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About

This is the official new page for research into Behavioral Communication (BC). The study began around 2006, initiated by Michael Ivanov, Ph.D., then a doctoral student at the California School of Professional Psychology in San Francisco, CA. The research continued through 2012, with final data published in 2018. If you were a participant in the original study, please click here.

Abstract

How can differences among people in the proclivity to say things by doing rather than verbally be understood and measured? Behavioral Communication (BC) is defined as a variable of individual differences concerning the use of behaviors that indirectly express one's feelings, needs, and thoughts, as a substitute for more direct and open forms of communication. BC thus provides a conceptual framework to account for many instances of day-to-day behavior from communication standpoint. A measure of the construct, the 33-item Behavioral Communication Questionnaire (BCQ), was developed with an Internet sample (N = 247). High alpha reliabilities (from .92 to .93) were obtained in measuring behavioral communication toward three referents: partner, friend, and colleague. Strong positive intercorrelations among these versions of the BCQ suggested that people report consistency in what and how they communicate regardless of with whom they communicate. Psychometric analyses of the BCQ as well as its subscales and correlates are presented.

Updates

• 2012: The second phase of research into behavioral communication has recently been completed. In this new study, a partner version of the BCQ was developed, allowing individuals to report on the amount of behavioral communication they receive from their partners. Similar to the original self-report version, the BCQ partner version demonstrated excellent psychometric properties and yielded expected correlations with other study variables. Additionally, this study provided an opportunity to analyze results for both BCQ measures within a sample of couples. The findings offered data on (a) the concurrent validity of the measures, (b) test-retest reliability, and (c) additional correlations between behavioral communication and various personality and relationship attributes. These new results are published in the doctoral dissertation titled Perceptual Agreement: Reality and Illusion in Romantic Relationships by Michael Ivanov, Ph.D.
• 2018: Updated results from the measures of behavioral communication were published in the journal Couple and Family Psychology: Research and Practice under the title “Perceptual Agreement: Assessing Reality and Illusion in Romantic Relationships.”

BC Publications

• Ivanov, M. & Werner, P. (2010). Behavioral communication: Individual differences in communication style. Personality and Individual Differences, 49(1), 19-23. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2010.02.033
• Ivanov, M, & Werner, P. (2018) Perceptual Agreement: Assessing Reality and Illusion in Romantic Relationships. Couple and Family Psychology: Research and Practice, 7(2), 76-90. https://doi.org/10.1037/cfp0000101

BC Conference Presentations

• Title: "The Behavioral Communication Questionnaire: Development and Analyses" Presented at: Society for Personality Assessment Conference, New Orleans, LA Presentation Date: March 27th, 2008
• Title: "Behavioral Communication and Its Personality Context" Presented at: Western Psychological Association Conference, Irvine, CA Presentation Date: April 10th, 2008

Information Request

To request a copy of presentation materials, the article, or other information, please fill out the contact form. Note that some presentation materials, articles, and the measure are not available to the general public, so please indicate the purpose of your request as well as your institutional affiliation. If you are a researcher interested in using the Behavioral Communication Questionnaire, you will be required to complete and sign a research agreement.