Dark Side of Interpersonal Communication

Relational Communication Challenges
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Relational Communication Challenges
Relationship is a common and significant experience people encounter in their lives. Whether family, workplace, romantic, or friendship, a relationship boosts self-esteem, increases happiness and satisfaction, and improves the physical and mental well-being of an individual. Studies have shown that people in healthy relationships are less likely to develop psychological and emotional problems like depression and suicide ideation because they live happily. In contrast, those in unhealthy relationships live in fear and anger, making them more vulnerable to mental conditions. However, no relationship is perfect. All relationships are prone to the dark side of interpersonal communication. These are communication that results in negative outcomes or challenges experienced in developing relationships. They include verbal aggression, hurtful messages, stalking, bullying, deception, infidelity, bullying negative conflict spirals, and psychological abuse.
Part I
Communication is an effective tool in building a healthy relationship. Healthy communication in a relationship allows partners to share their thoughts and feelings, and express their needs (Wrench et al., 2020). Every relationship has ups and downs, but a substantial communication style can make it easier to deal with conflicts when they arise. This improves the emotional connection between couples and enables them to become more confident in establishing deeper intimacy. However, poor communication destroys relationships as it makes partners feel emotionally unsafe and detached (Wrench et al., 2020). They feel frustrated, lonely, and unimportant in their relationship. This keeps them stuck in negative patterns of communicating, making it hard for them to solve their disagreements. Some of These negative patterns form the dark side of communication.: - a communication that leads to negative outcomes. Some types of communication considered to be on the dark side are verbal aggression, hurtful messages, deception, betrayal, stalking, and bullying (Wrench et al., 2020). This communication can be explained using various interpersonal communication theories like social penetration theory and relational