Discuss in detail the important key elements of Communication MA RD SEM 2 Continue
Communication may be referred to as the process of human beings responding to the symbolic behavior of other persons. To understand the process we first need to talk about the following elements of communication.
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Sender and Receiver
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Message encoding and Message decoding
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Filters and Barriers
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Psychological noise and Physiological Noise
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Communication Channels
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Feedback
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Communication Environment or context
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Sender- The person or persons responsible for creating a message to be sent is typically understood as a sender in a communication process.
Example: A politician giving a speech, a parent lecturing a child.
Receiver- The person or persons who are receiving the created messages are referred to as
receivers in a communication process.
Example: An audience receives the politician’s speech, The child is the recipient of the
parents lecture.
2. Communication channel: The medium through which a sender or a receiver uses to send his or her message is termed as communication channel.
Channels may be verbal or non-verbal or of any other form of language.
Example: Speech is a channel.
Writing is a channel.
Non-verbal gestures are channels.
Voice tones are channels.
3.Encoding-When a sender attempts to replicate his or her internal thoughts or feelings into some kind of external message or medium for the sake of transmitting those thoughts or feelings to another person or persons then the whole process can be called as encoding.
Example:
One good thing about courses in Human communication studies often contain public speaking component, in addition to writing component.
English, History, Sociology, Psychology… only writing, no speaking.
But remember what text said about what employers are looking for:
Only 90 percent of the personnel officials at five hundred US Businesses stated that oral communication skills play a bigger role in career achievement than technical competence, experience, or academic background.
Of course, technical skill, experience, education important, but if you can’t communicate your knowledge, ideas, arguments to others…
Technical skill and experience aren’t worth much.
Many college courses teach written encoding skills… But this course focuses primarily on oral encoding skills…
Which are at least equally if not more important than writing skills.
And I’m not just talking about public speaking.
I’m talking about bettering your encoding skills in personal settings, romantic settings, intercultural settings, business settings, group settings…
…So public speaking is very small portion of this class.
4.Message Decoding-Message decoding occurs when the receiver attempts to ascertain the meaning of the sender’s message.
And figuring out what other people “mean” isn’t easy.
I’m sure all of us had times when we’ve had others become frustrated with us because we didn’t understand what they meant…
I’m sure we’ve all become frustrated with other people when they didn’t understand what we mean.
5.Noise- Any force that interferes with effective communication is called as noise. Three types: External noise, physiological noise, psychological noise.
External noise: External noise refers to any physical phenomenon that might impair a receiver’s ability to decode a message.
Ex. Gym, Elevator Music Blaring…
Bodybuilders gruntling…
She was paying attention, just couldn’t hear my name… that why call me “Phil,” not”Paul.”
Physiological Noise- Involves biological factors in the receiver or sender that interfere with accurate reception.
Ex- Seinfeld: George’s “I love you”
Psychological Noise- Involves mental forces within a receiver or sender that might inhibit his or her ability to either encode or decode a message correctly.
Ex. If a receiver suffers from low-self esteem, might interpret a sincere compliment as sarcastic or condescending even though it was n’t.
6. Environment- Fields of experience or cultural backgrounds that influence the way communicators encode and decode messages.
7. Filters and Barriers in Communication- Filtering is the deliberate manipulation of information to make it appear more favourable to the receiver. Most of us filter our communication with others simply in presenting the message in ways we believe the receiver will best understand.
There are many barriers in communication. Language can be a barrier. If the receiver does not understand the language of the sender, it is a barrier. In electronic communications, such as radio or television, static or a weak signal can be a barrier. A bad receiver antenna can be a barrier as well. Emotions can cause people to not be receptive to the words of another person, even if the words are understood. That is a barrier. In short, anything that interferes with a signal sent to a receiver is a barrier to communication.
8.Feedback- To communicate is to pass on a message, be it verbally or otherwise, in order to obtain a certain desired response or reaction(the desired respond can be happiness, anger, cooperation, understanding or whatever you tried to get). Your feedback can be verbally or any other kinds of reaction. Without it you would not know whether you have accomplished what you wanted to achieve with the signal you sent out.