[Speech and conviction as determinants of behavior and perception in interactions: an example of physician-patient...

We report on a simulation study with 72 student subjects as well as on an inquiry of 58 patients on the doctor-patient interaction. We were especially interested in inferences that patients draw from general practitioners' behaviors, i.e., their warmth, their kind of talk, and their embarrassment. The simulation study as well as the inquiry reveal patients' inferences that were highly consistent in 9 (out of 16) dependent variables. Patients' inferences on the state of the disease, on the doctor's competence, interest and warmth, on the doctor's kind of talk and sympathy, all consistently depended on the doctor's behaviors. The psychological as well as medical implications of these results are discussed.