Listening is a skill that requires active, rather than passive, participation to advance shared understanding and minimise misinterpretation. Active listening strategies such as analysing and displaying non-verbal body language, clarifying meaning and accuracy, expressing understanding for the speaker’s feelings through empathy and moments of silence contribute to effective communication. These methods encourage the speaker to convey his or her thoughts and minimises misinterpretation between sender and receiver. In order to discuss this topic it is necessary to determine the definition of the terms effective communication and active listening. Effective communication occurs when there is a shared understanding between sender and receiver (Eunson 2008: 9). Active listening is a listening skill that ‘focuses on ... clues, ie, utterances and/or behaviours that are not explicit but may have special meaning and suggest unshared ideas, concerns, and expectations’ (Lang et al 2000: 222). Active listening is as much a visual activity as it is an auditory activity. Non-verbal body language such as eye contact and body positioning allows the listener to fully understand the point that the speaker is communicating while, for the listener, displaying positive messages through these channels lets the speaker know that there is interest and full attention is being given to what is being said. Simon Armson illustrated this point when he said ‘If you listen to everything that you hear, not just the words, but what’s going on around them, you get a much richer picture’ (cited in Theobald & Cooper 2004: 103). Non-verbal signals such as eye contact, mirroring the speaker’s mannerisms, facing the speaker with an open body posture and n... ... middle of paper ... ...an, DT 2009, The basics of communication: a relational perspective, Sage Publications, Canada. Eunson, B 2008, Communicating in the 21st century, 2nd edn, Wiley, Milton. Rogers, CR & Farson, RE 1987, ‘Active listening’, Global Effectiveness Training, viewed 25 March 2011, < http://www.go-get.org/pdf/Rogers_Farson.pdf>. Theobald, T & Cooper, CL 2004, Shut up and listen!: the truth about how to communicate at work, Kogan Page, London ; Sterling, VA. West, R & Turner, L 2009, Understanding interpersonal communication: making choices in changing times, 2nd edn, Wadsworth Cengage Learning, Boston. Lang, F, Floyd, MR & Beine, KL 2000, ‘Clues to patients’ explanations and concerns about their illnesses: a call for active listening’, Archives of Family Medicine, vol. 9, March 2000, pp. 222 – 227, viewed 27 March 2011, .
Listening and responding to others has a major role to play in good communication and as such, satisfy their own purposes in life. People communicate with each other for getting information across, for learning and evaluating purposes, for listening and observation purposes or for mere enjoyment or recreation. However, it is a well known fact, that no two people listen, communicate or respond in the same way, and we know that it is true because research in the field has proved that it is so. According to
Most times listening can be taken for granted and be confused with hearing. People are so focused on getting their message across that they forget to stop and pay attention to what others are saying. Another important part of how we communicate is the verbal and non-verbal elements of a message. Verbal communication is everything we say; nonverbal communication includes everything else. The way you stand, your facial expressions, and even the clothes you wear can add meaning to what you are saying. The phrase “actions speak louder than words” summarizes the importance of nonverbal communication. Imagine being in a room full of people where no one is talking. Chances are you can tell who is anxious, who is sleepy and even who is relaxed. Someone is able to know all this because of all the nonverbal signals taking place around you. Every day people are surrounded by situations in which they have to interpret a message based on what they see and hear. As a customer, as well as an employee, you can come across circumstances in which your listening skills and your ability to read gestures can lead to either successful or very frustrating
Communication in all relationship can be successful when our listener get the message that we want to convey and it is not so much about what we want to say. Listening is a unique process because it involves psychological and voluntary process that goes beyond simply reacting to sounds. It includes understanding, analyzing, evaluating, and responding. As a human, we will use different listening styles, depending on our preferences and purposes. Listening styles refer to the different ways people listen and analyze the content of a conversation. Usually, these styles either have to do with the way listeners choose to receive the message or with how they analyze the message. Listening is very important because we listen in order to establish and communicate power. There are few types of listening that can be used in order to communicate effectively.
For example, James Van Fleet sheds light on the most effective strategies you can take and use in every one of your relationships with every communication and moment of interaction with others. For example, one of the huge components of good communication is active listening. Though "listening" by itself may seem mundane, Van Fleet presents real-life examples of how this works. One of the benefits of Conversation Power is the fact that you can listen to this audiobook repeatedly for different occasions.
A vital aspect of interpersonal communication is the style in which one listens. While every individual possesses their own preferred method of listening in communication, it can be enlightening to analyze our own strengths and weaknesses so as to maximize effectual communication. Within the confines of four main listening style categories, I have chosen those which best describe my own personal listening style.
Communication and active listening are the key components which can help patients to feel more deeply seen and understood. When we integrate a holistic approach other than just medical, it helps the patient reduce stress, produces better
As The Gift of Listening describes, “Opening one’s heart and listening at a deep level does not come easily and is rarely achieved simply by life experience” (Browning & Waite, 2010, p. 151) There are different aspects to being a good listener that are often difficult to achieve and lead to poor listening. One significant challenge to listening is the attention needed in order to actively listen to another person. Proper listening does not occur due to a passive process but instead it takes deliberate action and thought towards what a person in saying. Like previously stated, actively listening is achieved by sitting in a comfortable and open way and maintaining good eye contact. When a person does not exhibit these techniques good listening often does not occur. The challenge of utilizing different techniques in order to listen to others in a better way often gets blocked by barriers that make active listening unable to occur. In our society today one major barrier to listening is technology. In a casual setting, proper listening often doesn’t occur due to someone being tied to their cell phone. The millennial generation is often guilty of passively listening to others due to the mobile technology that is being used today. Many conversations occur without eye contact or full focus on what the other has to say and instead is spent staring at a
Bienvenu, S. & Timm, P. R. (2002). Business Communication, Developing Strategy and Skills. Prentice Hall.
In our growing, diverse society it’s very important to have diverse communication skills. The reason for this is because it brings richness in our society. Effective communication helps us better understand a person or situation and enables us to resolve differences, build trust and respect, and create environments where creative ideas, problem solving, affection, and caring can flourish (Robinson, Lawrence, and Jeanne Segal). It helps our society flourish. Communication is the process of understanding information through the transmittal of words, actions, hidden messages, signals or thoughts. Communicating in a world of diversity may require more than just a transmittal of words. Communication sometimes require more than one process depending on who you are communicating to. Communicating in a world of diversity has many benefits. Communication is split into two parts which is listening and speaking. Speaking as well as listening goes hand in hand with each other. Speaking and listening is verbal and nonverbal. Listening is one of the most important aspects of effective communication (Robinson, Lawrence, and Jeanne Segal). It’s not always what is being said but rather what is being done. Non-verbal communication is a big part in communication also. Both the talker and listener are participating in non-verbal communication. Non-verbal communication is depicting the body language, body movement, gestures, postures, eye contact, or either one of the five senses. Developing the ability to understand and use nonverbal communication can help you connect with others, express what you really mean, navigate challenging situations, and build better relationships at home and work (Robinson, Lawrence, an...
Listening is one of the most powerful tools of communication and is a process that is used to receive, convey a meaning, and respond to both verbal and nonverbal messages. It is what we choose to do and it requires more work than speaking. Oftentimes, people simply misunderstand the difference between listening and hearing. Hearing is a passive process that takes in sounds and noises and listening is what you choose to do. This selective process includes 5 phases that can be acquired for us to become effective listeners in the future. The 5 phases are attending, understanding, remembering, critically evaluating (listening), and responding. Once the 5 different areas are understood, we will become aware of what needs to change and how we can change them. This will also allow us to improve our listening skills in the workplace, school, at home, etc.
Listen up! Are you really listening? What is Listening and why is it important? This paper will address the viewpoint of listening skills and its outcome. Listening is an essential tool, which is one of the constructive aspects in the communication process, for communicating with other people. To listen well is a talent that is learned. However, for people to listen effectively, they would need to practice to obtain the skill. ”As with any new skill, learning to listen takes effort, attention, and practice” (Stewart, 2006, p. 202).Listening skills allow people to make sense of and understand what another person is saying. In other words, listening skills allow you to identify with the meaning of what people are talking about.
communication as addressed in our book, Looking Out, Looking In. I strongly suggest you take notes on
It involves active listening and reflects the accountability of speaker and listeners. Information is conveyed as words, tone of voice, and body language. According to dimbleby et al(1992) Communication is a learnt activity and is provided by the media which forms a bridge between the sender and the receiver. In the process A speaker transmits a message and must ensure that the message is delivered clearly. A listener takes utterance of the message and must be an active listener and give feedback. Communication is a process that includes linear influencing and transactional views from different dimensional barriers (İşman et al., 2003). One-way communication where the sender cannot get any feedback is the linear view. On the other hand, the influencing others view is the existence of a two-way communication which includes feedback as well as nonverbal communication, but it does not include at the same time sending-receiving feedback th...
...tention to how people react to one another’s comments, guessing the relationship between the people and guessing how each feels about what is being said. This can inform individuals to better understand the use of body language when conversing with other people. It is also important to take into account individual differences. Different cultures use different non-verbal gestures. Frequently, when observing these gestures alone the observer can get the wrong impression, for instance, the listener can subconsciously cross their arms. This does not mean that they are bored or annoyed with the speaker; it can be a gesture that they are comfortable with. Viewing gestures as a whole will prevent these misunderstandings. Non-verbal gestures are not only physical, for example; the tone of voice addressing a child will be different from the way it is addressed to an adult.