A Communicative Approach to Conflict Forgiveness and Reconciliation

Douglas L. Kelley is Professor of Communication Studies and Lincoln Professor of Relationship Ethics at Arizona State University. His research and teaching focus on intimacy and love between relational partners and how they can respond humanely to hurt and struggle. He is recipient of the 2017 Bernard Brommel Award for Family Communication and author and co-author of five books, including Communicating Forgiveness (2008), Marital Communication (2012), Moral Talk Across the Lifespan: Creating Good Relationships (2015), and Just Relationships: Living Out Social Justice (2017).

Vincent R. Waldron is Professor of Communication Studies and Lincoln Professor of Relationship Ethics at Arizona State University. He researches communication practices that make relationships satisfying, productive, and just. He is author and co-author of seven books, including Communicating Forgiveness (2008), Communicating Emotion at Work (2012), Moral Talk Across the Lifespan: Creating Good Relationships (2015), The Middle Years of Marriage: Challenge, Change, and Growth (2017), and Navigating Work Relationships (2017). His work has been funded by the National Institutes of Health, the State of Arizona, and the Bernard Osher Foundation.

Dayna Kloeber, MA is a doctoral student and teaching associate at Arizona State University’s Hugh Downs School of Human Communication and a former fellow of Arizona State University’s Family Communication Consortium. Dayna received top student paper awards from the National Communication Association and Western States Communication Association for her research on conditional forgiveness. Her work has appeared in The Journal of Family Communication and edited books such as Communicating Interpersonal Conflict in Close Relationships and Marriage at Midlife: Counseling Strategies and Analytical Tools. Dayna’s role as a community advocate for forgiveness education led her to create The Forgiveness Tree Ceremony and together with Vince Waldron and Doug Kelley she founded Arizona State University’s Forgiveness Tree Project.