WALKING THROUGH INTERACTION - COMMENTS ON KELLEY,HAROLD,H - EXPANDINGTHE ANALYSIS OF SOCIAL INTERACTIONS BY REFERENCE TO THE SEQUENTIAL-TEMPORAL STRUCTURES OF SITUATIONS

Kelley proposes to analyse social orientations in tel ms of decision m aking. Social orientations are defined by classes of decision rules wh ich an individual adopts when entering and developing an inter action with another person. Contrary to the most traditional approach, outcom e allocation decisions are only an element of a chain of decisions mad e by the individual. The new theory broadens our view of interactions, draws our attention to their complexity and their dynamics. On the ot her hand, Kelley's man behaves as if he ol she processed information i n a systematic way, perceived longterm outcomes and as if he or she co ntrolled the interaction to achieve desirable outcomes. The vision of man as an internally consistent decision-maker is questionable. Many c hoices made in interaction with others ar-e spontaneous and emotion dr iven rather than a result of deliberate information processing. Kelley 's theory offers a highly sophisticated tool for a temporal analysis o f social interactions even though it cannot be applied to the entire s pectrum of intel dependence situations.