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Interpersonal Communication: What is it, and how do you use it?
By Administration | May 24, 2007
Every day you send off a variety of different signals, both verbal and non-verbal. These signals can be something as simple as a wink, or as complex as an in depth conversation with someone. How you use these signals defines how you act as a communicator, and even when you try not to communicate, you are still communicating.
Communication is continuous. No matter how hard you try, you can not simply stop communicating.
You may have heard of something called interpersonal communication. This type of communication is often discussed, and many people aren’t even completely aware of what interpersonal communication really is.
Without writing a novel on it, interpersonal communication can be defined quite simply as communicating between individuals, or, the various ways that you will communicate with other people. It becomes much more complicated, however, as interpersonal communication can be further broken down into four main areas:
- The sender - the individual who is actively partaking in communication. For example, if you are having a conversation with a friend, you are the sender when you are talking.
- The receiver - the individual who is receiving the communication. For example, when you are talking to a friend, they are the receiver while they are listening to you.
- The message - the message being sent by the sender. This can be vocal, such as words or expressions, or non-verbal, such as a glare or smile.
- Feedback - the response to the sender from the receiver. For example, when you are speaking to a friend, they are giving you feedback by nodding their head, making eye contact, etc.
So, in essence, interpersonal communication is the process of which two or more individuals communicate. You see this in many different forms every day, from something as mundane as a smile or funny face, or perhaps something a bit more pronounced, such as body painting or a rather up front tattoo.
You use interpersonal communication unconsciously, though you can also make the concious decision as to how you are going to use it. For example, when you are talking with a friend, you may be smiling, nodding your head in agreement, and you may even have an excited tone when you speak. All of those cues are elements of communication, and each one of them delivers a specific message.
You can choose to alter your subconscious delivery of these messages. For example, you may be talking to someone that you may not agree with, but you will smile and seem interested in order to be polite. Those messages (the smile, for example) are not natural, as you do not believe what you are discussing, and human instinct would dictate a different response. However, your choice to deliver positive feedback is the result of a conscious decision- you want to deliver that feedback for whatever reason.
For this reason, it can also be stated that interpersonal communication is subjective and contextual. At the very core, interpersonal communication is an instinctive method of communicating. However, adding layers (such as personal opinion or bias) removes the instinct from all aspects, as you are now making conscious decisions regarding your communicating.
So, to conclude:
- Interpersonal communication is multi-layered - All aspects of communication, from verbal to non-verbal, are components of interpersonal communication. This creates multiple channels by which you will communicate with other individuals.
- Interpersonal communication is unavoidable - Regardless of your attempts, you will still wind up communicating whether you mean to or not. Trying to avoid communicating sends off messages in and of itself, hence communicating.
- Interpersonal communication is subjective and contextual - Certain messages may have different meanings to different people, or they may have different meanings in different situations.
- Interpersonal communication is complex - The components of interpersonal communication are vast and diverse. We will discuss them in more detail later.
I hope that this relatively short introduction to interpersonal communication has helped you better understand your communicative methods.
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