Who Am I as a Communicator?

This week, I continued to investigate who I am as a communicator. My listening skills, levels of communication anxiety, and levels of verbal aggressiveness were measured both by a colleague and by my girlfriend.  I also evaluated myself within these same categories. What surprised me most was after analyzing the results of each assessment, all three of us placed me into the same categories for each assessment. Overall, I feel pleased with the results and am happy to know that both my coworker and my girlfriend view me as an effective communicator. In terms of my listening skills, I was regarded as empathetic and concerned with the emotions of others which helps me build relationships. The results of the communication anxiety inventory suggest that I am comfortable communicating in most situations and feel confident in anticipating such encounters. The results of the verbal aggressiveness scale indicate that I maintain a good balance between respect and consideration for others' viewpoints, and have the ability to argue fairly by attacking the facts of a position rather than the person holding that position. Taking these assessments also revealed several areas in which I should seek improvement, and I will create communication goals accordingly.

After continuing to explore who I am as a communicator, I have gleaned several new insights. In order to be effective communicators, we must work to understand how our perceptions respond to diversity. When communicating with others, we must not fall into a state of mindlessness in which we passively make snap judgements about the person with whom we are communicating. When we allow our perceptions to interfere with communication skills, our uninformed instant reactions and perceptions can be detrimental to the flow of effective communication. Additionally, we must be mindful not to let biases cloud our thoughts. When bias works its way into communication, we become unable to view situations differently and often ignore the information that is being shared. This represents what O'Hair and Wiemann (2012) refer to as selective perception, and it hinders our interactions with others.

I believe that being mindful of diversity and how my personal schemas respond to differences is key to communicating effectively with others. This heightened awareness will help me be prepared to shift my initial perceptions away from any existing biases and concentrate more on the sending and receiving of messages as they are intended.

Resources

O'Hair, D., & Wiemann, M. (2012). Real communication: An introduction, New York: Bedford/St. Martin's