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1、1A Wide-Angle View of CommunicationFrom birth to death, all types of communication play an integral part in our life. Whatever your occupation or leisure-time activities, communication of one form or another has a role. In fact, if people were asked to analyze how they spend most of their waking day
2、, the prime responses would be “communicating” or “being communicated with”. In reality, communication is our link to the rest of humanity.But what is communication? And what is it we seek to accomplish with it? Let us begin to answer these questions by examining what we consider to be the essential
3、 ingredients of communication.Senders and ReceiversCommunication involves people who send or receive messages. As senders we form messages and attempt to communicate them to others through verbal and nonverbal symbols. As receivers, we process the messages sent to us and react to them both verbally
4、and nonverbally. Sometimes, as in face-to-face communication we may send and receive messages simultaneously. This means that the role of sender or receiver is not restricted to any one party to the communication process; instead, we play both roles. And this is a good thing, for if we were just sen
5、ders, we might send message after message without ever stopping to consider whether the message was being received as we intended it to be. And if we were just receivers, we might be open to any and all messages that came our way.There are times when it seems as if communication is predominantly one
6、 way: receivers of messages fail to react; senders of messages fail to consider the reactions of the receiver before sending another message. But for communication to be effective, the messages people send to others should, at least in part, be determined by the messages received from them. The peop
7、le communicating have some relationship with one another that affects their perceptions of the ideas and feelings communicated. Friends usually have greater latitude in how they can say something in order to be understood correctly than do strangers or adversaries. That is one reason communication b
8、etween a public speaker and an audience differs qualitatively from communication between friends or colleagues.Field of Experience We each carry our field of experience with us wherever we go. When the people communicating have had similar life experiences, chances are they will be able to relate to
9、 each other in an effective way. However, to the extent that their life experiences have been different, they will probably have difficulty interacting with or understanding each other. As our storehouses of experience diverge, it becomes harder for us to share meaning. Conversely, as storehouses of
10、 experience converge, the sharing of meaning becomes easier.For instance, males and females can sometimes experience difficulty sharing 2meaning because they approach the world with different perspectives and life experiences. Moreover, when we are aware of such differences, we may tend to see them
11、as barriers to communication. The more one person differs from another, the less either person is able to predict the others behavior.MessagesThe message is the content of a communicative act. People communicate a wide variety of messages. Some of these messages are private (a smile accompanied by a
12、n “I love you”), while others are directed at millions (a network television show, a mass-market paperback). Some messages are sent intentionally (“I want you to know”), while others are sent accidentally (“I didnt realize you were watching me”). But as long as someone is there to interpret the resu
13、lts of a senders efforts, a message is being sent. Thus, we can say that everything a sender does or says has potential message value. Consequently, whether you smile, listen, renew a magazine subscription, watch a popular TV program, or turn away from a person, you are communicating some message, a
14、nd your message is having some effect. The pure ideas and feelings that exist in a persons mind represent meanings. In communication, messages are formed by putting meanings into symbols. The words, sounds, and actions that communicate meaning are known as symbols because they stand for the meanings
15、 intended by the person using them. The process of putting meanings into symbols is called encoding, while the process of transforming messages back into ideas and feelings is called decoding. Generally, because the meanings we assign to messages depend on our own experience, other people may at tim
16、es decode a message differently from the way we intend. Channels We send our messages to receivers through a variety of sensory channels. We may use sound, sight, smell, taste, touch or any combination of these to carry a message. Face-to-face communication has two basic channels: sound (verbal symbols) and sight (nonverbal cues). However, people can and do communicate by any of the five sensory channels. A fragrant scent or a firm handshake may contribute as much to meaning as wha
