Challenges of Communication
– Effective communication requires significant intellectual and psychological resources
– Not everyone we encounter will appreciate the value of communication
– We may over-rely on digitally mediated communication
– We live in a diverse world where intercultural understanding can be difficult
Linear Model of Communication
- Deciding on message-sender selects message to send
- Encoding–sender assigns symbols to his thoughts and feelings
- Transmitting- message sent using particular channel
- Perceiving-receiver detects message has been sent and attends to it
- Decoding- receiver assigns meaning to message
Transactional Model of Communication
- Sender ßà Receiver
- Context
Communication Competence Dimensions
- Appropriateness- can sense what is appropriate
- Communication Skills- build and develop skills-listening, small talk, public speaking, and empathy
- Motivation-factors can influence mood, energy, importance
Stages of Perception
- Selection- helps focus on some info and ignore other
-Exposure-attend to info that reinforces existing beliefs
-Attention-how we focus on certain info
-Perception-ongoing way of selecting messages- “hear what we want”
-Recall-remember what we agree with
- Organizational-efforts to group into units to make sense
-Figure-foreground or point of emphasis
-Ground- background of stimuli that captures attention
-Closure-fill in missing info to complete perception
-Proximity-physical closeness
-Similarity- degree to which something shares attributes
- Interpretation-we assign meaning to stimuli
Self-Concept is the Summation of who you are-DEFINES yourself
Self-Esteem is your EVALUATION of who you are- VALUE yourself
Once you know who you are you make evaluations about yourself
Errors
- Fundamental-attributing others positive success to “luck, easy teachers, or money” while negative (late to work) is personal, “lazy, bad student”
- Self-serving bias-evaluating ourselves-positive success=” intelligence, hard work” negative=blame situation “too expensive, not enough time”
Plan for Self-Presentation
- Set a goal-what impression do you want to create
- Create a strategy-verbal/nonverbal messages
- Execute-do it and evaluate
- Modify negative perceptions-rework this plan reformulating goals
Cultures Reflect Behaviors
- Values and beliefs shared
- Lifestyles lead
- Products bought; Holidays celebrated
- Rules followed
Characteristics of Culture
- Individualism- values people who are assertive and speak for themselves- independent, not reliant on others
- Collectivism-values their membership in the group more than their individual role- take care of one another, avoid competition
- High Context- people rely heavily on environmental cues and understand
- Low Context- people require explicit verbal messages to understand
- High Power Distance- place great deal of value on social rank and status occupation/political
- Low Power Distance- people speak in ways that promote equality and dimmish barriers that status and rank create
- Masculinity-value competitiveness and achievement- direct, forceful communication is valued
- Femineity- relationships, compassion, and nurturing are highly valued
- Monochronic- do things one at a time, punctual. Don’t cancel plans, very structured in their use of time
- Polychronic-flexible with time, change plans/priorities easily
Effective Intercultural Communication
- Learn what you can prior to travel
- Adapt to the norms of host cult
- They are deeply influenced by culture- not “difficult”
- Attempt to be more tolerant of ambiguity
- Use labels and generalizations with caution
Digital Communication
– Type of message-medium/channel
– Type of reply-synchronous/asynchronous
– Media capability-rich media/lean media
- Identify goal
- Assess context/receiver
- Assess strength/weakness
Selecting the Right Medium
- Instant feedback
- Communicating multiple cues
- Transmitting natural language
- Express personality and emotion
Non-Verbal Communication (Kenesics & Proxemics)
– Emblems; Wink, thumbs up, shh
– Illustrator: Gesture/facial expression accompanying a word affect display;
– Affect Display: Nonverbal gesture/facial expression that shows emotion
– Regulators: Nonverbal gesture/facial expression made to change conversation
– Adapters: Nonverbal gesture/facial expression done unconsciously when nervous or stressed.
– Proxemics: Use of space to communicate-intimate 0-18”, Personal 18”-4’, Social 4-12’, Public 12+’
Chronemics-Ways in which communicators use time and messages communicated as a result of how they manage their time.
Hepatics-use of touch in communication.
Paralanguage-vocal cues; pitch, rate, tone, enunciation, silence
Artifacts-ornaments and adornments displayed on or around their physical person
Verbal Communication
– Language is cultural: behaviors, beliefs, attitudes, values of groups
– Language has denotive meanings-universal, dictionary meaning
connotative meanings-Context words used, subjective/emotional definition
- Language is abstract-intangible: love, honor, moral
and concrete-tangible: can see/touch- car, pizza.
- Language is powerful-allows expression of our selves
Richard Weaver: Positive: “god terms” optimism
Negative: “devil terms” creates anger
Needs that Communication Help Satisfy
- Inclusion Needs- need to feel ACCEPTED by and involved with others
- Control Needs- need to feel COMPETENT and confident
- Affection Needs- need for APPROVAL
Relationship Development
- Initiating-3 strategies: direct, ambiguous, flippant
Self-Disclosure (Johari’s Window)
– Open-you and others know these
– Blind- you don’t know but others do
– Hidden- keep known things hidden from others
– Unknown- unknown to both
Social Penetration Theory-Model of self-disclosure-2 dimensions: breadth and depth
Breadth-range of topics on which disclosure is happening
Depth-significance of information disclose
- Intensification-5 strategies: time spent, social/emotional support, help-do favors for, gifts/tokens of affection, “relationship talks”
- Maintenance-behaviors to keep relationships stable
Dialectal tensions-Relationship Maintenance Challenges
- Connection/Autonomy Togetherness, closeness Separation, individual Hurt, lack connect
- Predictability/Novelty Consistent, routine Independence, variety Bored
- Openness/Privacy Sharing, open Hidden, secret Hurt, not sharing
Relationship Maintenance Strategies
- Positivity- cheerful, courteous
- Openness-expressing needs
- Assurances- implying relationship has a future
- Shared Connections outside of relationship
- Tasks- work is distributed equally
- Understanding- in empathetic ways, no judging, apologize
- Termination-3 strategies: agree to end relationship, create distance, end on a positive note
Barrier to Listening
Contextual
- Message Complexity- too detailed, difficult-break it down
- Communication Overload-more messages than we can process
- Physical noise
Personal
- Multitasking/Preoccupation
- Bias and judgement- can’t separate feelings of speaker/message
- Passivity-bored, tired, uninterested, hungry
Competent Communicators
- Set others up to listen effectively
- Careful about their self-talk
- Prepare to listen and concentrate on other’s messages
- Encourage others to talk
- Listen actively, not passively
Critically listen-3 strategies
- Tune in and assess context
- carefully assess the other communicators ideas
- consider source credibility
Interpersonal-Exchange of information, feelings, and meaning through verbal and nonverbal messages : face to face communication.
Small group-interactions among 3 or more people who are connected through a common purpose, mutual influence, and a shared identity.
Team communication-All interactions in exchanges within a team.
Ineffective teams
- Teams are not always best way
- Some tasks require unique and individual expertise and creativity
- Reason inherent in system or culture, predict operate in a dysfunctional manner
High Performance Teams Criteria
- Goal/Purpose
- Shared Accountability
- Rules, Roles, Sanctions
Beneficial: Take notes, serve as mediator , social director
Destructive: isolate themselves block all innovations for new ideas, extinguish morale
- Collaboration
Team Building Phases
- Forming-polite, safe, not too much work
- Storming-disagreements and conflict, no permanent definition of goals or roles
- Norming-solved conflicts, assume roles
- Performing- do the work, flexible, where you see synergy
Team Consensus and positive conflict management
- Team and individual goals are balanced
- Team is supported by its system
- Team objectives are sufficiently clear
- Members are selected systematically, and roles are well managed
- Team has ground rules
- Team is able to facilitate collaboration, disagreement, and trust
- Team has clearly defined standards for performance takes time to pause, reflect, and assess
French and Ravens categories of power-better understand relationship between power and leadership
- Reward-Positive or negative reinforcement in exchange for participation or cooperation
- Coercive-Member has ability to punish for not cooperating or complying with requests
- Legitimate-Power assigned because of 1’s job, position, or assignment
- Expert-ability to influence other’s thoughts or behaviors because they’re perceived as competent, credible, and knowledgeable
- Referent-Ability to motivate and influence others because they are well liked, respected, and admired
- Informational-Power associated with one’s ability to acquire and share valuable information
Bass and Riggio’s behaviors of transformational leadership
- Communicating vision
- Challenging others
- Supporting others
- Modeling good behavior
Attitude of Presentation
- Ethos-credibility of speaker-competence, trust, dynamism
- Pathos-emotional appeal of speaker, ability to arose emotion
- Logos- logical argument presented by speaker
Informative Presentation Goals
- Communicate information that is new knowledge for audience members
- Further existing knowledge
- Update outdated information for change listeners factual understanding for topic
Informative Speeches-builds on knowledge or teaches new
- Instructional-in-depth, knowledge of topic
- Brief report- short, to the point
- Demonstration- how-to advice
- Training session- building skills, more detailed than demo
Persuasive- change someone’s opinions, beliefs
Goals of Persuasion: change how listeners feel, think, or act. Influence other’s attitudes, beliefs, or behaviors.
Types of Persuasive Speeches:
- Definitional- technical, scientific, legal, particular
- Factual- information or evidence, argues for truth
- Policy-legal/political problem and lays out solution to it
- Value- Judgement or beliefs, argues virtue, accuracy
Monroe’s Sequence of Persuasive Speech
- Capture audience attention-stories, quotes, humor
- Identify Problem- provide evidence, create need to know from evidence
- Purpose a solution-reveal solution and how it works
- Help audience visualize life WITH solution
- Give audience action plan
Maximize Persuasiveness to Avoid Resistance
- Ask for small gradual changes
- Take a stand
- Inoculate Against Counterarguments
- Focus only on most important objections
- Use both reason and emotional appeals
- Use fear appeals when appropriate
- Deliver message competently
Expert sources should be used to bolster your own credibility, support your points with facts and data.
Hard Evidence-Facts, data, statistics, physical evidence, and conclusions of known experts. Gives power of suggestion that something is true. Cite any sources used to avoid plagiarism.
Evaluating credibility of supporting Information
- Relevance-Directly supports central object of presentation or point making
- Recency-Important because knowledge and information can change quickly; avoids outdated/disproven evidence
- Credibility-Comes from credible sources and is consistent with other accepted or proven facts
Use of Media will help
- Clarify something in your presentation that may be ambiguous
- Heighten and sustain audience’s interest
- Help audience remember information from presentation
Use of Media can be detrimental
- Message is simple enough for listeners to understand on its own
- Unnecessarily complicate/lengthen presentation, distract, bee to awkward/difficult for to use effectively
- To aid in boosting your confidence or to help you remember what to say and when to say it