Elements Of Communication

• Elements of communication


  Common components that together help define the communication process
• Elements of communication


  • People
  • Messages
  • Channels
  • Noise
  • Context
  • Feedback
  • Effect
• People


  • Communicators simultaneously send and receive messages, the role of sender or receiver does not belong exclusively to one person
  • Sender or source: encodes and transmits a message
  • Receiver: decodes and interprets a message
• Messages


  The content of communication or communicative act that is exchanged between source and receiver
• Means of communication


  • Verbal
  • Non-verbal
• Senses


  • Sound: auditory, use of intonation, surrounding
  • Sight: visual, see the person's looks
  • Taste: enjoy flavour of a food
  • Smell: olfactory, smell of friend's cologne
  • Touch: tactile, hug a parent
• Channels


  • The medium through which a message is sent
  • We are multichannel communicators because messages are sent and received through many or multiple channels
• Channels


  • Face-to-face interaction (Job interview, etc.)
  • Computer-mediated communication (E-mail, Instagram, etc.)
  • Text messaging (WhatsApp, etc.)
  • Mass medium (Tv, video streaming services, etc.)
• Noise


  Anything that interferes with, and distorts or disturbs communication
• Types of noise


  • Internal noise
  • External noise
• Internal noise


  • Physiological: physical condition of the communicator
  • Psychological: mental interference in sender/receiver
  • Semantic: when the communicators have different meaning system
• External noise


  • Caused by whatever happens in the environment (e.g. loud siren, disturbing odour, sunglasses, illegible handwriting, blurred type or fonts that are too small, poor grammar, popup ads, etc.)
• All communications contain noise, noise can't be totally eliminated, but its effects can be reduced
• Context


  • The physical setting i.e the place and time that influence the way people respond towards others
  • It includes physical, social-psychological, temporal and cultural context
• Types of context


  • Physical
  • Social-psychological
  • Temporal
  • Cultural
• Physical context


  The tangible or concrete environment in which communication takes place (e.g. meeting room, park, football field, etc.)
• Social-psychological context


  The relationships among the communicators (e.g. status relationships among the participants, their friendliness or hostility, the formality or informality and the seriousness or humorousness of the situation, etc.)
• Temporal context


  i. the time of day ii. the time in history in which the communication takes place iii. how a message fits into the sequence of communication events
• Cultural context


  One's and others' culture (e.g. the beliefs, values, and ways of behaving that are shared by a group of people and passed down from one generation to the next)
• Feedback


  The response or the information returned to a message source
• Types of feedback


  • Positive feedback
  • Negative feedback
  • Internal feedback
  • External feedback
• Positive feedback


  Extinguishes or stops, corrects or changes our behaviour
• Negative feedback


  A response that we give to ourselves as we monitor our own behaviour or performance during interaction
• Internal feedback


  A response from others
• External feedback


  A response or the information returned to a message source
• To be an effective communicator, one must be sensitive to both positive and negative feedback, whether internal or external
• Effects of communication


  • Physical
  • Cognitive
  • Emotional
• Physical effect


  Changes in behaviours can cause an action to happen, start a fight, argue, become apathetic, or evade an issue
• Cognitive effect


  Changes in attitudes, values, beliefs, and emotions
• Emotional effect


  An elicit feelings of joy, anger, or sadness
• A single message (e.g. a public speech on homelessness) may inform a person (intellectual effect), move him/her to feel differently (emotional effect), and lead to a more generous behaviour when come upon a homeless person (physical effect)
• The outcome or effect of communication encounters can be either emotional, physical, and cognitive, or any combination of the three
• These effects would influence the communicators and how they continue to communicate