Heider’s Balance Theory examines how attitudes toward a person and an issue form coherent or inconsistent perceived relations. Communication can clarify or change that configuration, while imbalance does not dictate which relation changes. Psychological balance must remain distinct from truth, ethics, and later communicative or mathematical adaptations.
- FamilyModel
- CategoryTheories & Explanatory Models
- DomainPersuasion & Argument
What these mean
Editorial orientation · Family
Model
In this series, Model names the editorial family primarily used to understand and explain communication: theories, frameworks, effects, traditions, principles and other conceptual resources. It is an umbrella for a route into the field, not a claim that every included object is a predictive model.
Editorial orientation · Category
Theories & Explanatory Models
Explains how or why a communication process works by relating mechanisms, conditions or variables. Its value is an account that can guide inquiry into what produces an outcome, rather than a name for the outcome alone.