single spaced pages. You are required
to work on your paper independently of your classmates (i.e., no collaborations).
The basic task is to compare and contrast the approaches taken by one author in chapters
Chapter 7 through Chapter 17, to a different author within those same Chapters. We’re
seeing how two different practitioners use and think about nonverbal communication.
Focus your compare and contrast around these issues below, and you MUST USE these
underlined headings and page numbers (you lose a point if you don’t) to help organize your
paper. I have included approximate page length guidelines for each section of this assignment
to give you a sense of what each section requires (based on a double spaced paper). You may
go under or over a bit on these length suggestions without losing any points. Here are the 4
sections:
1. Intro: (appx. 1/2 page). Tell me the two Chapters you chose, and, describe which
issue or fact or element of each author’s approach to nonverbal communication you
found most interesting or novel. Be specific; don’t only state “I like his approach”
or “his approach was most scientific.” You need to explain why. Thus “His
approach was most scientific because he…” or “I like his approach because he …”
2. Commonalities: (appx. 1 page). Describe 2 guiding principles or other aspects of
nonverbal communication that each of your two author’s chapters have in common
with each other. Be specific here too, and keep it focused on the nonverbal stuff. Are
there assumptions they share? How do they assess or prove things?
3. Differences: (appx. 1 page). Describe 2 guiding principles or other aspects of
nonverbal communication that each of your author’s chapters differ from each other.
Be specific…different assumptions? Models of human nature? Situational factors?
4. Contemporary synthesis: (appx. 1 page). Describe which of the two chapter authors
you selected had the most effective application of nonverbal communication. Why do
you think that is so? And finally: How might that author be helped or hindered by
advances in Artificial Intelligence? Give one reason how AI might help them, and one
reason why it might hinder their work. (e.g., written accounts, nonverbal behavior
analysis, faking investigations, identifying killers, product marketing, diagnosing
patients, or whatever -ANYTHING you can think of even if tangentially related).
Make sure to back up your reason with at least one fact from either the text / book of
readings / lectures from our Nonverbal Communication course. Also make sure that
you keep the focus on nonverbal communication aspects, and the science of it all, as
they apply to the practical issue. If you use material from Chapter 18 of the text (the
synthesis chapter) make sure to cite that as the place where you got the insight;
however, you need to come up with your own insights too.
