Page 137 - Essentials of Human Communication

116 ChaPter 5 Nonverbal Messages

Summary of Concepts and Skills Study and Review materials for this chapter
are at MyCommunicationLab

Listen to the Audio Chapter Summary or more feet. Your treatment of space is influenced by such
at MyCommunicationLab factors as status, culture, context, subject matter, sex, age,
and positive or negative evaluation of the other person.
This chapter explored nonverbal communication— Territoriality involves people’s possessive reactions to
communication without words—and looked at the functions particular spaces or objects.
nonverbal messages serve, the channels of nonverbal commu- 12. Artifactual communication consists of messages conveyed
nication, and some of the cultural and gender-related influ- by objects or arrangements created by humans; for exam-
ences on and differences in nonverbal communication. ple, by the use of color, clothing, body adornment, or space
decoration.
principles of Nonverbal communication
13. Touch communication, or haptics, may communicate a
1. Nonverbal messages often interact with verbal messages variety of meanings, the most important being positive
to accent, complement, contradict, regulate, repeat, or affect, playfulness, control, ritual, and task-relatedness.
substitute. Touch avoidance is the desire to avoid touching and being
2. Nonverbal messages help manage impressions. We pres- touched by others.
ent ourselves nonverbally to give people the desired 14. Paralanguage has to do with the vocal but nonverbal
impression. dimension of speech. It includes rate, pitch, volume,
3. Nonverbal messages help form relationships. resonance, and vocal quality as well as pauses and
4. Nonverbal messages structure conversation. hesitations. Based on paralanguage, we make judgments
about people, sense conversational turns, and assess
5. Nonverbal messages can influence and deceive. believability.
6. Nonverbal messages are crucial for expressing emotions. 15. Silence communicates a variety of meanings, from anger
(as in the “silent treatment”) to deep emotional responses.
the channels of Nonverbal communication
16. Time communication, or chronemics, consists of messages
7. Body gestures are classified into five categories: emblems communicated by our treatment of time.
(which rather directly translate words or phrases); illustra- 17. Smell can communicate messages of attraction, taste,
tors (which accompany and literally “illustrate” verbal mes- memory, and identification.
sages); affect displays (which communicate emotional 18. Cultural variations in nonverbal communication are great.
meaning); regulators (which coordinate, monitor, main- Different cultures, for example, assign different meanings
tain, or control the speaking of another individual); and to gestures, facial expressions, and colors; have different
adaptors (which usually are unconscious and serve some spatial rules; and treat time very differently.
kind of need, as in scratching an itch).
8. Body appearance (for example, height and general attrac- some Nonverbal communication skills
tiveness) communicates a variety of messages.
9. Facial movements may communicate a variety of emotions. 19. Encoding skills (maintaining eye contact, avoiding
The most frequently studied are happiness, surprise, fear, intrusive touching) will enable you to communicate more
anger, sadness, and disgust/contempt. Facial management effectively with nonverbal messages.
techniques enable you to control your facial expression of 2.. Decoding skills (being conscious of the several nonverbal
emotions. The facial feedback hypothesis claims that facial channels sending messages simultaneously, interpreting
display of an emotion can lead to physiological and psy- messages in a cultural context) will enable you to more
chological changes. effectively understand the meanings being communicated
10. Eye movements may seek feedback, invite others to speak, with nonverbal signals.
signal the nature of a relationship, or compensate for physi- This chapter has covered a wide variety of nonverbal
cal distance. communication skills. Place a check mark next to those skills
11. The study of proxemics investigates the communicative that you feel you want to work on most.
functions of space and spatial relationships. Four major
proxemic distances are: (1) intimate distance, ranging from 1. I recognize the varied functions that nonverbal
actual touching to 18 inches; (2) personal distance, ranging messages (my own and those of others) serve: for
from 18 inches to 4 feet; (3) social distance, ranging from example, to form and manage impressions, to define
4 to 12 feet; and (4) public distance, ranging from 12 to 25 relationships, and to structure conversations.