March meeting summary by
Tina M. Novinski
Over Views of Social Styles
Analyticals:
Drivers:
Amiables:
Expressives:
After the March meeting, we all know each other, ourselves, and our heroes and heroines a little bit better—and thanks to Alice, we had fun in the process. Alice Kober is a former copywriter for an ad agency. She wrote for such accounts as Land O’Lakes butter and Betty Crocker. No easy thing as Alice doesn’t cook. So she changed careers using her considerable skills to become a training course developer. For the past twenty years she has been successfully writing and delivering training courses for Fortune 500 companies.
What is a Social Style? It is a way to measure two dimensions of behavior: assertiveness and emotiveness or responsiveness (the amount of emotion we show in social situations).
Take a look at yourself, your loved ones—your critique group. Examine the clues to assertiveness. Note the volume of speech, the rate of speech (fast or slow). How do they express opinions? Emphatically or tentatively? Do they speak first or listen and observe in social situations? Do they ask more than they tell?
The clues to emotiveness include the voice—variation in pitch, facial expression, hand gestures and other body language. Emotiveness as described by Ms. Kober is not how much you feel, but how much feeling you show.
A Driver is more assertive, tells and is a high risk taker. The Expressive is an extrovert and shows more emotion and is relationship oriented. The Amiable is an introvert, shows more emotion and is relationship oriented. The Analytical is less assertive, asks and is a low risk taker.
Positive adjectives to describe the Driver include: Alpha, extroverted, aggressive, and productive. Negative adjectives would include: pushy, aggressive, cold, hard-hearted and overbearing.
Positive adjectives for the Expressive are: inspirational, visionary, creative, fun-loving and enthusiastic. Negatives might be: dreamers, flakes, unreliable, inconsistent, or BS’ers.
Positive adjectives for an Amiable are: friendly, loveable, warm, kind, considerate. Negatives overheard: passive-aggressive, wishy-washy, manipulating, wimpy, pouty.
Analytical's positive adjectives are: experts, predictable, patient, think-things-through. Negative adjectives: nit-pickers, icebergs, drones, nerds, know-it-alls.
Social Styles can also be used in creating your hero and heroine. Characterization ideas shared at the program included: Remember that opposites attract and they should appreciate the qualities of the mate of the opposite Social Style, not necessarily try to change them. Or consider starting with one Social Style for a character—a very extreme example, and have them adapt or modify out of respect in the love relationship.
Utilize Social Styles to make your secondary characters have excessive traits of a particular category. Remember that Social Styles are how they react in a social situation. It does not define how they grow and develop or change in the story.
Have fun with it and use it to better understand your characters and to make them come alive. Ask your characters questions and answer them based on the Social Styles.
Social Styles can help you to fully develop your story’s characterization. It can also prevent you from throwing something at your Driver critique partner.
Home | Membership Info | HODRW Authors | Congratulations!! | Links | Board Members | Meeting Info | Monthly Spotlight! | Articles | Calendar | Molly Contest | Aspen Gold Contest |