Interpersonal Communication: Everyday Encounters

I had to buy this for a college course. I might as well have wiped myself with the pages. If you are looking for a whole bunch of politically correct lectures about how all of the world's problems are caused by heterosexual, white males, then this is the book for you. If you have to buy this for a college class, I'm sorry.

This book is wonderfully accessible and serves as a great introduction to interpersonal communication and preparation for upper-level coursework on relational communication. I have used this textbook for 4 years at a community college and 2 years at a state university and the students have always rated this textbook very highly. Although they do state that the chapters are a bit long, they feel it is very accessbile and easy to understand. The students also report that they like the examples/blurbs from other students that pepper the chapters, and many of them bring up those examples or Wood's personal examples in relation to their own lived experiences during class discussion.
Thanks to the students' positive responses to the text, I have been able to explore more options in teaching besides reiterating the text in lecture format and have developed quite an array of exercises and projects that push my students to understand some difficult concepts better, to learn more sophisticated materials, and to improve their interpersonal communication skills through practice.
I praise Julia Wood for creating a textbook that allows students to be in charge of their own learning and teachers to go outside the expected routine.

I've been using editions of this text for more than fifteen years. It's a thorough introduction to the basics of interpersonal communication. I've also taken key concepts and used them in my workshops for business. Yes, it's a college text, BUT it really is an intelligent, easy to understand overview for anyone looking to improve their skills. It has a permanent place in my bookcase!

Bought this book for a college class. It is a very readable, very accessible book, pleasant and easy to read. For the most part, it is very inclusive of alternative cultural values and family configurations. Good author, good book - I totally would recommend it.

I am taking a Interpersonal Communications class right now, and wasn't familiar with what this meant, so I was curious about the book, as it is required reading. Wow. The author does make a lot of assumptions about cultural differences and relationships. She doesn't cover the aspects of miscommunication or disfunctional communication (not much anyway). And really, this whole subject is as clear as mud for me. Ms. Wood attempts to explain and define one subject, but her explanation requires a dictionary to decifer it! I would not recommend this book for this type of class.

Ms. Wood is intelligent and provides a lot of good information in this textbook. This was chosen for the course I teach before I took the position and if I had my way, we would have found a different book. It is not that the information is bad, it is just that Ms. Wood becomes very repetitive. About half of the first six chapters seem to drag on and most of the time restates the same thing from an earlier chapter or from the same chapter. I like what she has done with discussing multicultural issues, but some of it seems to be patronizing to the reader. I think another edition should be done and making the chapters shorter and more readable (Chapter 1 goes on for 78 pages -- which lost my attention, so I know my students had the same problem.) In the course review, the textbook generally gets a poor or below average rating. I can not give you a recommendation, as I am in the middle of searching for a better option.

A great book on communication. I have learned a lot from this book and would recommend it to anyone who wants to know more about how we communicate and how to improve our communication. A lot of theory and example. A lot of useful hints and tips.

This book is expertly researched and very well-written with material clearly organized for ease in learning. The chapters are a bit long, but worth the read for anyone taking a class or pursuing a degree in communications ;).