In this laboratory study of interaction patterns within leader-subordinate goal setting dyads, the hypothesis of role differences was supported. Leaders showed resistance to and subordinates showed compliance with each others' attempts to control the relationship. Leaders exercised multiple relationship options, in contrast with the subordinates' more structured responses.

A specific communication methodology for the study of organizational behavior at the level of the interpersonal relationship it presented. The model for analysis uses the transaction, patterned as probabilistic recurring sequences, as the basic unit of analysis and analyzes these stochastic processes using a Markovian framework. Exemplary applications of the methodology are presented, with discussion of methods to identify differences in interaction patterns both within a group and across groups.