When one cannot not communicate: A challenge to motley's traditional communication postulates

Abstract

In a recent article, Motley (1990) challenges the popular axiom that one cannot not communicate by advancing five postulates from a sender perspective. From this perspective, communication is intentional, is interactive, is encoded, requires symbols, and has a fidelity dimension. After detailing nine possible types of communication, the present article offers a receiver perspective, concluding that scholars should be interested in at least six types of communication. The receiver perspective holds that communication can be unintentional, noninteractive, and symptomatic, spontaneous, and nonsymbolic, and without a fidelity requirement. Implications of these perspectives for the study of communication are provided.