Humans have the ability to communicate in a personally effective and socially appropriate manner. This competence is dynamic, and is different for every single one of us. It is shaped by our different cultures, historical context, relationships and our every day life. One of the ways we practice our capabilities of communication is through messages; which can be verbal or non verbal. What these messages do for us, is that they reflect our interpretation of roles and goals as an aspect of our self presentation when we communicate. Meaning it helps us understand what someone else is trying to communicate and what we want to communicate to others. When a message is verbal, I like to think of it as a physical phenomenon of sound waves
emitting
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We recognize the message. We act on the message. And that, is what makes humans unique.
Nonverbal messages do the same for us, as verbal messages. They just come in many more ways. Nonverbal messages include: gazing, facial expressions, nonverbal codes, listening, images, and advertising, etc. I’m not going to include writing, because of the language barrier between different cultures. Nonverbal messages are more universal, but are the equal to verbal messages in what they set to accomplish. For instance, I saw a billboard on the freeway of a dead woman with a syringe shoved into her arm. The woman was black and white, the billboard even more black. As I passed, I noticed that the image depicts the woman as anorexic, dirty, and homeless. I don’t see her face as she is lying down supine with her head facing away. To me, this message interprets that drugs can kill. The goal of this powerful message was to convince me that drugs can kill. I understood the connection between the imagery of a syringe and a dead body. So the goal and my adaptation of this message, was built from the presentation and my perception of this image.
Another example of a nonverbal message is listening. I think listening is
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When you listen, your focus is set on the speaker and the speaker’s topic. When you listen, you are attentive, have an open posture, have a clear facial expression, and your body language is open and leaning towards the speaker. (Wankat, Oreovicz) And as we effectively listen, we effectively understand the nonverbal message better.
Why would we want to better understand a message? When we better understand a message, it creates a lesser chance for conflict, builds respect and speeds up the process of understanding and interpreting a message and the goals associated with it.
The last nonverbal message I will touch on is facial expressions. Again, this type of nonverbal is universal. One can argue that it is the most universal way of communicating. But it is more than that. It exhibits emotion better than any other nonverbal, yet it is very simple.
James A. Russell specifies in his Academic journal, “that some facial movements have some sort of emotional meaning, which is understood at above-chance levels by some humans in most cultures. At the other end of the continuum would fall the claim that, for example, exactly seven separate specific facial configurations signal the corresponding number of separate
Miscommunication is a struggle that lives within the world everyday. Being able to understand what another person is trying to convey is an essential part of the way humans interact with one another. When a message is not translated correctly from person to person conflict arises and heated battles rage within a relationship; whether it is a mother and daughter, or two quarreling lovers, or strangers upon the street. All humans are created differently, with diverse upbringings, perspectives, and mindsets. Particular forms of communications may mean different things to various people. When talking about the concept of miscommunications, one must also address the concept of communication itself.
In every society nonverbal communication is one of the most powerful tools that a person can use to interpret the message that is being delivered. Even though verbal communication is fairly straightforward, nonverbal communication allows others to sense the true emotions of the person that is expressing them. For example even though a person may say that they are not irritated, their usage of voice may display otherwise. Nonverbal communication not only reveals hidden messages, but it also complements, substitutes, and exaggerates verbal communication.
Communication involves the exchange of messages and is a process which all individuals participate in. Whether it is through spoken word, written word, non-verbal means or even silence, messages are constantly being exchanged between individuals or groups of people (Bach & Grant 2009). All behaviour has a message and communication is a process which individuals cannot avoid being involved with (Ellis et al 1995).
Nonverbal communication is rich in meaning. Everyone communicates through nonverbal gestures and motions. I realized that you can decipher a lot from an individual or individuals by just paying close attention to what they do, and that words are not really necessary. Watching two people interacting, I figured that they are really close by their space communication, eye language, and body movements.
In its most basic form, communicating involves a sender who takes his or her thoughts and encodes them into verbal and non-verbal messages that are sent to a receiver. The receiver than decodes the messages and attempts to understand what the sender meant to communication. The communication is completed when the receiver transmits verbal and nonverbal feed back to indicate his or her reception and understanding of the message. This process takes place within a context; also know as rhetorical situation, which includes all that affects the communication process such as the sender-receiver’s culture, the sender-receiver‘s relationship, the circumstances surrounding the sender-receiver’s interaction, and the physical environment of the interaction.
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.
Every communication interaction involves two parts: the verbal and the nonverbal. Furthermore, every person is always communicating even when they are not saying a word, thus, it is possible to send an exclusively nonverbal message but it is not possible to send an exclusively verbal message. Nonverbal cues in the interaction are always more powerful indicators of what a speaker means and what the speaker feels. Consider a very simple example: a mother tells her two-year old to stop running around the house but as she makes her direction, she is smiling. The toddler gets two messages: verbally to stop running; nonverbally the smile means mom is pleased with what he is doing. Which direction will the child follow; probably, the second one - mom is pleased regardless of her words so he will continue doing what he was doing.
Nonverbal communication does not rely on the use of words to convey its meaning. “Nonverbal communication is usually understood as the process of communication through sending and receiving wordless messages. These nonverbal messages can be transmitted by bodily gestures, posture, facial expressions, and eye contact” (Subramani 2010). Nonverbal communication is simply that, communication without words. Nonverbal communication is present everday in our society. It goes hand in hand with verbal communication. It complements and enhances spoken words. According to David McNeill, gestures have two core features: they carry meaning, and are synchronous with speech. He goes on to say, “gesture and speech express the same underlying idea unit but express it in their own ways.”
language can allow us to communicate an exact idea or to persuade others to one
The found information states that “nonverbal communication is the process of transporting messages through behaviors, physical characteristics and objects”. Its how and what we use in order to express our feelings and say things. Using symbols is a way of using nonverbal communication. Also, nonverbal communication is the way we use body language and gestures too. Nonverbal communication is often used unconsciously.
Verbal communication is when a sender communicates by speaking. However there are some pros and cons towards using verbal communication. For example, when someone uses verbal communications they can understand what message they are trying to send without any explanation however, some people have different ways of saying things especially people from different cultures because they have different accents and dialects.
I have learned about body language, and the tone of ones voice and the words you choose can make a difference in the way the message is received. Again, I think that this course has introduced me to a meaning and understanding of these types of messages that are more in depth, and complex then I expected. I feel as though the verbal codes are still a little confusing to me. For some of the codes, I can figure them out by looking at the prefix of a word such as morphology; the smallest form meaning in a language, and phonology; the combining of basic sound units of a language. For others, I wasn 't aware that there were words that define a concept, such as semantics, which is the study of the meaning of words. The majority of nonverbal messages in intercultural communication make sense to me. I can think of examples of when they are used in everyday life, but I think it is interesting that we, as least I, do not think of them when we they actually occur. For example, when I talk I do not think of the nonverbal behaviors I am doing that are tied to what I am saying, or illustrators. However, there are a few messages that are so close in similarity that I do have to think about them, such as the difference between regulators and vocalics, and proximity and
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...
I learned a lot about Human Communication in this class when I read the chapter about Nonverbal Communication. Nonverbal Communication is the process of using messages that are not words to generate meaning. I learned that it happens every day. I also learned that is very hard to read or understand depending on the person you are speaking to or with. Verbal and Nonverbal codes work in conjunction with each other. The words we speak or say are used in conjunction six different ways: to repeat, to emphasize, to complement, to contradict, to substitute, and to regulate. I never knew until reading this chapter that we do these things all most every time we communicate. These are things I took for granted until now. I now know that I will pay