The dentist-patient relationship: mutual perceptions and behaviors.

The relationship between patients' characteristics and dentists' perceptions as well as the associations between these dimensions and specific dentist behaviors as perceived by patients are explored. Dentist perceptions of patient sophistication and anxiety were related to several patient characteristics, but perceptions of patient likability were unrelated to patient personal and social characteristics. Perceptions of patient likability were associated with more specific dentist behaviors than were other dentist perceptions noted by patients. The results suggest that dentists' views are influenced primarily by those patient characteristics manifested during treatment. In general, dentists like patients who are dentally sophisticated and not anxious.