Listening in Interpersonal Communication Paper
Listening in Interpersonal Communication Paper
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There can be little doubt that you listen a great deal. On waking, you listen to the radio or television. On the way to school, you listen to friends, people around you, screeching cars, singing birds, or falling rain. In school, you listen to the instructors, to other students, and to yourself. You listen to friends at lunch and return to class to listen to more instructors. You arrive home and again listen to family and friends. Perhaps you listen to music on your phone, news on the radio or your computer, or dramas and sitcoms on television. All in all, you listen for a good part of your waking day. And there can be little doubt that listening is significant both professionally and personally. In today’s workplace, listening is regarded as a crucial skill. Whether a temporary intern or a high-level executive, you need to listen if you’re going to function effectively in today’s workplace. If you’re not convinced of this, take a look at the many websites that talk about the skills needed for success in today’s workplace and you will find that listening consistently ranks among the most important skills. Personally, we want partners who listen to us; we seek them out in good times and bad to share our thoughts and feelings. Without someone to listen to us, our lives would be a lot less fulfilling. In this chapter, we look at the nature of the listening process, the barriers to effective listening, the varied styles of listening you might use in different situations, and some cultural and gender differences in listening. Throughout this chapter, we’ll identify ways to avoid the major barriers to listening and provide guidelines for more effective listening.
The Process of Listening
6.1 Define listening and describe the five stages of listening. Traditionally, the study of listening has focused on spoken messages (Emmert, 1994; Brownell, 2010, Worthington & Fitch-Hauser, 2012). However, in light of Facebook, Twitter, wikis, and blogs, we need to expand the traditional definition of listening as the receiving and processing of auditory signals. If posting messages on social media sites is part of interpersonal communication (which it surely is), then the reading of these messages must also be part of interpersonal communication and most logically part of listening. Listening, then, may be defined as the process of receiving, understanding, remembering, evaluating, and responding to verbal [spoken or written] and/or nonverbal messages. We can look at listening as a process occurring in five stages: (1) receiving (hearing and attending to the message), (2) understanding (deciphering meaning from the message you hear), (3) remembering (retaining what you hear in memory), (4) evaluating (thinking critically about and judging the message), and (5) responding (answering or giving feedback to the speaker). This five-step process is visualized in Figure 6.1. All five listening stages overlap; when you listen, you’re performing all five processes at essentially the same time. For example, when listening in conversation, you’re not only remaining attentive to what the other person is saying but also critically evaluating what he or she just said and perhaps giving feedback. Listening is never perfect. There are lapses in attention, misunderstandings, lapses in memory, inadequate critical thinking, and inappropriate responding. The goal is to reduce these obstacles as best you can. Note that the listening process is circular. The responses of Person A serve as the stimuli for Person B, whose responses in turn serve as the stimuli for Person A, and so on. As will become clear in the following discussion of the five steps, listening is not a process of transferring an idea from the mind of a speaker to the mind of a listener. Rather, it is a process in which speaker and listener work together to achieve a common understanding. Figure 6.1 emphasizes that listening involves a collection of skills: attention and concentration (receiving), learning (understanding), memory (remembering), critical thinking (evaluation), and competence in giving feedback (responding). Listening can go wrong at any stage—but you can improve your listening ability by strengthening the skills needed at each step of the listening process. Consequently, suggestions for listening improvement are offered with each of the five stages.
Stage One: Receiving
Listening begins with hearing, the process of receiving the messages the speaker sends. One of the great myths about listening is that it’s the same as hearing. It isn’t. Hearing is just the first stage of listening; it’s equivalent to receiving. Hearing (and receiving) is a physiological process that occurs when you’re in the vicinity of vibrations in the air and these vibrations impinge on your eardrum. Hearing is basically a passive process that occurs without any attention or effort on your part; hearing is mindless. Listening, as you’ll see, is very different; listening is mindful. At the receiving stage, you note not only what is said (verbally and nonverbally) but also what is omitted. You receive, for example, your boss’s summary of your accomplishments as well as the omission of your shortcomings. To improve your receiving skills: • Focus your attention on the speaker’s verbal and nonverbal messages, on what is said and on what isn’t said. Avoid focusing your attention on what you’ll say next; if you begin to rehearse your responses, you’re going to miss what the speaker says next.
•Avoid distractions in the environment; if necessary, take the ear buds out of your ears or turn off your cell phone.
•Maintain your role as listener and avoid interrupting. Avoid interrupting as much as possible. It will only prevent you from hearing what the speaker is saying.
At times, you may wish to ask your listeners to receive your messages fairly and without prejudice, especially when you anticipate a negative reaction. For this purpose you’re likely to use disclaimers, statements that aim to ensure that your messages will be understood and will not reflect negatively on you. Disclaimers also lessen any impression of what you’re saying being an attack on face. Some of the more popular disclaimers follow (Hewitt & Stokes, 1975; McLaughlin, 1984):
•Hedging helps you to separate yourself from the message so that if your listeners reject your message, they need not reject you (for example, “I may be wrong here, but…”).
•Credentialing helps you establish your special qualifications for saying what you’re about to say (“Don’t get me wrong; I’m not homophobic” or “As someone who telecommutes, I…”).
•Sin licenses ask listeners for permission to deviate in some way from some normally accepted convention (“I know this may not be the place to discuss business, but. . .”).
•Cognitive disclaimers help you make the case that you’re in full possession of your faculties (“I know you’ll think I’m crazy, but let me explain the logic of the case”).
•Appeals for the suspension of judgment ask listeners to hear you out before making a judgment (“Don’t hang up on me until you hear my side of the story”).
Generally, disclaimers are effective when you think you might offend listeners in telling a joke (“I don’t usually like these types of jokes, but…”). In one study, for example, 11-year-old children were read a story about someone whose actions created negative effects. Some children heard the story with a disclaimer, and others heard the same story without the disclaimer. When the children were asked to indicate how the person should be punished, those who heard the story with the disclaimer recommended significantly lower punishments (Bennett, 1990). Disclaimers, however, can also get you into trouble. For example, to preface remarks with “I’m no liar” may well lead listeners to think that perhaps you are lying. Also, if you use too many disclaimers, you may be perceived as someone who doesn’t have any strong convictions or as someone who wants to avoid responsibility for just about everything. This seems especially true of hedges. In responding to statements containing disclaimers, it’s often necessary to respond to both the disclaimer and to the statement. By doing so, you let the speaker know that you heard the disclaimer and that you aren’t going to view this communication negatively. Appropriate responses might be: “I know you’re no sexist, but I don’t agree that …” or “Well, perhaps we should discuss the money now even if it doesn’t seem right.” In this brief discussion of receiving—and, in fact, throughout this entire chapter on listening—the unstated assumption is that both individuals can receive auditory signals without difficulty. But for the many people who have hearing impairments, listening presents a variety of problems. Table 6.1 provides tips for communication between people who have and people who do not have hearing difficulties. Listening in Interpersonal Communication Paper
DeVito, Joseph A.. Interpersonal Communication Book, The (Page 150). Pearson Education. Kindle Edition. Listening in Interpersonal Communication Paper
Stage Two: Understanding
Understanding is the stage at which you learn what the speaker means—the stage at which you grasp both the thoughts and the emotions expressed. Understanding one without the other is likely to result in an unbalanced picture. Understanding is not an automatic process; it takes effort. You can improve your listening understanding in a variety of ways:
1. Avoid assuming you understand what the speaker is going to say before he or she actually says it. Making assumptions can prevent you from accurately listening to what the speaker wants to say.
2. See the speaker’s messages from the speaker’s point of view. Avoid judging the message until you fully understand it as the speaker intended it.
3. Ask questions for clarification if necessary; ask for additional details or examples if they’re needed. This shows not only that you’re listening—which the speaker will appreciate—but also that you want to learn more. Material that is not clearly understood is likely to be easily lost.
4. Rephrase (paraphrase) the speaker’s ideas in your own words. This can be done silently or aloud. If done silently, it will help you rehearse and learn the material; if done aloud, it also helps you confirm your understanding of what the speaker is saying.
Right now, a large part of your listening takes place in the classroom—listening to the instructor and to other students, essentially for understanding. Look at Table 6.2, which offers a few suggestions for listening effectively in the classroom.
DeVito, Joseph A.. Interpersonal Communication Book, The (Page 151). Pearson Education. Kindle Edition.
Stage Three: Remembering
Effective listening depends on remembering. For example, when Susan says that she is planning to buy a new car, the effective listener remembers this and at a later meeting asks about the car. When Joe says that his mother is ill, the effective listener remembers this and inquires about her health later in the week. In some small-group and public speaking situations, you can augment your memory by taking notes or by recording the messages. In many work situations, taking notes is common and may even be expected. In most interpersonal communication situations, however, note taking is inappropriate—although you often do write down a telephone number, an appointment, or directions. Perhaps the most important point to understand about memory is that what you remember is not what was said but what you remember was said. Memory for speech is not reproductive; you don’t simply reproduce in your memory what the speaker said. Rather, memory is reconstructive; you actually reconstruct the messages you hear into a system that makes sense to you. Although this may seem obvious to you (reading a chapter on listening), in a survey of over 1,800 people, 63 percent thought that memory works like a video and accurately records what they hear and what they see (Simons & Chabris, 2011). If you want to remember what someone says or the names of various people, this information needs to pass from your short-term memory (the memory you use, say, to remember a phone number just long enough to write it down) into long-term memory. Short-term memory is very limited in capacity— you can hold only a small amount of information there. Long-term memory is unlimited. To facilitate the passage of information from short- to long-term memory, here are FOUR suggestions (focus, organize, unite, repeat):
1. Focus your attention on the central ideas. Even in the most casual of conversations, there are central ideas. Fix these in your mind. Repeat these ideas to yourself as you continue to listen. Avoid focusing on minor details that often lead to detours in listening and in conversation.
2. Organize what you hear; summarize the message in a more easily retained form, but take care not to ignore crucial details or qualifications. If you chunk the material into categories, you’ll be able to remember more information. For example, if you want to remember 15 or 20 items to buy in the supermarket, you’ll remember more if you group them into chunks—produce, canned goods, and meats.
3. Unite the new with the old; relate new information to what you already know. Avoid treating new information as totally apart from all else you know. There’s probably some relationship and if you identify it, you’re more likely to remember the new material. Listening in Interpersonal Communication Paper
4. Repeat names and key concepts to yourself or, if appropriate, aloud. By repeating the names or key concepts, you in effect rehearse these names and concepts, and as a result they’ll be easier to learn and remember. If you’re introduced to Alice, you’ll stand a better chance of remembering her name if you say, “Hi, Alice” than if you say just “Hi.” Be especially careful that you don’t rehearse your own anticipated responses; if you do, you’re sure to lose track of what the speaker is saying.Listening in Interpersonal Communication Paper
Stage Four: Evaluating
Evaluating consists of judging the messages in some way. At times you may try to evaluate the speaker’s underlying intentions or motives. Often this evaluation process goes on without much conscious awareness. For example, Elaine tells you that she is up for a promotion and is really excited about it. You may then try to judge her intention: perhaps she wants you to use your influence with the company president, or maybe she’s preoccupied with the promotion and so she tells everyone, or possibly she’s looking for a compliment. In other situations, your evaluation is more in the nature of critical analysis. For example, in listening to proposals advanced in a business meeting, you may ask: Are the proposals practical? Will they increase productivity? What’s the evidence? Is there contradictory evidence? In evaluating, consider these suggestions:
1. Resist evaluation until you fully understand the speaker’s point of view. This is not always easy, but it’s almost always essential. If you put a label on what the speaker is saying (ultraconservative, bleeding-heart liberal), you’ll hear the remainder of the messages through these labels.
2. Distinguish facts from opinions and personal interpretations by the speaker. And, most important, fix these labels in mind with the information; for example, try to remember that Jesse thinks Pat did XYZ, not just that Pat did XYZ.Listening in Interpersonal Communication Paper
3. Identify any biases, self-interests, or prejudices that may lead the speaker to slant unfairly what is said. It’s often wise to ask if the material is being presented fairly or if this person is slanting it in some way.
4. Recognize fallacious forms of “reasoning” that speakers may employ, such as:
• Name-calling: applying a favorable or unfavorable label to color your perception—“democracy” and “soft on terrorism” are two currently popular examples.
• Testimonial: using positively or negatively viewed spokespersons to encourage your acceptance or rejection of something—such as a white-coated actor to sell toothpaste or a disgraced political figure associated with an idea the speaker wants rejected.
• Bandwagon: arguing that you should believe or do something because “everyone else does.”
DeVito, Joseph A.. Interpersonal Communication Book, The (Page 153). Pearson Education. Kindle Edition.
Stage Five: Responding
Responding occurs in two phases: responses you make while the speaker is talking (immediate feedback) and responses you make after the speaker has stopped talking (delayed feedback). These feedback messages send information back to the speaker and tell the speaker how you feel and what you think about his or her messages. When you nod or smile in response to someone you’re interacting with face-to-face, you’re responding with immediate feedback. When you comment on a blog post, poke a person on Facebook who has poked you, or say you like a photo or post on Facebook, you’re responding with delayed feedback. The ease with which feedback can be given on social media (and e-mail and mobile communication) seems to have created an expectation for feedback. When you don’t respond (or don’t respond quickly enough), it may be interpreted as negative feedback, for example, that you don’t like the new post or that you want to create more distance between you. This ease of responding and the expectation (and desire) for feedback may also be one of the reasons motivating the frequent status updates and the adding of new photos, at least for some social media users. In face-to-face communication, supportive responses made while the speaker is talking are particularly effective; they acknowledge that you’re listening and that you’re understanding the speaker. These responses include what nonverbal researchers call back-channeling cues—comments such as “I see,” “yes,” “uh-huh,” and similar signals. Responses made after the speaker has stopped talking or after you read a post on a blog or on Facebook are generally more elaborate and might include expressing empathy (“I know how you must feel”), asking for clarification (“Do you mean that this new health plan is going to replace the old one?”), challenging (“I think your evidence is weak here”), agreeing (“You’re absolutely right on this; I’ll support your proposal”), or giving support (“Good luck”). Social networks make this type of feedback especially easy with comment buttons and the thumbs up icon. Improving listening responding involves avoiding some of the destructive patterns and practicing more constructive patterns, such as the following five:
1. Support the speaker throughout the speaker’s conversation by using and varying your listening cues, such as head nods and minimal responses, for example, “I see” or “uh-huh.” Using the “like” icon, poking back on Facebook, and commenting on another’s photos or posts on social networking sites also prove supportive.Listening in Interpersonal Communication Paper
2. Own your responses. Take responsibility for what you say. Instead of saying, “Nobody will want to do that” say something like “I don’t think I’ll do that.” Use the anonymity that most social networks allow with discretion.
3. Resist “responding to another’s feelings” with “solving the person’s problems” (as men are often accused of doing), unless, of course, you’re asked for advice (Tannen, 1990).
4. Focus on the other person. Avoid multitasking when you’re listening. Show the speaker that he or she is your primary focus. Take off headphones; shut down the iPhone and the television; turn away from the computer screen. Instead of looking around the room, look at the speaker; the speaker’s eyes should be your main focus.
5. Avoid being a thought-completing listener who listens a little and then finishes the speaker’s thought. Instead, express respect by allowing the speaker to complete his or her thoughts. Completing someone’s thoughts often communicates the message that nothing important is going to be said (“I already know it”).
DeVito, Joseph A.. Interpersonal Communication Book, The (Page 154). Pearson Education. Kindle Edition. Listening in Interpersonal Communication Paper
Listening Barriers
6.2 Explain the major barriers to effective listening. In addition to practicing the various skills for each stage of listening, consider some of the common general barriers to listening. Here are five such barriers and some suggestions for dealing with them as both listener and speaker—because both speaker and listener are responsible for effective listening. Listening in Interpersonal Communication Paper
