Abstract:The current work explores the generalizability of a revised analysis of face and facework (Wilson, Aleman, & Leatham, 1998) by investigating the potential face threats that concern young adults as they seek to initiate, intensify, or end romantic relationships. Participants in Study 1 (N = 141 students) read three hypothetical scenarios in which they might attempt to (re)define a romantic relationship, and responded to open-ended questions regarding both parties' identity concerns and emotions. Emergent themes were utilized to develop a questionnaire assessing the extent to which participants in Study 2 (N = 274 students) associated unique potential face threats with initiating, intensifying, or ending romantic relationships, and varied what they said when pursuing these three goals in light of relevant potential face threats. Results indicated that people associate very specific sets of potential face threats with each of the three romantic (re)definition goals. This research advances understanding of how individuals utilize face-management strategies in romantic relationships and offers directions for future research.

Recognizing that the object-directed actions of others are governed by goals and intentions is a crucial component of human interaction. These actions often occur rapidly and without explanation, yet we learn from and predict the actions of others with remarkable speed and accuracy, even during the first year of life. This review paper will serve as a bridge between several disparate literatures that, we suggest, can each contribute to our understanding of how infants interpret action. Specifically, we provide a review not just of research on infant goal attribution per se, but also incorporate findings from studies on the mirror neuron system and infant object cognition. The integration of these various research approaches allows for a novel construal of the extents and limits of early goal attribution – one in which the importance of the entire action context is considered – and points to specific future research directions.

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This commentary article is to be published alongside: Hernik, M., & Southgate, V. (2012). Nine‐months‐old infants do not need to know what the agent prefers in order to reason about its goals: on the role of preference and persistence in infants’ goal‐attribution. Developmental Science. doi/http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-7687.2012.01151.x