Phatic

From ThesisWiki

Definitions

1. Of, relating to, or being speech used to share feelings or to establish a mood of sociability rather than to communicate information or ideas.
2. Relating to discourse that is social rather than informative

Correlation to Goffman

Phatic communion is closely related to the notion of "face" (Goffman 1983); "positive face" is the desire of all speakers to be approved of by their listeners, while "negative face" is the desire of all speakers to be unobstructed in their autonomy.

• Social Intelligence in Conversational Computer Agents
• Erving Goffman: "On Face-Work" (find this article)