The majority of silence research has been limited in a negative perspective in which silence was stigmatized as passive non-behavior or counterproductive behavior in the organization. The present study proposed a broader and balanced approach of silence as a way of active communication in daily communication and investigated its social functions. The Eighty college students completed an open-ended questionnaire asking context cues, the reasons, and the consequence of intentional silence in daily life. The reasons and consequence were categorized to extract their structural factors. Eleven factors of silence reasons were abstracted: “partner caring”, “conflict avoidance”, “thinking arrangement”, “dissatisfaction”, “discomfort”, “embarrassed”, “annoyingness”, “misunderstanding”, “no-idea”, “uninterestedness”, and “ignorance”. The silence consequence data revealed 11 factors such as “turning topic”, “understanding and accepting silence”, “apologizing”, “partner's efforts of resuming communication”, “escaping discord”, “continuation of partner's unilateral speaking”, “misunderstanding”, “partner–embarrassed”, “awkwardness”, “stop communicating”, and “nothing happened”. Furthermore, the analyses on frequencies of silence reasons by partner's gender or relational attribute(vertical vs. horizontal) showed the patterns that have been consistently found in verbal communication literature. The findings suggest that silence is not meaningless inaction but active and goal-driven communication. Its functional implications in cultural contexts were discussed.

Abstract
 1. 연구배경 및 연구목적
 2. 이론적 배경
  2.1. 기존 서구 관점 중심의 침묵 연구
  2.2. 침묵에 관한 새로운 시각과 문화적 차이
  2.3. 침묵 유형화의 타당성을 확인할 수 있는 변인
 3. 연구방법
  3.1. 연구 참여자
  3.2. 자료수집 과정 및 개방형 질문지
  3.3. 자료 분석
 4. 침묵 이유와 침묵 결과의 요인추출
  4.1. 침묵 이유의 분류와 범주화
  4.2. 침묵 결과의 분류와 범주화
 5. 침묵 이유 특성 유형화의 타당성 검증
  5.1. 성별에 따른 침묵 이유
  5.2. 관계의 속성에 따른 침묵 이유
  5.3. 침묵 이유에 따른 침묵 결과
 6. 논의
 7. 결론
 참고문헌

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