Chapter 93. RealComm4e_chapter_outline

93.1 Section Title

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Chapter 7

Listening

What to Expect

How We Listen
The Value of Listening Well
Listening Challenges
Unethical Listening
Listening in Context

Chapter Outline

Listening is not the same process as hearing.
1. Hearing is the physiological process of perceiving sound; it is not synonymous with listening.
2. Listening is the process of recognizing, understanding, accurately interpreting, and responding effectively to the messages we hear.
3. The listening process includes three components: affective, cognitive, and behavioral.
  1. The affective component of listening refers to our attitude toward listening to a person or message.
  2. The cognitive component of listening involves the mental processes of selecting messages to focus on, giving them our attention, and then trying to understand them.
    1. Selecting is choosing one sound over the others when faced with competing stimuli.
    2. Attending is the additional step of being willing to focus attention on both the presence and the communication of someone else.
    3. Understanding, or making sense of messages, enables us to interpret meaning.
  3. The behavioral component of listening involves showing that we understand and remember the information given.
    1. It is helpful to paraphrase or rephrase what we think the speaker has said in order to make sure we are listening and comprehending accurately.
      1. Active listeners choose to select, attend, understand, and paraphrase.
      2. Passive listeners fail to make active choices; they must frequently have information and instructions repeated to them, and may misinterpret or ignore messages.
      3. Passive listeners engage in confabulation when they fabricate distorted memories, unaware that the information is false.
      4. The goal of the listening process is listening fidelity, the degree to which the thoughts of the listener and the thoughts and intentions of the message producer match following the communication.
4. There are four distinctive goals of listening, which people accomplish by adjusting their listening depending on the situation.
  1. We use relational listening, also called empathic listening, when we want to know how another person is feeling.
    1. Relational listening can be used to provide emotional support for someone in need or to comfort someone when tragedy or disappointment strikes.
  2. In analytical listening, listeners take in and organize all pieces of information before making a judgment.
    1. Questions are aids in informational listening.
    2. Questioning techniques are inquiries that a listener can make to coordinate what the speaker is saying with what the listener is hearing.
  3. Critical listening involves evaluating or analyzing information, evidence, ideas, or opinions.
    1. Determining the thesis or main point of the speaker’s message
    2. Focusing on what the speaker is saying
    3. Decoding nonverbal cues accompanying the messages
    4. Remembering what the speaker said
  4. Task-oriented listening, also called informational or comprehensive listening, focuses on tasks and tend to keep the discourse on track to accomplish these tasks.
    1. Processing information as efficiently as possible
    2. Understanding key or takeaway points
Ask Yourself:
- Can you remember a time when you engaged in hearing without listening? What happened as a result?
- Do you find yourself actively switching between listening goals, or is it more subconscious? Why do you think this is the case?
Effective listening is a valuable commodity. It enables us to live productive, satisfying, and healthy lives in specific ways.
1. Effective listening helps your career.
2. Effective listening saves time and money.
3. Effective listening creates opportunities.
4. Effective listening strengthens relationships.
Ask Yourself:
- Think of a time when you were accused of not listening well. What could you have done differently in that situation to ensure that you heard, understood, and critically responded to the messages you received?
- Can you think of any individuals in your life who have high relational listening skills? How do you feel when (and after) interacting with them?
There are a variety of listening barriers, or factors that interfere with our ability to comprehend information and respond appropriately, that prevent us from effective listening.
1. Environmental factors create internal and external noise and distractions.
2. Biological factors—due to physical or medical issues as well as learning disabilities—can inhibit comprehension.
3. Multitasking, attending to several things at once, makes it nearly impossible to listen well, because it limits focus.
4. Motivational factors, such as boredom and overexcitement, prevent us from paying attention to a message. We tend to daydream or be distracted under these circumstances.
5. Certain negative attitudes about listening can cause us to struggle when listening.
  1. In many Western cultures, talking seems more powerful than listening.
  2. Overconfidence and laziness may lead to misunderstanding messages.
  3. Listening apprehension, also called receiver apprehension, is a state of uneasiness, anxiety, fear, or dread associated with a listening opportunity and can inhibit communication processes and outcomes.
Ask Yourself:
- During an evening at home, how much technology are you engaged with at a given time? Do you notice a difference in your listening abilities when a friend calls you during this time versus if you met up with the friend for coffee the next day?
- Can you think of a situation in which you felt as though your message was not being effectively received because of noise and distractions? How did you combat this?
There are ethical choices to make that will lead to effective and appropriate communication.
1. Defensive listening is responding with aggression and arguing with the speaker without fully listening to the message.
2. When we focus only on the bits of information that support a particular point of view or attitude, we engage in biased listening. This is common in situations where we feel defensive or insecure and can have negative implications.
  1. Insensitive listening is a type of selective listening that occurs when we fail to pay attention to the emotional content of someone’s message.
3. Self-absorbed listeners hear only the information they find useful for achieving certain goals.
  1. Self-absorbed listening can also be monopolistic listening, or listening in order to control the communication interaction.
  2. Self-absorbed listeners sometimes hurt others by the way they listen.
    1. Attacking is a response to someone else’s message with negative evaluations.
    2. Ambushing is more strategic and involves listening specifically to find weaknesses in others and then pulling those weaknesses out at strategic or embarrassing times.
4. Pseudolistening is pretending to listen when you’re not really paying attention.
Ask Yourself:
- What should you do if you find yourself listening defensively?
- Give an example of a time when selective listening might be useful. How might it also be unethical?
Communication context affects listening skills and ability.
1. The situation we are in (a crowded restaurant versus a private living room) and our relationship with the other person profoundly affects our listening behaviors.
2. Both actual listening behaviors and perceptions of appropriate listening vary among cultural groups and between genders.
3. Technology can be both helpful and hurtful to the listening process.
  1. We must listen actively (pay attention) to cues in messages sent via electronic channels.
  2. Using technology competently means taking into account the receiver of your message.
Ask Yourself:
- How does communication context affect listening skills, and vice versa?
- Can you recall a situation in which technological context hindered your listening or caused miscommunication?