The Importance Of Listening

The listening process is undeniably complicated as almost people cannot make a distinction between hearing and listening. It is necessary to understand the exact meaning of both acts. First, hearing is defined as the act of receiving sound. Meanwhile, listening is the active process of receiving, creating meaning and responding to verbal or non-verbal messages. It mainly involves the skill to hold information and to respond enthusiastically to spoken or nonverbal messages. Additionally, listening is predominantly used in communication that requires concentration from both speaker and listener, obtaining meaning from the sound that is heard and reacting to it. People should be willing to put out the constant effort needed to become a truly effective listener. Thus, it is essential to develop effective listening styles which consist of emphatic and objective listening, non-judgemental and critical listening, surface and depth listening, and active and passive listing.

Firstly, in order to listening effectively, a person should learn what the emphatic and objective listening is. Apparently, this style of learning refers to the extent to which a person or listener pay attention on feeling what the speaker is feeling. Emphatic listening is a way of listening in which someone tries to understand what another person means and feels rather than the message being conveyed. To empathise with others is to feel exactly what they are feeling and perceive their worldview as if it were your own. Together with the emphatic listening, it is essential for someone to engage in objective listening as well. A person needs to listen with objectivity and detachment and beyond the level of empathy to better understand the other person. For example,...

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...and listener. In addition, it forces people to listen attentively and avoid misunderstanding as they need to have clarification first before understanding the entire messages. Therefore, active listening is particularly useful in effective communication strategies and planning as it improve productivity in passive listening mode and mutual understanding as well.

To conclude, an effective listener will become the best communicator as he understands the styles of effective listening. Each style provides listeners with the skills how to deal with people feelings and emotions which includes provide emphatic and objective response, use non-judgemental feedback then critical evaluation, emphasize depth listening and practice active listening. These indirectly assist people in striving to become more responsibility and competent listener for the quality of communication.