A Self-Evaluation of Communication

This week I completed three self-assessments concerning my communication skills in regard to the type of listener that I am, my verbal aggressiveness, and my communication anxiety levels. I asked my husband and a student that has been in three different classes that I teach at the high school level and is now my student aide to also complete the self-assessments for me. I was surprised to see that each of us evaluated my communication very similarly. My communication at work rated less aggressive and more confident than my communication at home but overall they were very close to the same. What surprised me the most was the listening style category that I fit into. I was rated a "people-oriented" listener (Rubin, Rubin, Graham, Perse & Seibold, 2009). The results suggest that I mainly focus on the feelings of the people that I communicate with and that although that may play a factor in strengthening relationships it may interfere with accurately judging a situation or a person’s motives (Rubin, Rubin, Graham, Perse & Seibold, 2009). I had never thought about how being focused on another person's emotions might stand in the way of seeing the whole picture clearly. Although I still think that it is very important to be an empathetic listener, I realize now that I need to make sure that I am clearly seeing the rest of the details as well.

This week I gained a few other insights about communication. First, I learned that perception and personal experiences or schemas play such a vital role in the way we communicate and interpret information around us. While completing the discussion assignment, I was surprised to learn that I could have an opinion about so many different things just by looking at a picture of someone. Perception can easily allow biased thoughts to stand in the way of accurate interpretations if we let it (O'Hair & Wiemann, 2012). Second, I learned about the self-fulfilling prophecy which states that our own predictions of how things will happen lead to behaviors that make those predictions come true (O'Hair & Wiemann, 2012). For example, "if your friend Josh goes to a party believing that others don't enjoy his company, he is more likely to stand in a corner, not talking to anyone and making no effort to be friendly. Thus, Josh's prophecy is fulfilled: others don't like him" (O'Hair & Wiemann, 2012, p. 51). The self-fulfilling prophecy helps me see how anxiety about a situation may lead to failure and how confidence in a situation may lead to more successful outcomes.


Reference:

O'Hair, D., & Wiemann, M. (2012). Real communication: An introduction. New York: 

Bedford/St. Martin's.

Rubin, R. B., Rubin, A. M., Graham, E. E., Perse, E. M., & Seibold, D. R. (Eds.(2009). Communication research measures II: A sourcebook. New York: Routledge.