Shame in social interaction: Descriptions of experiences of shame by participants with high or low levels of narcissistic traits.

In this study, we investigate how personal experiences about shameful events are described in face-to-face social interaction, and how these stories differ between participants who have either high or low levels of narcissistic personality traits. The dataset consists of 22 dyadic conversations where the participants describe events where they felt ashamed of themselves. We found the narratives to vary in terms of five dimensions. With narcissistic individuals, the default narrative tended to exhibit a cluster of characteristics that gather at one end of these dimensions: (1) weak expressions of shame; (2) located in the story-world; (3) low level of reflexivity as well as; (4) responsibility of the described event; and (5) a general level of description. We discuss the findings in relation to sociological and psychological theories of shame and suggest that individuals with narcissistic personality traits are more inclined to use suppressive conversational practices in their treatment of shame, thus providing a "window" to these interactional practices.

Recognition in interaction: theoretical and empirical observations.

In the current paper we aim to combine the theoretical ideas of recognition theory to conversation analytical, empirical observations. We ask what recognition theories can give to conversation analysis, and vice versa. We operate on a model of recognition that consists of three different modes: respect, esteem, and love/care, and which distinguishes the levels of conversational actions and the attitudes of recognition manifested in such actions. In this study we examine data examples from various conversational settings (institutional, quasi-experimental, family interaction) and activities (decision-making, storytelling), focusing on the more complex cases of (mis)recognition. We show how recognition can appear both explicitly and implicitly in conversational sequences, and demonstrate how the levels of conversational actions and recognition can be either congruent or incongruent with each other. At the end of the article, we discuss the implications of this view for the interface of conversation analysis and sociological theory, arguing that it can inform and promote the development of interactionally based social and societal critique.

Physiological responses to proposals during dyadic decision-making conversations.

A novel conversation-analytically informed paradigm was used to examine how joint decision-making interaction, with its various types of proposal sequences, is reflected in the physiological responses of participants. Two types of dyads-dyads with one depressed and one non-depressed participant (N = 15) and dyads with two non-depressed participants (N = 15)-engaged in a series of conversational joint decision-making tasks, during which we measured their skin conductance (SC) responses. We found that the participants' SC response rates were higher and more synchronized during proposal sequences than elsewhere in the conversation. Furthermore, SC response rates were higher when the participant was in the role of a proposal speaker (vs. a proposal recipient), and making a proposal was associated with higher SC response rates for participants with depression (vs. participants without depression). Moreover, the SC response rates in the proposal speaker were higher when the recipient accepted (vs. not accepted) the proposal. We interpret this finding with reference to accepting responses suggesting a commitment to future action, for which the proposal speaker may feel specifically responsible for. A better understanding of the physiological underpinnings of joint decision-making interaction may help improve democratic practices in contexts where certain individuals experience challenges in this regard.

Physiological responses to affiliation during conversation: Comparing neurotypical males and males with Asperger syndrome.

We examined the emotional and psychophysiological underpinnings of social interaction in the context of autism spectrum disorder, more specifically, involving participants diagnosed with Asperger syndrome (AS). We recorded participants' autonomic nervous system (ANS) activation (electrodermal activity, heart rate, and heart rate variability) and facial muscle activation during conversations in two different types of male dyads: (1) ten dyads where one participant has been diagnosed with AS (AS/NT dyads) and (2) nine dyads where both participants are neurotypical (NT/NT dyads). Afterwards, three independent raters assessed continuously each participant's affiliative and dominant behaviors during the first and last 10 minutes of the conversations. The relationship between the assessed data and ANS responses was examined. We found that, in the NT/NT dyads, a high level of affiliation displayed by the conversational partner calms down the participant when they are actively dominating the interaction. In contrast, when the participants themselves expressed affiliation, their psychophysiological responses indicated increase in arousal, which suggests that the giving of affiliation is physiologically "hard work." The affiliation-related ANS responses were similar in those NT participants whose conversational partner had AS, while some differences in facial muscle activation did occur in comparison to NT/NT dyads. In the AS participants, in contrast, a high level of affiliation provided by the conversational partner was associated with increase in arousal, suggesting heightened alertness and stress. As for their own affiliative behavior, the AS participants exhibited similar indicators of alertness and stress as the NT participants, but only when their own level of dominance was low. Our results increase understanding of how individuals with AS experience social interaction at the physiological level, and how this experience differs from that in NT individuals. Moreover, our results confirm and further specify our earlier results, where we proposed that affiliation involves the type of "sharing of the burden" that also reverberates in the participants' bodies.