Introduction

This essay will examine an interaction between Joey and Chandler, two of the characters in
the popular television show Friends, in which some of the hallmarks of effective
communication are present—especially in Chandler’s initial approach to the interaction—but
where conflict and anger nevertheless arise in a seemingly natural and inevitable way. The
analysis will focus mainly on the opening stages of the exchange, identifying and evaluating
key elements such as the participants’ use—and misuse—of phatic and nonverbal messages,
a structured series of feedforward metamessages, and a significant shift in the social-
psychological context of the interaction. The essay will then highlight several barriers
operating in the situation—in particular, psychological noise and polarisation—and will go

on to argue that greater attention to nonverbal messages could have significantly enhanced
the exchange. A transcript of the dialogue of the interaction is included in the Appendix.

The Interaction
Chandler approaches his housemate Joey to confess that he and Cathy, Joey’s girlfriend, have
shared a passionate kiss. Chandler feels guilty about “betraying” his best friend, and it seems
that his main motivation for talking to Joey is his desire to reaffirm the friendship by a
negative self-disclosure (DeVito, 1995, pp.141–148) which he realises is risky, but ethically
important to their continuing friendship. Their interaction begins with a short series of phatic
messages (Tubbs & Moss, 1994, p.22): they greet each other; Joey offers Chandler a drink;
and they have a brief, inconsequential discussion about whether there is really such a drink as
a “Sambuca Margarita”.

The verbal content of this exchange is mainly functioning to signal that all is well between
them, and to reassure themselves and each other that the channels of communication they
habitually share are “open for business”. However, both Chandler and Joey are giving
nonverbal intimations that are at odds with the “All’s well” message implied by their
participation in the phatic ritual. For example, Joey is toying with a cocktail and watching
television in a distracted way, his posture stiff, his face tense and troubled. Meanwhile,
Interpersonal Skills—Case Study and Essay

Chandler comes into the room awkwardly and tentatively, puts his hands in his jacket pockets
but almost immediately takes them out, then briskly removes his jacket. These are good
examples of “double-bind” messages (DeVito, 1995, pp.179–181), or what Birdwhistell
(cited by Tubbs & Moss, 1994, pp.106–107) has dubbed “kinesic slips”, where the verbal and
nonverbal aspects of an interaction contradict each other. And although nonverbal behaviour
is claimed to account for between 65% and 93% of the total meaning of human
communication (Wood, 1997, p.151), there is little evidence in this interaction that Joey even
notices Chandler’s agitation, let alone takes it into account in his interpretation of Chandler’s
words. Similarly, Chandler seems to be so preoccupied with his “betrayal” of Joey that he
fails to notice Joey’s tense posture, his sullen face and his distracted, careless attitude.

The television and Joey’s fiddling with his drink are sources of potential physical noise in the
conversation Chandler wants to establish (DeVito, 1995, p.17), and so to attract Joey’s
attention more fully, he makes effective use of a series of feedforward metamessages
(DeVito, 1995, pp.15–16). First, he tells Joey he needs to talk to him about something. Joey
responds to this by turning the television off, putting his drink down, turning towards
Chandler and apparently giving him his full attention. Chandler’s nervous and hesitant body
movements, facial expression and vocal tone still embody the same message as at the outset
of the interaction, but there is still no evidence that Joey is receiving this message. Given the
elimination of the two obvious sources of noise, this suggests that there may be a further
source of noise at work—most likely the soon-to-be-disclosed fact that Cathy has just broken
up with him. This is discussed further in the following section.

The second feedforward metamessage Chandler sends is to identify the subject of his main
message: “It’s about Cathy”. While the primary effect of the first statement was to clear some
noise from the communication channel, this second statement operates as a preview of the
message to come (DeVito, 1995, p.16)—as does his next assertion: “I like her; I like her a lot,
actually”. Moreover, the semantic and temporal structure of this series of messages, when
considered together with Chandler’s nonverbal communication, takes the form of a

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disclaimer (DeVito, 1995, p.16). That is, Chandler’s apparent intention here is to ensure that
Joey will appreciate the seriousness with which Chandler views his breach of Joey’s trust,
thereby avoiding—or at least softening—the negative reaction Joey will most likely have to
Chandler’s main message. To do this, he first identifies that Cathy is the object of his
message; then pauses; then says that he likes her; pauses again; then intensifies the emotional
content of the last message (“I like her a lot, actually”)—thereby leading Joey slowly and
smoothly into the dangerous emotional territory of his main disclosure.

Throughout the sequence he displays appropriate hand gestures, engaged facial expressions
and strong eye contact, all of which reinforce his concern for Joey’s feelings in relation to the
matter he is about to reveal. But his empathy at this stage is clearly grounded in a static
evaluation of Joey’s state of mind (DeVito, 1995, p.216) rather than in the dynamic reality
that confronts him. This is a direct consequence of his conspicuous failure to respond to the
nonverbal evidence of Joey’s current feelings.

An alternative interpretation of this feedforward sequence might argue that Chandler is

simply unwilling to address his unpalatable topic directly, and that he is merely using
euphemism and circumlocution as a sophisticated form of avoidance behaviour (Tubbs &
Moss, 1994, pp.196–197). This interpretation could be fortified by noting that, later in the
interaction, Chandler momentarily goes along with Joey’s assumption that Chandler has
come to him before anything has “happened” with Cathy—an unmistakable instance of
avoidance behaviour.

Perhaps both interpretations have some merit. On the one hand, Chandler would clearly
prefer not to have to make this disclosure, so it would be unsurprising to find evidence of
avoidance behaviour in his approach to it. On the other hand, Chandler is probably aware that
to launch directly into the disclosure without first carefully preparing the ground would very
forcefully communicate a lack of empathy to Joey. And even though his eventual admission
does provoke an angry reaction from Joey, the remorseful framework within which Chandler
casts his painful message may nevertheless allow their friendship to heal more rapidly—and

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more effectively—than would otherwise have been the case. On balance, then, Chandler’s
use of feedforward here is well-intentioned and thoughtfully conceived, even if it also allows
him to delay the moment he is dreading.

In spite of this promising opening, however, Chandler is abruptly deflected from his course
by Joey’s announcement that Cathy has just broken up with him. This message causes a
sudden shift in the social–psychological context of their interaction (DeVito, 1995, p.18).
Instead of playing the role of the “repentant would-be cuckolder” Chandler is thrown into the
role of “concerned best friend”, distressed to hear that Cathy has just dropped Joey. Both his
words and body language communicate the genuineness of his empathic response: he says
that he is so sorry and asks Joey if he is okay, while moving closer to Joey and leaning
slightly towards him, the expression on his face now revealing a strong other-orientation in
place of the earlier, self-oriented apprehensiveness (DeVito, 1995, pp.117–118).

Even at this stage Chandler could have steered their exchange towards a less hostile and
unsatisfactory conclusion. For example, his question, “Are you okay?”, is not open-ended
enough (Egan, 1994, pp.125–126) to elicit much more than the primarily phatic reply: “I’m
all right”. By asking Joey a more open question about how he feels, and by paraphrasing and
reflecting his responses, Chandler might have recovered some of the ground lost by being
deflected from his main communicative goal, and Joey’s eventual response might have been
less severe.

However, Joey quickly turns the conversation back to Chandler’s feelings for Cathy and,
after almost backing away from his self-disclosure, Chandler eventually reveals that he has
kissed Cathy, and that he thinks he is in love with her. Joey becomes angry, prompting
Chandler to apologise abjectly. But Joey scarcely notices him now and, after delivering a
series of harsh comments to Chandler, leaves the room, slamming the door behind him.

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Barriers
Two sources of physical noise in the interaction—the television and Joey’s drink—have
already been noted, as well as the barrier of Chandler’s static evaluation of Joey’s emotional
state. But perhaps the most significant barrier to communication here is the psychological
noise (Wood, 1997, p.21) generated by both Chandler’s and Joey’s preoccupation with their
own concerns—Joey with his break with Cathy; Chandler with his guilt. One important
consequence of this is that neither of them makes effective use of the ample nonverbal
messages present throughout the exchange. As a result, Chandler fails to anticipate Joey’s
own revelation, and therefore proceeds on the assumption that the most important thing they
need to discuss is his own news. Similarly, Joey fails to realise just how seriously Chandler

judges his own behaviour with Cathy, and misses the opportunity to offer his best friend
appropriate emotional support in making a difficult confession.

Within the context of this psychological noise there is at least one other barrier at work as
well: Joey interprets Chandler’s behaviour in highly polarised terms (DeVito, 1995, pp.208–
210) rather than recognising it in its full complexity. This is demonstrated in his use of terms
such as “betrayal”, and comments such as: “... you’re so far past the line that you can’t even
see the line—the line is a dot to you!” He portrays Chandler as at the negative extreme of a
continuum from betrayal to loyalty, treating his behaviour as if it were the most heinous act
imaginable. This polarisation is facilitated by Chandler’s highly polarised interpretation of
his own actions, which effectively embraces the severity of Joey’s judgement: “You’re right,
I have no excuses. I was totally over the line”; and “... I feel horrible—you have to believe
me”.

Because Chandler is so willing to go along with the exaggerated terms in which Joey casts
his reaction—most likely because of the guilt he is feeling—they fail to communicate
effectively about the real issue at hand. Instead, both participants discharge some of the
emotions that are driving the psychological noise each of them is struggling with: Joey takes
out his hurt and anger at being “dumped” on Chandler, while Chandler leaps at the chance to

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show Joey just how remorseful he feels about his “despicable” behaviour. They may succeed
in communicating something to each other—about the emotions that are preoccupying
them—but this is at the expense of addressing the issue concerning trust, loyalty and
friendship that is the main focus of their interaction.

Improvements
While there were several very positive things about Chandler’s approach, a quite different,
and perhaps more valuable, interaction would have emerged if at least three key elements had
been different. First, if Chandler had temporarily set aside his strong, emotionally laden self-
orientation, this would have allowed him a greater degree of immediacy in the interaction
(DeVito, 1995, pp.113–114), which would have prevented him from embarking almost

blindly on his carefully planned confession.

Second, if he had paid careful attention to Joey’s non-verbal communication from the
moment he arrived home, he would have realised that Joey himself was upset about
something, and he could have used an appropriate open-ended question—for example, “You
look a bit stressed. How’s your day been?”—to transform the phatic ritual into a meaningful
communication opener. This almost certainly would have elicited Joey’s news about his
break-up, which would have allowed Chandler a chance to explore Joey’s reaction through
further questions, paraphrasing and empathic feedback (DeVito, 1995, pp.78–80). This might
have prompted Joey to express some of his anger and disappointment in a constructive way,
rather than simply taking it out on Chandler.

Third, if Chandler had deferred his own revelation until he was sure Joey had dealt with his
immediate hurt about breaking up—perhaps even leaving it until another time—this would
have allowed Joey to see that there were two quite separate issues: his disappointment about
losing Cathy, and Chandler’s apparent breach of trust. One risk with this, however, is that,
when Joey eventually did find out about the kiss, he might retrospectively have
misinterpreted Chandler’s supportiveness and empathy as psychological “guilt money”, and
as a result might have had an even stronger negative reaction. The timing of Chandler’s

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revelation is therefore something only he could judge, given Joey’s behaviour in the
hypothetical new scenario. But at least in the new scenario Chandler would be in a position to
choose the best time to disclose.

Conclusion
Non-verbal communication has been central to this analysis of Chandler’s interaction with
Joey. Because both participants experienced psychological noise with a high emotional
content, neither of them paid sufficient attention to the other’s body language. As a result,
Chandler mis-timed a self-disclosure which triggered a hostile response from Joey, and Joey
failed to realise the full depth of Chandler’s concern about the breach of trust in their
relationship. Chandler was probably better-placed than Joey to initiate a different interaction

because it was the timing of his disclosure that occasioned Joey’s response. If he had been
able to set aside his guilty feelings, respond to Joey’s body language with appropriate
questions, empathic listening and paraphrasing, and perhaps defer his own revelation, Joey’s
exaggerated and bitter attack on him might have been avoided, and their friendship
strengthened instead.

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References
DeVito, J.A. (1995). The interpersonal communication book (7th ed.). New York, NY:
HarperCollins.
Egan, G. (1994). The skilled helper (5th ed.). Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks/Cole.
Tubbs, S.L., & Moss, S. (1994). Human communication (7th ed.). New York, NY:
McGraw-Hill.

Wood, J.T. (1997). Communication in our lives. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.

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