Communication professor Howard Giles is an interaction specialist. In his undergraduate and graduate courses on intergroup, intergenerational, and intercultural communication, he examines conflicts between people, focusing on how they see themselves as members of social groups, and how that contributes to their sense of well-being.

"I want to open students’ minds to important areas of social life they hadn’t really thought about before. I hope they take what we’ve discussed in class and allow it to influence other courses they take as well as how they communicate throughout the rest of their lives."

Giles became aware of his interest in communication while working as an attendant in a medical clinic in his native Wales.

"The patients I took to the physicians just had to open their mouths and speak and I could predict the manner in which the physicians were going to deal with them," he says. The physicians responded more actively to certain tones of voice and attitudes and gave patients who displayed them more time and attention than they gave others.

That single concept was enough to spark Giles’s interest in the way people communicate and perceive themselves in relation to others.

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