Introduction to Communication Studies 101: Purpose of Communication PDF

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What is communication? blah blah % blah ? $ ! blah blah blah $ ? % blah ! blah “The art of communication is the language of leadership.” James Humes COMMUNICATION › is a term used to refer to any dynamic, information-seeking process › transmits information, ideas, emotions, skills, etc., by the use of symbolic words, pictures, figures, graphs, etc. › is the act or process of stimulating meaning in the mind of another individual by means of a message.  Wilbur Schramm thinks of communication as a sharing process. He puts it this way: “Communication comes from the Latin communis, common. When we communicate, we are trying to establish a “commonness” with someone. That is, we are trying to share information, an idea, or an attitude. It is somewhat trying to communicate with the idea that the essence of communication is getting the receiver and the sender “turned” together for a particular message.” COMMUNICATION is stirring up ideas in the mind of another. It is the sharing of ideas among a group of people. It is imparting concepts to an audience. Monroe et al. (1982) described it as the sharing of experiences publicly for the common good.  Models of Communication 1. The first and earliest model comes from Aristotle (5 B.C.), who was a teacher of Rhetoric and even put up an academy to produce good speakers. (Message) (Listener) SPEAKER EFFECT SPEECH AUDIENCE ARISTOTLE’S MODEL OF COMMUNICATION Aristotle focused on the Speaker and the Message which the most important part in his model is the Setting where the Listener is situated. It is the Setting that dictates the Message. The three settings in Aristotle’s time were legal, deliberative, and ceremonial. The LEGAL SETTING meant the courts where ordinary people defended themselves (there were no lawyers then). The DELIBERATIVE SETTING meant the political assemblies, the highest of which was the Roman Senate. The CEREMONIAL SETTING meant the celebrations held when they won a war, when they lost a leader or had a new one, and when they welcomed a visiting leader from another kingdom or country. Such occasions called for speeches of welcome, poems of tribute or of eulogies, and poems of lament.  Aristotle further explains that speakers should adjust their messages according to their audience and the occasion to achieve a particular effect The components illustrated in Aristotle’s Model (speaker, speech, occasion, audience, and effect) should be considered when communicating one’s message. 2. The Claude Shannon and Warren Weaver Model (1949) which gave us the concept of “noise”. This is often called the Telephone Model because it is based on the experience of having the message interfered with by “noise” from the telephone switchboard back in the 1940s. Sender Encoder Channel Decoder Receiver FEEDBACK SHANNON-WEAVER’S MODEL OF COMMUNICATION  In this model, the SENDER is the person giving the message, while the ENCODER is the transmitter which converts the message into signals. The DECODER, on the other hand, is the reception place of the signal which converts signals into message, which is why in modern parlance, when there is “no signal,” there is difficulty in decoding the message. The RECEIVER is the DESTINATION of the message by the sender which is the person who is being called – and when there are problems, or “noise,” that interferes with the message, then the receiver gives the FEEDBACK, which is usually phrased as “choppy,” when the message cannot be heard because of the signal. The messages are transferred through the use of a CHANNEL; in the case of the telephone, the channel is the cable, while in the case of the cellphone, the channel is the radio frequencies. 3. WILBUR SCHRAMM is considered as the Father of Mass Communication. He came up with five models, but the Schramm Model (1955) is the concept that explains why communication breakdown occurs. Schramm asserts that communication can take place if and only if there is an overlap between the Field of Experience of the Speaker and the Field of Experience of the Listener. Field of Experience Source Encoder Signal Decoder Destination Field of Experience SCHRAMM’S MODEL OF COMMUNICATION What is the Field of Experience? It is everything that makes a person unique – everything he/she has ever learned, watched, seen, heard, read, and studied. In other words, it is everything a person has ever experienced or not experienced in his/her life.  It is this Field of Experience that is used to interpret the Message and create a Response. It is also this Field of Experience of the Listener that needs to overlap with the Speaker’s Field of Experience, which can only happen when the two fields have commonalities. According to Sheha Mishra (2017), the field experience may constitute “culture, social background, beliefs, experiences, values, and rules.” FOR EXAMPLE: The teacher must deliver his/her lecture in either English or Filipino because that is the language that students know and use. If the teacher suddenly started using Chinese in the lecture, the students will not understand a single thing! The teacher may only be understood in Chinese if he/she is teaching in a Chinese school.  OSGOOD-SCHRAMM MODEL OF COMMUNICATION 4. OSGOOD-SCHRAMM MODEL pays attention to the role of the interpreter. Encoding and decoding are not automatic processes both go through the filter of the interpreter. Therefore, the message may succeed or fail, based on the interpreter’s appreciation of the message. There are times when the sender and receiver may apply different meanings to the same message, and this is termed “semantic noise.” 4. EUGENE WHITE MODEL (1960) tells us that a communication is a circular and continuous, without a beginning or end. This is why he made a cyclical model. He is also points out that although we can assume that communication begins with thinking, communication can actually be observed from any point in the circle. WHITE’S MODEL OF COMMUNICATION  According to White, it is possible to begin at any of the stages outlined in his model. People are under the mistaken impression that when we communicate, we usually start with thinking, but that is not necessarily the case. Since it is a circular model, it means that oral communication is a continuous process with no real beginning or end. The most important contribution from Eugene White’s model is the concept of feedback, which can only be processed by the speaker if he or she has been monitoring the audience or the listener. Hence, the speaker must also pay attention to the listener’s verbal and non-verbal cues (Flores, 2016)  In conclusion, communication is not a simple process that starts with the speaker and ends with the listener – there are many factors that should be considered. When it comes to the message, how the message is organized and what field of experience it comes from should be taken into consideration. When it comes to the sender, the best communication is the one that involves feedback. Furthermore, there are several kinds of “noise” that may severely affect the reception of the message and thus, should be considered and avoided. Cultural differences, technology, & interpretation need to be considered as well. To be good communicators, one needs to pay attention to how people are responding to the message, and adjust accordingly rather than being preoccupied with simply expressing oneself.