Clarifying boundary conditions and extending the motives for nonimmediate language use: A proposed model and test using physicians' role experience and gender

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Abstract
This study examines, in empirical and theoretical terms, the notion of verbal immediacy taken from the discipline of communication and Wiener and Mehrabian's (1968) work. Physicians’ role experience and gender were found to predict nonimmediate language use, with experience being positively related to use of spatial nonimmediacy and automatic phrases. Gender and experience interact to predict physicians’ use of temporal, implicit, and qualified nonimmediacy. Inexperienced male physicians used the most immediate language overall during interaction with patients, whereas experienced male physicians used the most nonimmediate language overall during interaction with patients. Physicians may use these findings to understand how specific speech forms are used to objectify experience. With this understanding, physicians may choose to tailor some speech patterns. Theorists may use these findings to further understand the motives for use of particular speech indices which may, at times, communicate avoidance, but at other times, communicate approachability.