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What is communication?
Communication is the management of messages for the purpose of creating meaning.
That is, communication occurs whenever a person attempts to send a message or whenever a person perceives and assigns meaning to behavior.
Successful Communication (sent w/ intent)
Occurs when a person intentionally sends a message
Miscommunication (sent w/ intent)
Occurs when a person intends to send a particular message, but the receiver interprets the message incorrectly
Attempted Communication (sent w/ intent)
Occurs when a person intends to send a message, but no one receives it
Accidental Communication (sent w/o intent)
Occurs when a person attaches the right meaning to another person’s unintentional behavior
Misinterpretation (sent w/o intent)
Occurs when a person attaches the wrong meaning to an unintended behavior
Unattended Behavior
Occurs when a behavior goes unnoticed by the receiver
What are the four different approaches/perspectives for what counts as communication?
Source Perspective
Receiver Perspective
Message Perspective
Process-oriented Perspective
Source Perspective
Communication occurs when a person intends to send a message and another person attends to that message
As long as the message is directed toward a receiver, the message is considered to be sent with the intent
Only includes messages that fall under successful communication and miscommunication in the figure
Receiver Perspective
Based on the idea that behavior is communication as long as someone attaches meaning to it, regardless of whether the behavior was displayed with or without intent
Successful communication, miscommunication, accidental communication, and misinterpretation all count as forms of communication
Message Perspective
Specifies that nonverbal communication occurs when people exchange messages that have common social meanings
Behaviors qualify as communication if they meet at least one of the following criteria:
Typically sent with intent
Usually interpreted as intentional
Or they have shared meaning with a particular relationship, group, or culture
Idiosyncratic (unique) behaviors do not count
Process-oriented Perspective
Includes all of the forms of communication shown in the figure except for unattended behavior
Successful communication, followed by miscommunication and accidental communication, are the best examples of communication
Attempted communication and misinterpretation are also important to study because they can influence the overall pattern of communication
What three characteristics affect what counts as communication?
Whether or not the sender intends to send a message
Whether or not the receiver pays attention to and interprets the message
Whether the receiver's interpretation is accurate
What are the functions of nonverbal communication?
Creating Impressions and Making Judgements
Sending Relational Messages
Expressing Emotion
Deceiving and Detecting Deception
Sending Messages of Power and Persuasion
Creating Impressions and Making Judgements
Physical appearance and kinesics are especially important in creating impressions because they are often noticed first
Sending Relational Messages
Use nonverbal behaviors to tell others how you feel about them
Also, evaluate the nonverbal communication of others they try and figure out how they feel about you
You can show others that you like them, are similar to them, and trust them
Can also use it to define a relationship as formal or informal, and as a task related or socially oriented
Immediacy cues
Nonimmediacy
Immediacy principle
Predicts that people will approach individuals, situations, and objects they like and will avoid or move away from those they dislike.
Immediacy Cues
Communicate liking through behaviors such as smiles, close distances, touch, gaze, and forward lean
Nonimmediacy Cues
Functions to create distance and cut off communication
Maintaining large distances, leaning and looking away from someone, and engaging in defensive posturing signals that you are unavailable for communication and possibly dislike someone
Expressing Emotion
The facial expressions made when one is feeling primary emotions is universal and is interpreted similarly
Although often the expression of both basic and blended emotions are done freely and spontaneously there are times when you want to control (or manage) your emotional expression
What are the primary/basic emotions?
Happiness
Fear
Anger
Sadness
Disgust
Surprise
What are emotional blends?
Occur when more than one basic emotion is experienced at the same time, are expressed more subtly, and are therefore more difficult to recognize
What are some examples of emotional blends?
Disappointment: a blend of sadness and surprise
Jealousy: often a blend of anger and fear
Deceiving and Detecting Deception
Two kinds of nonverbal cues typically co-occur during deception: strategic and nonstrategic behavior
According to the leakage hierarchy, some nonverbal behaviors are harder to control than others during the deception process
Leakiest = the voice and the lower body channels
The face and upper body are easier to control
Very difficult to detect deception
Strategic Behavior/Cues
Used to try to hide the fact that they are deceiving
When people are deceiving they know that one of the behaviors of deceivers is to look away so they look at you straight in the eye more
Nonstrategic Behavior/Cues
The behaviors that deceivers cannot control
“Leak” negative emotion
When deceivers are looking you straight in the eyes their smiles could be false looking or their voices might sound shaky which is leaking their feelings of anxiety
Sending Messages of Power and Persuasion
Nonverbal messages exercise social control
Such messages can be used to control people and events, establish power, or dominate others
Powerful people touch others more than they are touched and look at others less than they are looked at (except when staring down at someone)
Have control over time and territory
Also, take up more space than less powerful people, and environments can be used to control people by structuring interaction
Ex: Classroom setting
Used to persuade others
Ex: smile and touch friends when trying to get them to do something for you
Study #1 - Black vs. non-black uniforms
Method: Shown color slides showing the jerseys, etc. of various NFL and NHL teams then rated the uniforms
Results: Black uniforms were rated as more malevolent than non-black uniforms
Study #2 - Analyzing penalty records
Method: involved analyzing penalty records from the NFL and NHL over a 16-17 year period
Results: statistical analyses revealed that teams with black uniforms were penalized more than teams with non-black uniforms
Also showed that when the colors switched from non-black to black uniforms the number of minutes they spent in the penalty box increased
Study #3 - Fans or referees rating defensive teams actions
Method: knowledgeable football fans or refs. were shown one of two videos depicting a scrimmage
The defense wore white in one and black in another, the offense always wore red in both
Then rated actions of defense
Results: both fans and referees were more likely to rate the defensive team’s actions as illegal and aggressive if they were wearing black
Study #4 - Ranking games when alone vs. in a group w/ black or white uniforms on
Method: Groups of 3 participated in an experiment “competition”,
Each was asked individually to choose and rank 5 games from a list of 12 that they would like to play (varied in levels of aggression
They were then outfitted in either black or white uniforms
The three subjects re-ranked their game preferences as a team rather than as individuals
Results: After the groups were outfitted in their uniforms those in black chose more aggressive games as a group than they had as individuals.
White did not show an increase in aggressive choices
Overall findings from the four studies
All this goes to show how the color of one’s uniform can induce such a shift in a person’s identity
However not all wearing dark clothing is innocent, some people do choose to wear black on purpose (to intimidate)
Illustrators
Those acts which are intimately related on a moment-to-moment basis to speech
Usually augment what is being said verbally and are used with awareness and intentionality
How is illustrator frequency related to a person’s mood and conversational role?
When a person is demoralized, discouraged, tired, unenthusiastic, concerned about the other person’s impression, or in a non-dominant position in a formal interaction and setting, the rate of illustrators is less than is usual for that person
Negative feelings = fewer illustrators
With excitement, and enthusiasm about the topic or process of communication, when in the dominant role in a formal interaction, or in a more informal interaction where there is little concern about the impression being conveyed more illustrators are used
When difficulty is experienced in finding the right words, or when feedback from the listener suggests he is not comprehending illustrators increase
Can fill pauses and maintain a person’s speaking turn
Serve a self-priming function, helping the speaker past an awkwardness in their speech or thought, and accelerating the flow of her and his ideas
How is eye gaze related to Machiavellian tendencies?
People occasionally reveal increased eye-to-eye contact while being deceptive
Those with high Machiavellian tendencies increased their direct eye contact after being accused of cheating as if to project an image of innocence
Those with low Machiavellian qualities tended to avert their gaze, being less able to conceal their shame
Functions of Eye Gaze
Social Position
Positive vs. Negative Emotions
Willingness to Relate
Women vs. Men
Cultural Factors
Synchrony of Speech
Character Traits
Social Position
Persons in positions of leadership tend to gravitate toward locations where they are the visual focus of attention
Ex: Head of the table
Positive vs. Negative Emotions
Positive emotions (delight, surprise, or interest) are associated with increased gaze
Negative emotions (horror or disgust) are associated with gaze aversion
High anxiety = eye movements are deployed in an avoidant manner, with shorter eye fixations and shifts of gaze away from threatening areas
Pupils enlarge when people look at things they like
Willingness to Relate
A person’s decision to look back into the eyes of someone who is already looking at him is one of the principal signals by which one denotes a willingness to begin an encounter
Ocular engagement reflects human engagement
Women vs. Men
Women tend to look at their conversational partners somewhat more than men
Also appear to engage more readily in mutual gazing, while men show a greater tendency toward one-way (“stolen”) glances
Cultural Factors
Culturally prescribed norms of visual engagement exert a profound effect on gazing patterns
Some groups are taught to avoid eye contact while others emphasize intense eye contact as evidence of sincerity and interest
Synchrony of Speech
Listeners glance more frequently than talkers
Gaze aversion among talkers is more pronounced during periods of unfluent speech
To limit distracting sensory input while difficult verbal production is in progress)
Patterns are believed to assist conversationalists in synchronizing their speech by supplementing auditory info with an interchange of facial expression and body kinesics
Character Traits
A direct gaze is more likely to be returned by a person with aggressive and assertive character traits
Extroverts also tend to exchange eye contact more readily than introverts
Hysterics have been found to avert their gazes more often than obsessives when confronted by a sexually evocative stimulus
People with a high degree of eye contact are judged to be more friendly, natural, self-confident, and sincere
Those with little eye contact are perceived as cold, defensive, evasive, submissive, or inattentive
Why does nonverbal communication play an important role in our interactions with others?
Research suggests 60-65% of social meaning is derived from NVB
Adults often interpret messages by relying more on nonverbal cues
People rely more on NV communication to send positive and negative messages to relational partners
Particularly important when expressing emotion, forming impressions, and communicating relational messages
Seen as more believable than verbal messages
Which communication channels do people consider when interpreting messages? Which channels are important?
People often pay more attention to the visual channel (facial expressions and body movement) than to the verbal channel
Vocal channel (including voice tone, pitch, and volume) is also important
Relational partners rely heavily on the voice when sending and interpreting messages
Definition of Nonverbal Communication (Guerrero et al.)
“Involves all messages other than words or language, including aspects of the voice, body movement, facial expression, space, time, smell, and the environment
Sender
The person doing the behavior
Feedback
The behaviors that indicate we are paying attention
What are the channels of nonverbal behavior?
Kinesics
Appearance and Adornment
Vocalics
Contact Codes
Time and Place Codes
Kinesics
All about body movement and how are we using our body to communicate nonverbally
Gestures, body postures, facial expressions (communicate emotions), eye contact (study of eye contact = oculesics), etc.
Appearance and Adornment
Physical appearance (clothes (status, accessories (backpack, laptop, etc)
The size of our body (being taller or shorter)
The shape of our body
Hair length, hair color, absence of hair),
Odor is how the body smells
What is the study of smell?
Olfactory Communication
Vocalics
Not the words we are saying but how we say the words (talking loud, quiet, fast, slow, changing pitch), and as we change our voice it can change our meaning
What is paralanguage?
The study of vocalics
Contact Codes
Include how we utilize space
Do we allow people to invade our personal zones?
How do we occupy space - do we choose to take up less space?
What is the study of space?
Proxemics
Touch
Touching others communicates nonverbally
Ex: rubbing someone’s back, giving a hug or kiss, aggression, parent and children holding hands
Touch has to occur in the intimate zone of proxemics, there cannot be distance
What is the study of touch?
Haptics
Time and Place Codes
The way that we use time can communicate nonverbally
Different cultures will approach time differently
Monochromic vs polychronic cultures
Monochromic Cultures
Linear and do things one at a time
They use it to structure their lives
Polychronic Cultures
Other entity that exists but they don’t structure their lives around it
They will multitask
What is the study of time?
Chronemics
What are the three benefits of studying nonverbal communication?
It will improve your accuracy in understanding others
Will ensure that you do not do anything offensive
It will improve your own ability to communicate info and persuade others
Will ensure consistent messages are being sent both verbally and nonverbally
It will enable you to make a more effective self-presentation
You can choose nonverbal behaviors to highlight or conceal things to make a more favorable impression
What are the aspects of meaning in nonverbal behavior?
Intention (encoding): What are people’s intentions when they emit this behavior?
Perception/interpretation (decoding): How do receivers of this behavior interpret it?
Interactive: Are the behaviors that have a reliable behavioral effect on others
Shared encoding-decoding: are there behaviors whose meaning senders and receivers consistently agree on?
What does it mean when a behavior is called interactive?
If there are consistent reliable responses for why this behavior is happening then this would be classified as an interactive behavior
External Conditions
Often influenced or grounded in the context, this will likely change the difference in communication
Ex: Going to see family and giving them a hug vs. going to see Gary May
Will tell us what nonverbal communications behavior in relation to the verbal
Relationship to the Verbal
What is the nonverbal communications behavior in relation to the verbal
Awareness
Many times we are aware of our behaviors but sometimes we are unaware
Ex: getting accused of rolling our eyes when we think we didn’t but probably did (unaware)
Intent
Is it deliberate, or are we doing it on purpose, other times they don’t happen deliberately but they happen
We can do something intentionally and be aware of that (shaking someone’s hand)
Can do behavior unintentionally and be aware of them (professor gestures throughout the lecture unintentionally but is aware)
Feedback
The behavior we do to indicate that we are paying attention (nodding head, etc.)
Allows us to be both sender and receiver in our transactional model of communication
The type of information conveyed
There are four types: idiosyncratic, informative, communicative, interactive
Idiosyncratic
Usage and meaning are peculiar to the individual
This does not mean others would not know what they mean but it wouldn’t be consistent among a large percentage of people
Informative
Shared encoding and decoding (i.e., both conversation partners come to same conclusion)
Communicative
Enacted with clear, conscious intention to convey a message
If it is communicative it will have high awareness
Interactive
Influence or modify another person’s behavior
Ex: Invading someone’s personal space
Diagram
Figure out what to write…
What are the three sources of behavior?
Innate neurological mechanisms (i.e., there are things we were born able to do)
Species constant experiences (i.e., when the context of our environment calls for a specific action and we do what makes sense but it is not something we are born with)
Learning and socialization (i.e., much of our behavior is learned through socialization, like the middle finger)
Arbitrary
There is no logical reason why the nonverbal behavior means what it means
Iconic (metaphoric)
The behavior we do and the message it communicates have some sort of logical connection (it is not the exact thing we are trying to say but we see aspects of what it is)
Telephone gesture
Hands out for driving
Intrinsic
The behavior both represents and is the thing we are communicating
Ex: Punching someone in the face (this communicates aggression and is aggression)
Yawning (communicates tiredness and we are tired)
Emblems
Nonverbal behaviors that have a very clear dictionary-like translation
These often can be used instead of words because the translation is so clear
Culturally bound
Definition of Illustrators
Nonverbal behaviors that are 100% tied to language always accompany words being spoken and provide a visual representation
Ex: Big fish gesture
Adaptors
Nonverbal behaviors that we do to manage our emotional arousal
We do not want to feel overwhelmed or anxious but we also don’t want to be too lowly aroused
Regulators
Nonverbal behaviors we do to control our “traffic signals” or to know when it is our turn to speak
Ex: Raising a hand or saying wait a minute by holding up a finger
Emotion Displays
We convey a lot of emotions through our nonverbals
Many of these occur on our faces (disgust, contempt, etc.) but we can do it with our body (clenching fists)
Substitute
We can use nonverbal communication to substitute for the verbal
Ex: Emblems (which have a specific type of translation)
Complement
This suggests our verbal and nonverbal work together to send a more complete message
This occurs at the same time
Congruent
The verbal and nonverbal are moving together to send the same message
Ex: The facial expressions of joy combined with a higher pitched voice
Accent
This is used when we want to draw emphasis on the importance of what we are trying to say
Ex: Gestures, stress with paralanguage, and accent
Regulate
This tells us when it is our turn to speak and when it isn’t
Ex: When we have the floor we might make a gesture of 1 minute to help control the flow of the conversation
Repeating
The nonverbal will repeat what was said in the verbal after it took place
Ex: Pointing at the MU after saying "it is over there”
Conflicting
What we are communicating nonverbally and verbally is incongruent
Ex: Kid saying “ I am not pouting” but clearly is
Do individuals tend to trust the nonverbal or verbal more when the behaviors do not match up?
People trust the nonverbal more
Sarcasm
If someone says “Well… that was pretty smart” the verbal would say that was in fact smart but the nonverbal would state the opposite
Where did the revival of interest in gesture stem from?
The first book on gestures in the 17th century (believed that language and gestures had similar origins in the brain
This was rotted in the fact that children slowly learn gestures and language
The discovery that apes can be taught at least some aspects of sign language
Koko the gorilla
Gesture
A movement of the body, or any part of the body, that is considered to be expressive of thought or feeling
Can be done with our head, hands, and feet
What is the difference between “gesture” and “practical actions?”
Practical actions are movements of the body that are trying to accomplish a practical act (picking up a pencil, unscrewing lid)
The line is blurry between the two
Are they doing the practical action in a way that is really embellished? If so it is a gesture
Andrew Dice Clay cigarette Ex: goes beyond because the actor has a significant way to light the cigarette (exaggerated arm movement (idiosyncratic))
If it is symbolic then a practical action can take on the role of gestures
What are the 4 types of gestures and their sub-categories?
Emblems
Illustrators
Regulators
Beats and Batons (Pres. Clinton)
Adaptors
Self-adaptors
Object-adaptors
Beats and Batons
It still, helps to control the flow of conversation but adds rhythm to what we are saying and helps keep the conversation going
Ex: Bill Clinton: I. Did. Not. Have. Sexual. Relations. With. That. Woman
Not all Regulators are Beats and Batons
Self-adaptors
Body movements where we engage in self-touching
Moving our hands through our hair, chewing fingernails, playing with our hair
Man touching his lip
Note
Flashcard