Wek 9 D-3, Barriers

One concept that I found interesting were the barriers to active listening. The book lists ten different barriers. The first one is the one that I found the most useful to myself. The first barrier is, lack of interest. The book mentions that people lack the interested in the subject matter either because it’s uninteresting to them, or too difficult to understand. When a person lacks interested, then it can lead to boredom, daydreaming, impatience with the speaker, and more. I have found myself daydreaming when listening to others, especially if the speaker is talking about something they have already told me.  I can get annoyed with hearing the same thing over and over, and I will get bored with the conversation or just leave the room. The book also mentions a way to work with the barrier. It mentions that people should find things that interest them, or to just tell themselves that they should pay attention for the moment, since they are there.

week 9 D-2

I think that at times, everyone has selective attention. I know that when I am listening to people talk and when they tell the same story that I heard them say before, I tend to let it go in one ear and out the other. I try to be nice about it and not interrupt them, or tell them they already told me that, but I just sit there and “pretend” to listen. I think I do this because I don’t want to be rude to them, or cut them off while they are talking. One way to overcome it would be to maybe politely mention something that’s going to happen next in their story to give them a sense that they already told it. Also if I’m not interested in a topic then I tend to get distracted and have selective attention. Everyone at one point in their life has had selective attention. For my dad, I can tell when he is paying attention or not. Its fun to call him out, or ask him for things since I know he will say yes, but not really know what  he is agreeing to.

week 9, Listening

There have been times where I found a situation to be difficult to listen to. Each time seems to be a different reason as to why. The most recent time I can recall finding it difficult to listen to someone was this past weekend with friends. One of the girls was telling a story and I just keep zoning out. I could even focus on the conversation. It was hard to sense/head the message that was going on. This usually never happens to be, as for I am usually a good listener to others. I was caught off guard when asked about the story and I had to ask my friend to repeat the whole thing. I was embarrassed for spacing out and found myself to be rude, since my friend usually counts on me to listen to hear and give feedback. Since it doesn’t happen often Im not sure how to overcome it. It hasn’t happened again and I think it happened because I had so much going on anyways that I just needed a break to clear my head, and I didn’t communicate that to my friend, so she just started a conversation with me.

Week 7 D3

After reading this chapter the part that I found the most interesting was the table 6.5 about the functions of nonverbal communication. There were 6 different functions listed. The first is Repetition. Repetition means to reinforce verbal messages with nonverbal behaviors. You use verbal and nonverbal cues together to get a message across. The next is Complement is when using nonverbal messages to expand, or modify details to a verbal message. After that is Accentuation, and that is when you use nonverbal communication to provide emphasis. Next is Substitution and that is using a nonverbal behavior in place of a verbal one. For example, shaking your head to indicate no. Contradiction is the second to last and that involves making the nonverbal and verbal message incongruent. Sarcasm is the best example of contradiction. And the last function of nonverbal communication is Regulation. Regulation is using nonverbal behaviors to interrupt or terminate interactions.  Its behaviors like gestures, nod, eye contact that indicate how the interaction should progress.

Week 7 D2

Proxemics is “the study of how people use space to communicate”(103). Our proximity to others is important in communication.  The book mentions the way we sit in relation to others came be communicated in different ways. One might think that sitting close to others would mean that your trying to make new friends or join a group.  However it could also be seen as invading personal space of a group. Chronemics is “the study of the use of time”(105).   The book says that, “Western cultures are particularly oriented towards clock-based time as an organizing principle in the work world.”  Time deadlines are big with work and school. However in a different setting like hanging out with friends, it can be okay to be a little late, nothing bad will come from it.  As for universal rules for these concepts for all cultures, I don’t think there is one. Each culture differs with personal space and use of time.  One culture might be sticker for their use of time and find it more unacceptable then another for being late to dinner.  Also a culture might think of a dinner as a 4hr thing where you come early to socialize and then stay late and it is rude to leave early.

Week 7 D1- Principles

There are eight principles of nonverbal communication.  One of the principles is, “cultural norms and expectations guide our interpretation”. This means that the way people respond to age, time, class, race, gender, ethnicity, etc., varies in a group setting. An example of this would be age-based and a person of one culture might think it would be fair for the oldest person to take the leader role, and someone of another culture might think it would be the person who puts in the most effort to be the leader. Another principle is, “research suggests that women and men differently decode nonverbal cues”.  This means that men and women differ in the way they decode messages.  For example in a group, a man from one culture might take a women bringing cookies to a meeting as flirtatious, where  a woman from another culture would see it as just a snack. There are other principles and they are all important.