Chapter 5 Encoding Messages/Nonverbal Communication

Goal: To appreciate the extent to which nonverbal behaviors convey messages; to identify common nonverbal codes and explore ways to use them more effectively during communication.

I. Nonverbal communication is the study of communication systems that do not involve words.

• A. It is not easy to define nonverbal communication.
  • 1. Experts disagree about whether to count unintended actions as nonverbal communication .
    • a. In this book, nonverbal communication is regarded as occurring whenever stimuli other than words create meaning in either a sender's or a receiver's mind.
    • b. Given such a broad definition, we must keep in mind that nonverbal stimuli are often outside a sender's awareness.
  • 2. It is important to take care in interpreting nonverbal messages.
    • a. To increase interpretive accuracy, we should check the communication context cues to meaning.
    • b. Comparing nonverbal acts to baseline behaviors will increase interpretive accuracy.
    • c. If unsure, we should ask for verbal feedback.
• B. As a system of communication, nonverbal communication is unique.
  • 1. It has several defining characteristics.
    • a. As already suggested, it may be unintentional.
    • b. Nonverbal messages often combine multiple codes.
    • c. Nonverbal communication is relatively universal, although nonverbal acts can be conventionalized.
  • 2. Nonverbal communication conveys certain kinds of messages particularly well.
    • a. It is immediate, continuous, and natural.
    • b. Nonverbal communication is often used to make initial judgments when direct verbal questioning would be inappropriate.
    • c. It gives us information about our relationships with others, particularly in regard to status, liking, and responsiveness.
    • d. Nonverbal messages are particularly appropriate for conveying emotion.
  • 3. Nonverbal communication often accompanies and supplements verbal messages by repeating, contradicting, substituting for, complementing, accenting, and regulating them.

II. Nonverbal communication consists of several codes working in concert.

• A. Body movement and gesture, part of the kinesic code, are important sources of information.
  • 1. Emblems act like words, they have direct verbal translations.
  • 2. Illustrators are gestures that accompany speech and add meaning to it.
  • 3. Regulators maintain the back and forth flow of talk in an interaction by acting as social traffic signals.
  • 4. Affect displays convey emotional meaning.
    • a. Posture and gesture often tell us how a person feels.
    • b. When people lie, body movements can give them away.
    • c. To check for lies, look for verbal and nonverbal leakage and strategic cues.
  • 5. Adaptors are unnoticed gestures or movement we use to calm ourselves in moments of stress.
• B. Facial displays, including eye movement, are also part of nonverbal communication.
  • 1. The face is a powerful source of nonverbal information.
    • a. Facial displays are partly innate and partly learned.
    • b. People learn to use facial expressions to intensify or deintensify feelings and to neutralize or mask other emotions.
    • c. We follow cultural, professional, and personal display rules as we learn to manage our faces.
  • 2. The eyes, long associated with mystic power, are important sources of information.
    • a. Eye behavior serves to maintain social position.
    • b. The eyes are good indicators of emotion.
    • c. Eye contact signals our willingness to relate to one another.
    • d. Eye behavior is associated (often falsely) with character traits.
• C. Paralanguage, the way we say something rather than what we say, is another nonverbal code.
  • 1. Paralanguage is usually divided into three parts, each of which convey meaning.
    • a. Vocal qualities are characteristics of the voice like pitch.
    • b. Vocalizations are special sounds like groans or sighs.
    • c. Vocal segregates are pauses, fillers, and other hesitation phenomena.
  • 2. Although the judgments we make on the basis of voice are not necessarily accurate, we think they are.
  • 3. Silence is an overlooked aspect of paralanguage that carries meaning.
• D. Time, or chronemics, and space, or proxemics, also convey messages.
  • 1. The values we attach to and the way we use time provide useful information about us.
    • a. People have different psychological orientations to the present and the future.
    • b. People are also controlled by biological clocks.
    • c. Cultures also differ in the meanings they attach to time.
  • 2. The way we use space is called proxemics.
    • a. We mark and defend four kinds of territories, public, home, interaction and body, these territories can be encroached through contamination, violation, and invasion.
    • b. The ways we arrange home and public territories affect the amount, flow, and kind of interaction that occur in these territories.
    • c. Each of us varies in our attitudes to personal space, how close we prefer to be to other people.
    • d. The extreme of personal closeness is touch.
      • (I) All cultures regulate and forbid certain kinds oftouch.
      • (2) Touch defines relationships, communicates social status, and satisfies emotional needs.
• E. Physical appearance and object language are two final nonverbal codes.
  • 1. All cultures favor certain body types and create stereotypes about the characteristics attached to them.
    • a. People can be classed according to somatypes.
    • b. North American cultural norms value men who are muscular and women who are slender.
  • 2. Dress fulfills several functions: comfort protection, modesty, and cultural display
  • 3. The objects or artifacts we display also send messages.
    • a. Our possessions are closely linked with our sense of self.
    • b. Elements in the design of built environments give off additional messages. Size, shape, texture, linear perspective, lighting, color, temperature, noise, and sensory stimulation are important environmental factors.

III. There are several ways to increase nonverbal sending and receiving skills.

• A. We should remember to be cautious in interpreting nonverbal messages.
• B. We should learn to give proper attention to nonverhal cues.
• C. We should monitor ourselves for inadvertent nonverbal messages.
• D We should remember that nonverbal behaviors can be invasive and threatening.

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Com110 Syllabus

© Trenholm, Sarah. 1995