Communication Professor.com

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

"World News" Portrait of a Candidate: Barack Obama Interview

Tuesday, August 7, 2012

Communication Model Explained and Basic Concepts Related to the Model

The basics of communication can be found several places on the web. A suggested start is the University of Missouri, one of the top communication schools in the nation.

I. Foundation for School and Life Success
A. Introductions to not only the field, but to college and how to survive and prosper.
B. You must use the college requirements and learn the methods utilized at your school.
C. Notes, outlining, references, testing techniques, etc.
D. Assistance available through student services.
E. Use of computer, Angel, Word, Internet and so on.
F. Use of library, outside references, sources, tools.
G. Basic Research skills for life
H. Organizing thoughts
I. Outlining
J. Presenting your ideas effectively

The Shannon and Weaver model

II. Components of a Speech Transaction
A. Situation and Context
B. Speaker / Transmitter / Source
C. Channels / Media
D. Message
E. Symbols / Semantics
F. Encode
G. Decode
H. Feedback
I. Noise / Interference / Screens / Filters
J. Internal Noise
K. External Noise
L. Cultural Noise

M. All three forms of noise are interconnected and interact

N. Semantic Noise is not one of the three forms of noise, it means the signals or symbols of a transmission are not being understood properly due to outside factors (the other three forms of noise)
O. The components of a speech transaction occur simultaneously and are interdependent

P. All communication is transactional, involves a two-way passage of information, emotion, intent.

III. Intro into basic course concepts
A. Communication Model

1. Transmitter,
- Intent of Transmitter,
- What was meant to be communicated
a. Sender,
b. Source
c. Speaker
2. Channel,
3. Medium. Media
4. Message, intended message
5. Receiver,
6. Listener,
7. T2 (not Arnold!)
8. Feedback
9. Encode
10. Decode

11. Codes
a. Verbal,
- Words, actual language, vocabulary
b. Vocal,
- How you say the words, voice, inflection, etc.
c. Visual,
d. - Everything else, see, hear, smell, touch, etc.

12. Proofs,
- How we prove and argument, why we believe things
f. Ethos, Credibility, Power, Likeability, Trust, Source, Expertise, Position
g. Logos, Logic (some variance by culture)
h. Pathos, Emotion, Emotional Appeal
i. Mythos, Cultural, Cultural shorthand, David v. Goliath, Patriotism. Flag, etc.

12. Noise: Screens, \ Filters, Interference, anything that gets in the way of the message

13. Internal Screens,
- Whatever happens inside your mind or body to interfere with understanding the message as intended, or to interfere with transmitting the message in a way that will be understood
- Internal noise is what is occurring inside the transmitter or receiver. For example an event earlier in the day or in the life of the individual could change the way they interpret or send signals. Physical, psychological, cognitive forms of interference may impact how message is encoded or decoded, interpreted or received. Disabilities, health, fatigue, hunger, external events impact on how you feel or think, and unrelated thoughts are examples of internal noise.

14. External Screens
- Whatever happens outside of your mind or body to interfere with understanding the message as intended, or to interfere with transmitting the message in a way that will be understood.
- External noise is what occurred outside of the sender or receive. This could include sound, smell, lighting, temperature, time of day, events occurring at the same time as the message, other messages conflicting or concurrent with the intended message, environment, etc.

15. Cultural Screens
- Differences in culture (including Demographic, Psychographic differences) that interferes with understanding the message as intended.
- Differences in culture interfere with transmitting the message in a way that will be understood.
- Cultural noise comes from the self-identity, backgrounds, beliefs and culture of the sender and/or the receiver.
- Messages can have differing meanings. Protocol, prolific, etc.

16. Semantic Noise, not understanding the words, not understanding the language
- Not one of the three forms of screens or noise, because semantic can cross internal, external and cultural boundaries and it simply means tat symbols (usually words) are not being transmitted or interpreted the same between parties in the communication transaction.

17. Demographics as way of understanding yourself and your audience
a. Age
b. Gender (Sex)
c. Psychographics and Culture
d. Age and Gender are fixed properties
e. Psychographic is everthing else you can measure or put a number to
f. Psychographic differs as is is self-identified, what you volunteer yourself as

B. The Communication Process
1. Speaker/ Sender/ Transmitter
a. The source of the message
b. Requires technical skills
c. Requires enthusiasm and active stimulation
d. Involves intent
e. Requires understanding the Receiver
f. Requires decisions on how to send message
g. Requires knowledge, processing preparation and understanding

2. Channel/ media
a. How the message is sent
b. Tolls used to send message
c. Media or Medium utilized in encoding and decoding message
d. Means by which the message is communicated
e. One of more channels may be used
f. May involve technical support or intervention
g. Could be as simple as eye contact

3. Message
a. Whatever is being communicated
b. Intended and unintended messages can be transmitted
c. Verbal and non-verbal transmissions
d. May or may not be interpreted properly by receiver

4. Listener/ Receiver/ Audience
a. Every message is filtered through the listeners frame of reference
b. Listeners frame of reference is the sum total of their experiences, goal, knowledge, values, attitudes and beliefs.
c. No source and receiver have the exact frame of reference
d. A message and its transmission must be adapted to the audience
e. Noise gets in the way of the communication

5. Feedback
a. Message sent by listener to the speaker, receiver to the transmitter
b. The receiver becomes the transmitter
c. The transmitter become the receiver
d. Because all communication is transactional (involving a transaction of information, feelings or ideas) feedback operates under the same principals and rules as the original transmission and channel
e. Feedback may be immediate or delayed
f. Noise/ Screens/ Filter interfere with both the original transmission and the feedback
g. Successful speakers adjust their message based on careful studied reception of feedback

6. Interference/ Screens/ Noise / Filters
a. Anything that impeded the communication of a message
b. Can be internal or external
c. May also involve internal and external cultural filters
d. External comes from outside, physical or psychological, of the speaker or listener
e. Internal involves anything, physical or psychological, involving what is inside the sender or receiver, speaker or listener.
f. External may be noise, lighting, major events, size or shape of room, sound, temperature, other speakers and so forth
g. Internal may be poor listening skills, lack of concentration, the other 50-% of what is going on in your brain, physical ailments or disabilities, fatigue and so forth.
h. Successful speakers overcome interference in a wide range of ways, numerous times during their message

7. Encode
a. Selecting symbols to communicate a message
b. Determining how to transmit the message
c. Combination of verbal, vocal, visual and other
d. Anticipating the receiver

8. Decode
a. Understanding symbols uses to communicate a message
b. Understanding the intent of the message
c. Understanding and translating verbal, visual and other codes
d. Anticipating the intent of the sender
9. Codes
a. How a message is encoded
b. Verbal are the words used, the vocabulary
c. Vocal is how the words are said or transmitted, vocal tones, inflections, etc.

d. Visual is everything else, all sight, sound, smell, tactile touch, etc.

10. Proofs
a. Ethos - credibility, real and perceived
b. Logos – logic, common pattern of thought to a group
c. Pathos – emotional appeals
d. Mythos – myths, common stories and shorthand by culture

11. Demographics
a. Explains an individual, group, audience, market or culture
b. Numbers
c. Age
d. Gender or sex
e. Psychographic (anything else you can put a number to)

For additional information please click on "read more" below"

You enter the car showroom looking for a vehicle. The first thing the salesperson will do is make sure you have something to drink, perhaps something to eat, and that that you are comfortable (thus the well lit showrooms with seating and tables). They are meeting your basic physiological needs.

The showroom and lot appear safe, good lighting, lots of people around, an island of safety in which to shop for a car or truck. The dealership is meeting your need for safety and security.

The salesperson calls you by name, discussed your family and "theirs", and if appropriate touch (handshake, shoulder and so forth).

The esteem level comes when you get behind the wheel. Their job is to talk you up and get you a vehicle you will love that will also enhance you self esteem and image. Does the vehicle give you confidence, make you feel successful, gain you the respect of others or earn you respect from those you wish to look up to or respect you?

Self Actualization is an issue beyond what anyone else can do for you. The explanation varies by field, by interpretation, by context. In a way if you feel good about yourself and if the vehicle meets your needs at the highest level it may contribute to your self-actualization. A person may feel self actualized with a used car, or a bicycle for that matter.

This in a nutsell is Maslow. A pyramid, not a triangle, built on a foundation that must be strong and with each new level needing to be on a sound foundation for the levels above to be strong and successful.

Most of the world lives at the bottom two levels. Most of the educated industrial world lives in the botom four levels. The top level is very difficult to achieve, if even possible.

The following is from: http://www.envisionsoftware.com/articles/Maslows_Needs_Hierarchy.html

Self-actualization is the summit of Maslow's motivation theory. It is about the quest of reaching one's full potential as a person. Unlike lower level needs, this need is never fully satisfied; as one grows psychologically there are always new opportunities to continue to grow.

Self-actualized people tend to have motivators such as:

Truth

Justice

Wisdom

Meaning

Self-actualized persons have frequent occurrences of peak experiences, which are energized moments of profound happiness and harmony. According to Maslow, only a small percentage of the population reaches the level of self-actualization.

Click here for further details, explanation and examples of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.

Esteem Needs

After a person feels that they "belong", the urge to attain a degree of importance emerges. Esteem needs can be categorized as external motivators and internal motivators.

Internally motivating esteem needs are those such as self-esteem, accomplishment, and self respect. External esteem needs are those such as reputation and recognition.

Some examples of esteem needs are:

Recognition (external motivator)

Attention (external motivator)

Social Status (external motivator)

Accomplishment (internal motivator)

Self-respect (internal motivator)

Maslow later improved his model to add a layer in between self-actualization and esteem needs: the need for aesthetics and knowledge.

Social Needs

Once a person has met the lower level physiological and safety needs, higher level motivators awaken. The first level of higher level needs are social needs. Social needs are those related to interaction with others and may include:

Friendship

Belonging to a group

Giving and receiving love

Safety Needs

Once physiological needs are met, one's attention turns to safety and security in order to be free from the threat of physical and emotional harm. Such needs might be fulfilled by:

Living in a safe area

Medical insurance

Job security

Financial reserves

According to the Maslow hierarchy, if a person feels threatened, needs further up the pyramid will not receive attention until that need has been resolved.

Physiological Needs

Physiological needs are those required to sustain life, such as:

Air

Water

Food

Sleep

According to this theory, if these fundamental needs are not satisfied then one will surely be motivated to satisfy them. Higher needs such as social needs and esteem are not recognized until one satisfies the needs basic to existence.

Applying Maslow's Needs Hierarchy - Business Management Implications

If Maslow's theory is true, there are some very important leadership implications to enhance workplace motivation. There are staff motivation opportunities by motivating each employee through their style of management, compensation plans, role definition, and company activities.

Physiological Motivation: Provide ample breaks for lunch and recuperation and pay salaries that allow workers to buy life's essentials.
Safety Needs: Provide a working environment which is safe, relative job security, and freedom from threats.
Social Needs: Generate a feeling of acceptance, belonging, and community by reinforcing team dynamics.
Esteem Motivators: Recognize achievements, assign important projects, and provide status to make employees feel valued and appreciated.
Self-Actualization: Offer challenging and meaningful work assignments which enable innovation, creativity, and progress according to long-term goals.

Remember, everyone is not motivated by same needs. At various points in their lives and careers, various employees will be motivated by completely different needs. It is imperative that you recognize each employee's needs currently being pursued. In order to motivate their employees, leadership must be understand the current level of needs at which the employee finds themselves, and leverage needs for workplace motivation.

Maslow's Theory - Limitations and Criticism

Though Maslow's hierarchy makes sense intuitively, little evidence supports its strict hierarchy. Actually, recent research challenges the order that the needs are imposed by Maslow's pyramid. As an example, in some cultures, social needs are placed more fundamentally than any others. Further, Maslow's hierarchy fails to explain the "starving artist" scenario, in which the aesthetic neglects their physical needs to pursuit of aesthetic or spiritual goals. Additionally, little evidence suggests that people satisfy exclusively one motivating need at a time, other than situations where needs conflict.

While scientific support fails to reinforce Maslow's hierarchy, his thery is very popular, being the introductory motivation theory for many students and managers, worldwide. To handle a number of the issues of present in the Needs Hierarchy, Clayton Alderfer devised the ERG theory, a consistent needs-based model that aligns more accurately with scientific research.

Monday, August 6, 2012

Basic Levels of Communication

Intrapersonal communication is communication in which there is one person.

Interpersonal communication, which is communication between two people on inside a small group of people in a less formal environment.

Since all communication is transactional, requires a transaction, intrapersonal communication is often seen in terms of psychology and not social communication.

Social communication begins with two people, which is called a dyad

In small group communication there is at least three individuals and can range up to what some social scientist cap at about a dozen. There is no fixed number.

The context in which messages go up and down hierarchies is called organizational communication.

intercultural communication is communication between (inter) cultures.

Public speaking is also known as presentational speaking, where one or more speakers address a group or audience.

Mediated communication involved the use of technology or tools that have limitations in and of themselves. Pretty much any computer technology, including e-mail, blogs, web posts, text messaging, instant messaging and cellular communication are seen as mediated. The use of video, audio, or images seen as visual or presentation aids can also be seen as mediated communication,

Today mediated communication is blending with all other forms, including but not limited to the use of video and audio conferencing, over reliance on PowerPoint, YouTube and other tools or services, and the use of virtual tools rather then physical models or examples.

PowerPoint

The Trouble With Online Education

Loren Capelli

By MARK EDMUNDSON

New York Times (click here)

“AH, you’re a professor. You must learn so much from your students.”

This line, which I’ve heard in various forms, always makes me cringe. Do people think that lawyers learn a lot about the law from their clients? That patients teach doctors much of what they know about medicine?

Yet latent in the sentiment that our students are our teachers is an important truth. We do in fact need to learn from them, but not about the history of the Roman Empire or the politics of “Paradise Lost.” Understanding what it is that students have to teach teachers can help us to deal with one of the most vexing issues now facing colleges and universities: online education. At my school, the University of Virginia, that issue did more than vex us; it came close to tearing the university apart.

A few weeks ago our president, Teresa A. Sullivan, was summarily dismissed and then summarily reinstated by the university’s board of visitors. One reason for her dismissal was the perception that she was not moving forward fast enough on Internet learning. Stanford was doing it, Harvard, Yale and M.I.T. too. But Virginia, it seemed, was lagging. Just this week, in fact, it was announced that Virginia, along with a number of other universities, signed on with a company called Coursera to develop and offer online classes.

But can online education ever be education of the very best sort?

It’s here that the notion of students teaching teachers is illuminating. As a friend and fellow professor said to me: “You don’t just teach students, you have to learn ’em too.” It took a minute — it sounded like he was channeling Huck Finn — but I figured it out.

With every class we teach, we need to learn who the people in front of us are. We need to know where they are intellectually, who they are as people and what we can do to help them grow. Teaching, even when you have a group of a hundred students on hand, is a matter of dialogue.

In the summer Shakespeare course I’m teaching now, I’m constantly working to figure out what my students are able to do and how they can develop. Can they grasp the contours of Shakespeare’s plots? If not, it’s worth adding a well-made film version of the next play to the syllabus. Is the language hard for them, line to line? Then we have to spend more time going over individual speeches word by word. Are they adept at understanding the plot and the language? Time to introduce them to the complexities of Shakespeare’s rendering of character.

Every memorable class is a bit like a jazz composition. There is the basic melody that you work with. It is defined by the syllabus. But there is also a considerable measure of improvisation against that disciplining background.

Something similar applies even to larger courses. We tend to think that the spellbinding lecturers we had in college survey classes were gifted actors who could strut and fret 50 amazing minutes on the stage. But I think that the best of those lecturers are highly adept at reading their audiences. They use practical means to do this — tests and quizzes, papers and evaluations. But they also deploy something tantamount to artistry. They are superb at sensing the mood of a room. They have a sort of pedagogical sixth sense. They feel it when the class is engaged and when it slips off. And they do something about it. Their every joke is a sounding. It’s a way of discerning who is out there on a given day.

A large lecture class can also create genuine intellectual community. Students will always be running across others who are also enrolled, and they’ll break the ice with a chat about it and maybe they’ll go on from there. When a teacher hears a student say, “My friends and I are always arguing about your class,” he knows he’s doing something right. From there he folds what he has learned into his teaching, adjusting his course in a fluid and immediate way that the Internet professor cannot easily match.

Online education is a one-size-fits-all endeavor. It tends to be a monologue and not a real dialogue. The Internet teacher, even one who responds to students via e-mail, can never have the immediacy of contact that the teacher on the scene can, with his sensitivity to unspoken moods and enthusiasms. This is particularly true of online courses for which the lectures are already filmed and in the can. It doesn’t matter who is sitting out there on the Internet watching; the course is what it is.

Not long ago I watched a pre-filmed online course from Yale about the New Testament. It was a very good course. The instructor was hyper-intelligent, learned and splendidly articulate. But the course wasn’t great and could never have been. There were Yale students on hand for the filming, but the class seemed addressed to no one in particular. It had an anonymous quality. In fact there was nothing you could get from that course that you couldn’t get from a good book on the subject.

A truly memorable college class, even a large one, is a collaboration between teacher and students. It’s a one-time-only event. Learning at its best is a collective enterprise, something we’ve known since Socrates. You can get knowledge from an Internet course if you’re highly motivated to learn.

But in real courses the students and teachers come together and create an immediate and vital community of learning. A real course creates intellectual joy, at least in some. I don’t think an Internet course ever will. Internet learning promises to make intellectual life more sterile and abstract than it already is — and also, for teachers and for students alike, far more lonely.

Mark Edmundson, a professor of English at the University of Virginia, is the author of “Why Read?”

Communication Contexts (Types of Communication)

(click for source link) Communication Contexts

Communication Contexts
Oftentimes, we identify what something is by identifying what it is not, in order to understand how we are referring to public speaking in this text, we need to understand how public speaking differs from other contexts in which communication operates. In the following section, we will describe the communication contexts, which are the environment and circumstances between the participants that are communicating. I’ll use the example of Tom to explain each context.

Link to home web site for ACA Open Knowledge Online Project, click here.

The first is intrapersonal communication. Intrapersonal communication is communication in which there is one person. Tom may notice that the local community Arts Center is falling into a state of disrepair. As a musician, Tom may think to himself that the Arts Center is vital to the well-being of the community and seeing the poor shape of the building, Tom may think about taking up the issue in front of the city council.

Tom may think to himself about the issue and when he mentions it to his roommate, Steve, there is interpersonal communication, which is communication between two people. Intrapersonal and interpersonal communication look alike, but they are very different in that one is self-addresses (intra) whereas the other in between two people (inter). Many scholars recognize that communication begins with two people, which is called a dyad, and not with one person, which is seen as an interest to psychology and not to communication. Others believe that Tom can debate whether or not to support the Arts Center by himself and consider this important for communication studies. That is, the debate is within one person but between two positions.

Now let’s say Tom and Steve both believe that the Arts Center is a really great idea, but they don’t have enough time between the two of them. They may enlist some other friends—Kevin, Brahm, Meredith, and Cara. When they all sit down and discuss the Arts Center they are engaging in small-group communication. In small group communication there is at least three individuals and can range up to twelve. While there is at least three, any less would be a dyad, the maximum number is defined by the ability of all those involved to contribute regularly to the discussion. Turning to a different example will be helpful. In court proceedings there are normally twelve members to a jury. If there were anymore, it would be questionable if everyone could participate. Now, you might be asking, “Wouldn’t it be easier just to have two people? Maybe. But groups are usually task based whereas dyads are relationally based (e.g., platonic/romantic). The more members of a group there are, the more ideas and different perspectives can be explored—it’s the Marketplace of Ideas in action. Nevertheless, there can be groups such as Tom and his friends that exist for different purposes such as friendship and inclusion.

Tom and all his friends all like the idea of rebuilding the Arts Center, but he has to go to work at the music store downtown. Tom goes off to work and talks to his coworkers and his manager about starting a petition about the Arts Center. Tom was so excited, he even wanted to tell the chief executive officer (CEO) of the company, but Tom cannot. The business that he works at is very large and the organization’s home office is on the other side of the country. Tom cannot just go into the CEO’s office and talk about a local Arts Center. The CEO is too busy making decisions and sitting in conferences, which can be a type of small group. Tom can, however, tell his supervisor directly over him who can then tell the area manager, who can in turn tell the district manager and eventually the message, if it’s important enough, can get to the CEO. Odds are the national CEO would not need to approve Tom’s use of the store to get people to sign a petition. That decision may be made by the local or regional manager. That is, the message would not get very high in the chain of command. On the other hand, the CEO can send messages down through the chain of command. For example, if the CEO of a company wants to implement a change in the way the records are displayed, then that message would be handed down through high-level managers to low-level managers until the message was received by the workers who would be affected by the change. This context in which messages go up and down hierarchies is called organizational communication.

Now let’s say for a moment that Tom and his friends were highly successful in the efforts to rebuild the Arts Center and decide to operate their own organization to build art centers throughout the world. They visit other cultures and do research, they will find four major dichotomies: individual and collective; high and low context, high and low power distance; and feminine and masculine, which are the basic concepts of intercultural communication, which is communication between (inter) cultures. Individual oriented cultures focus on the individual whereas a collective culture focuses on the community’s interests. In high context cultures, meaning is in the setting and therefore meaning is communicated implicitly whereas in low context cultures, the emphasis is on the spoken word and meaning is explicit. High and low power distance differ in that the[pg] former values such things as birth order and occupation and in low power distance cultures, everyone is considered equal. Lastly, is feminine and masculine, which is different from woman and man. Feminine traits generally focus on nurturing whereas masculine traits refer to assertiveness and competitiveness. Importantly, a man can be nurturing just as a woman can be assertive.

But if Tom and his friends all just focus on their local Arts Center, they may go to the library and uncover information about the city’s budget and the value or art to a community. He then arranges the information so that the speech flows nicely. Next, he memorizes the speech although he doesn’t need to memorize the speech word-for-word. He might compose some stylistic elements of the speech, which he memorizes exactly but may not memorize other lesser elements. Finally, he practices his delivery to get the most out if it. These are the elements in the context of public speaking. The rest of this book explains this context in great detail.

(click for the book source link) Communication Contexts

But let’s say Tom gives his speech outside the Arts Center, but many people were not around to hear it. He decides that he will send a press release to the local television and radio outlets that announce the date and time of his next speech. This causes the outlets to come and record the speech and broadcast it. Tom is now in the mass-mediated context. The difference between the Tom’s public speaking and the broadcast of Tom speaking is very important. In the public speaking context, Tom can see his audience. In the mass-mediated context, Tom cannot see his audience. The difference is slim but substantial. When Tom can see the audience, he can change his speaking style to reflect the audience. If the crowd is complacent, he can energize them; if they are cheering, he can become louder or wait until they are done. If he does not know the reactions of his audience, then he cannot do this. Watching great speakers like Martin Luther King Jr. speak show how reacting to the audience can do wonders for a speech.

The last context is the computer-mediated context. As its name suggests it is communication mediated through computer technology especially through the use of the Internet. Some people may record Tom’s speech with their digital cameras and place it online. Whereas mass-mediated communication only broadcast Tom’s speech to the local community, the computer-mediated context allows anyone with an Internet connection to view the speech. Thus, one of the major differences between mass communication and computer communication is the latter’s ability to transcend geographic limitations. That is, with computer-mediated communication, people in India, Luxemburg, or Samoa can view Tom’s speech. Not only can they view the speech but they can also offer comments and make their own videos responding to Tom’s.

Some may argue that mass communication can transcend geographical boundaries too. While they can to a certain degree, computer-mediated communication is far superior. You local television affiliate broadcasts news to your local community, the national news networks broadcast to the country. Some of these national networks are picked up around the world—just like Americans can watch the British news from the BBC

on public television. These are examples of mass-communication transcending boundaries, but do you ever see local British news aired in America? Have you ever seen the local news from a town in any country in Africa? China? Russia? Probably not. Have you ever watched videos on YouTube.com from Africa, China, or Russia? Odds are you have. And these videos do carry the extremely local news—the events at school or in the neighborhood— and these events that the local news wouldn’t broadcast to the area can be posted for the entire world to watch.

From: