magazine issue 2 2012 / Issue 14

The dish on gossip: Its origins, functions, and bad reputation

• written by Ashley Waggoner Denton
• edited by Namkje Koudenburg

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Kyratzis, A. (2004). Talk and interaction among children and the co-construction of peer groups and peer culture. Annual Review of Anthropology, 33, 625-649.

Lyons, A. & Kashima, Y. (2001). The reproduction of culture: Communication processes tend to maintain cultural stereotypes.  Social Cognition, 19, 373-394.

McAndrew, F. T. & Milenkovic, M. A. (2002). Of tabloids & family secrets: The evolutionary psychology of gossip. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 32, 1064-1082.

McDonald, K. L., Putallaz, M., & Grimes, C. L. (2007). Girl talk: Gossip, friendship, & sociometric status. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly, 53, 381-411.

Morreall, J. (1994). Gossip and humor. In R. F. Goodman & A. Ben-Ze’ev (Eds.), Good Gossip (pp. 56-64). Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas.

Paquette, J. A. & Underwood, M. K. (1999). Gender differences in young adolescents' experiences of peer victimization: Social and physical aggression. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly, 45, 242-266.

Schoeman, F. (1994). Gossip and privacy. In R. F. Goodman & A. Ben-Ze’ev (Eds.), Good Gossip (pp. 72-82). Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas.

Smith, E. R., & Collins, E. C. (2009). Contextualizing person perception: Distributed social cognition. Psychological Review, 116, 343-364.

Smith, E. R., & Mackie, D. M. (2007). Social psychology (3rd edition). New York, NY: Psychology Press.

Solove, D. J. (2007). Free speech, anonymity, and accountability. In D. J. Solove, The future of reputation: Gossip, rumor, & privacy on the Internet (pp. 125-160). Yale University Press.

Wert, S. R., & Salovey, P. (2004). A social comparison account of gossip. Review of General Psychology, 8, 122-137