Speech Anxiety, Listening Skills, Ethics, and Audience Analysis in Public Speaking

Illusion of transparency

The false belief that your anxiety is visible to the audience when it actually is not

Performance anxiety

Anxiety experienced WHILE delivering a speech

Pre-performance anxiety

Anxiety felt as soon as a speech assignment is given

Preparation anxiety

Anxiety felt while gathering supporting materials

Post-performance anxiety

Anxiety felt after the speech is over

Trait anxiety

General, ongoing anxiety across many situations

Visualization

Summoning feelings and actions consistent with successful performance

Anxiety is lowest during which phase

Preparation phase

Hearing

Physiological, largely involuntary process of perceiving sound

Listening

Conscious act of receiving, constructing meaning from, and responding to spoken and nonverbal messages

Active listening

Focused and purposeful listening

Selective perception

Paying attention to certain messages while ignoring others

Scriptwriting

Thinking about what YOU will say instead of listening to the speaker

Defensive listening

Deciding in advance you won't like what the speaker says

Dialogic communication

Open sharing of ideas in an atmosphere of respect

Consequentialist ethics

Rightness of an action is determined by its outcome

Rules-based ethics

Do what is inherently right based on moral norms

Virtue ethics

Using your own moral compass to make decisions

Copyright

Legal protection of literary and artistic works

Fair use

Doctrine allowing use of copyrighted material for reporting, education, and research

Public domain

Works whose copyright has expired and are free for public use

Plagiarism

Presenting someone else's work as your own

Direct quote

Using the exact verbatim words from the original source

Paraphrase

Restating someone else's ideas in your own words

Summary

Condensing material from a source into a brief overview

Pathos

NOT a pillar of character — it is a persuasive appeal

Attitudes

General evaluations of people, ideas, objects, or events

Beliefs

What we hold to be true or false

Values

Most enduring judgments about what is good in life

Captive audience

Audience required to attend

Voluntary audience

Audience that chooses to attend

Demographics

Statistical characteristics of an audience: age, gender, ethnicity

Psychographics

Mental characteristics of an audience: beliefs, attitudes, values

Millennials

Generation born between 1980 and 1999

Individualistic culture

Emphasizes needs of the self over the group (e.g., United States)

Collectivist culture

Emphasizes group needs over individual needs

Scale question

Survey question measuring level of agreement or disagreement

Open-ended question

Survey question with no fixed answer

Word association

Writing a topic then the first related thing that comes to mind

General speech purpose

Broad objective: to inform, to persuade, or to mark a special occasion

Specific speech purpose

Exact objective declaring what you want the audience to learn or do

Thesis statement

Single declarative sentence stating the central idea of the speech

Facts

Documented information that can be independently verified

Testimony

Firsthand accounts, eyewitness info, and expert opinions

Narrative

A story used as supporting material

Brief example

A single illustration of a point

Extended example

A detailed, longer illustration of a point

Hypothetical example

An example of an event that has not actually happened yet

Mean

Sum of all scores divided by the number of scores

Median

The center-most number in a distribution

Mode

The number that occurs most frequently in a distribution

Frequency

Count of how many times something occurs

Primary source

Personal experiences, firsthand accounts, interviews by speaker, government documents

Secondary source

Newspaper articles, encyclopedias, magazine articles, reference books

News articles are primary or secondary sources

Secondary sources

Government documents are primary or secondary sources

Primary sources

Information

Accurate data set in a context for relevance

Misinformation

Inaccurate info spread WITHOUT intent to deceive (e.g., urban legend)

Disinformation

Deliberately falsified information

Propaganda

Information presented to provoke a desired response

Deep web

Large invisible portion of the internet that search engines cannot access

Oral citation

Verbally crediting the source of speech material derived from others' ideas

Source credibility

Level of trust in a source's credentials and accuracy

Source qualifier

Brief description of a source's qualifications to address the topic

Common knowledge

Info likely known by many people; does NOT require citation

Preview statement

Brief overview of topic, thesis, purpose, and main points in the introduction

Internal preview

Brief overview of an upcoming main point within the body

Internal summary

Restatement of ideas already covered before moving to next point

Transition

Signals movement from one point to the next

Primacy effect

People remember what they hear FIRST

Recency effect

People remember what they hear LAST

Body of a speech

The part that presents main points and supporting points

Conclusion

Restates the thesis and summarizes main points

Chronological pattern

Organizes main points in sequential time order

Spatial pattern

Organizes main points by physical proximity or direction

Causal pattern

Organizes points by causes and effects

Problem-solution pattern

Demonstrates a problem and provides a justified solution; used in persuasive speeches

Topical pattern

Organizes main points as subtopics or categories; used in informative speeches

Narrative pattern

Speech told as a story or series of stories

Canon of arrangement

The process of devising a logical and convincing structure for your speech

Coordination

Points of equal importance placed in parallel alignment

Subordination

Supporting points placed below and to the right of the points they support

Working outline

Used to organize and develop main points; written in full sentences

Sentence outline

Every point written as a declarative statement

Key-word outline

Uses keywords or phrases; allows maximum eye contact with audience

Speaking outline

The outline used when actually delivering the speech

Most common outline format

Roman numeral outline

4 functions of an introduction

Arouse attention, introduce the speech, establish credibility, motivate the audience

Attention-getter using a quote

Sharing a relevant quotation

Attention-getter using a story

Telling a compelling story or anecdote

Attention-getter using shared concerns

Establishing common ground

Attention-getter using a question

Posing a provocative or rhetorical question

Attention-getter using surprising facts

Providing unusual information

Rhetorical question

A question not meant to get an actual response but to make the audience think

Ethos

Your credibility as a speaker; good character and qualifications

Keys to effective delivery

Directness, confidence, enthusiasm, naturalneness

Oratory

Speaking from memory; also another word for the method of speaking from memory

Methods of delivery

Speaking from manuscript, from memory, extemporaneously, impromptu

Speaking from manuscript

Reading word-for-word; used when exact wording matters

Speaking extemporaneously

Prepared and practiced but delivered conversationally