Communication Skills
Communication is used to both share information and set the tone; it facilitates both the giving and receiving of information. Successful communication helps the peer visitor and person being visited better understand each other. It creates the conditions for sharing feelings and ideas and solving problems. Communication skills involve listening, speaking, observing, and empathizing. Two of the most important communication skills are listening and speaking.
Listening
Listening is “the learned process of receiving, interpreting, recalling, evaluating, and responding to verbal and nonverbal messages” (International Listening Society). Listening, as opposed to the passive process of hearing, involves cognitive, behavioural, and relational processes.”
We talk at a rate of about 150 words per minute, but we can listen at a rate of nearly 1000 words per minute; this leaves time for our minds to wander. For this reason, we need to deliberately suppress our natural tendency to process what we hear at the fastest speed possible. Most of us take listening for granted and tend to overestimate our skill as listeners. We fail to identify the need to improve our listening skills. Listening skills are essential for a peer visitor.
Active listening means being attentive to what an individual is saying both verbally and non-verbally. It enhances trust and facilitates communication. Non-verbal skills to facilitate active listening include: facing the individual, making eye contact, and having good posture.
The development of positive listening habits can help in establishing a positive listening norm. Positive listening habits can be contagious. Once you develop a reasonable degree of listening skill the potential gains in terms of knowledge, understanding, and cooperation outweigh the effort of learning to listen. In addition, when someone genuinely feels that they’ve been listened to, trust, respect, and appreciation grow.
You might want to try this quiz to assess how good your listening skills are.
Reflection Exercise
How to complete this activity and save your work: type your reflective response to the question in the box below. When you’re done reflecting on the question, navigate to the export page to download and save your response. If you prefer to work in a Word document offline, you can skip to the export section and download a Word document of the reflection here.
Watch this short video on active listening (1.5 minutes).
Practice active listening over the next few days.
- Practice paraphrasing. After a friend or family member has spoken, summarize by saying ‘So what you mean is…’ or ‘If I can summarize what you said…’
- Create a list of open and closed questions you can ask in different contexts. You can start by noting the sorts of questions other people ask and whether those questions get productive or unproductive answers.
- Test your listening skills by debriefing with someone who has been with you during a conversation or meeting with other people. Ask the following questions about what you both heard:
-
- Who said what?
- How did people react at different points (with their body language as well as their words)?
- What did you learn about the agendas and priorities of each person present in the conversation?
Barriers to communication
Interpersonal communications fail for many reasons. Often this is because the message is not received in exactly the way the sender intended it to be understood. It is important when you communicate and receive feedback to check that your message has been understood. Barriers to communication include physical, emotional, language, and cultural barriers. We’ll talk about language and culture in the next section.
People communicate differently based on individual needs, strengths, and backgrounds. One individual may be very direct and concise in their language, while others need more time to get their message across and prefer to provide many details. Some people rely on visual stimuli and gestures, while others are keen on the use of tone and facial expressions. These variations can create communication obstacles when people with diverse communication styles are unaware of and don’t recognize the needs of the other party.
Some people may find it difficult to express their emotions and some topics may be completely ‘off-limits’. These topics could include, but are not limited to, politics, religion, disabilities, sexuality and sex, racism, and any opinion that may be seen as unpopular.
Physical barriers include hearing impairments, speech impediments, visual impairments, or other physical or mental differences. These can act as communication barriers, can cause difficulty in performing daily tasks, and can complicate interpersonal communication.
Check Your Understanding
This is a self-assessment to check your understanding of the concepts presented in this section. Be sure to click the blue arrow button in the bottom right corner of the activity window below to navigate through all 4 questions. You can attempt the activity multiple times.
