Public Speaking Chapter 1 Key Terms

Study Notes

Stagefright is anxiety over giving a speech in front of an audience, while positive nervousness is controlled nervousness that helps energize a speaker.
Visualization is mentally imagining oneself giving a speech successfully.
A channel is the means of communicating a message, and feedback is the nonverbal message sent from a listener to a speaker.
Interference (noise) is anything that impedes the communication of a message, and ethnocentrism is the belief that one's own culture is superior to other groups' cultures.

Appreciative listening is listening for pleasure or enjoyment.
Empathetic listening is listening to provide emotional support to a speaker.
Comprehensive listening is listening to understand the message of a speaker.
Critical listening is listening to evaluate a message for the purpose of accepting or rejecting.
Pseudolistening is pretending to listen, while insulated listening avoids listening to something one doesn't want to deal with.
Defensive listening takes others' comments as personal attacks, and ambushing uses only the part of the message that can be used to attack the speaker.
Active listening gives attention to a speaker in a genuine effort to understand the message.

Brainstorming is a method of generating ideas.
A specific purpose is a phrase that states precisely what the speaker hopes to accomplish.
A central idea (thesis) is a one-sentence statement that encapsulates the main idea of a speech.

Demographic audience analysis focuses on factors such as race, ethnic, religion, etc.
Situational audience analysis focuses on factors such as the size of the audience, physical setting, occasion, etc.
Stereotyping is creating an oversimplified idea by assuming all group members are alike.
Attitude is a frame of mind in favor of or opposed to a belief, person, idea, etc.

An example is a specific case used to represent or illustrate a group of something.
A brief example is a specific instance, while an extended example is a story or narrative anecdote with some length to illustrate a point.
A hypothetical example describes an imaginary or fictional example.
Statistics are numerical data, and mean, median, and mode are measures of central tendency.
Testimony is a quotation or phrase used to support a point, and can be classified as expert testimony or peer testimony.
A direct quotation is a word-for-word testimony.

Chronological order is a pattern where the main points of a speech follow a organized time pattern.
Spatial order is a directional pattern, while causal order shows a cause-and-effect relationship.
Topical order divides a speech into logical and consistent subtopics.
Problem-solution order is a persuasive speech method where the first point shows a problem and then the second point shows the solution.
Connectives are words or phrases that connect ideas of a speech, and transitions indicate a shift in the speech.