The Expectancy Violations Theory In Legally Blonde

When examining social interaction, there is an understood set of social norms that predominate the conversations. People often interact with many different people under a certain script. Due to these social norms and social formulas, when going outside of these norms there is an expectation that is being interrupted or rather violated. Burgoon established the expectancy violations theory to dissect these types of situations. The expectancy violations theory can be seen in a situation displayed within a movie titled Legally Blonde where a video resume was submitted for the main character Elle Woods to be accepted into Harvard. She submitted a video resume that shows how she was not the most stereotypical or expected student for Harvard, but against the odds, she was accepted (Platt, 2001). Expectancy violations theory can assist with the explanation of how she defeated the odds and was accepted. To understand how the expectations were violated, it is first important to understand the expectations that were at play

The communicator reward valence is defined as the combination of the positives and negatives of the rewards that the communicator can have on the interpreter (Burgoon, 2023). The difference between the communicator reward valence, and the violations valence, is the communicator reward valence has a lot more to do with the communicator, than the actions. This can be seen within the Legally Blonde clip where the interpreters are obviously judging her based on her appearance of nonprofessional attire wearing a bikini for most of the video, along with her peppy and bubbly personality (Platt, 2001). This gave a negative reward in the communicator reward valence due to the fact that it perceived Elle who was the communicator outside of the expectations of what they expected within the attire and personality that is seen throughout corporate