Interactional synchrony, positivity, and patient satisfaction in the physician-patient relationship.

Abstract

A growing number of studies examining therapeutic relationship attest to importance of communicating positive affect and establishing rapport. As advances in study of nonverbal communication revealed it to be an important source of affective information,1 increasingly more studies focused on nonverbal components of therapeutic relationship. Within specific context of physician-patient relationship, researchers have found that certain nonverbal behaviors such as smiling, nodding, high levels of eye contact, and forward trunk lean affect judges' ratings of practitioners'interpersonal skills and rapport.2-5 Numerous researchers have posited a relationship between rapport and a form of nonverbal behavior termed interactional synchrony.6-8 Tickle-Degnen and Rosenthal8 have proposed a model of rapport that includes three essential components: mutual attentiveness, positivity, and coordination. First described by Condon and Ogston,9 interactional synchrony refers to coordination of units of behavior by two or more persons and can be defined as the degree to which behaviors in an interaction are