Interpersonal Communication

Interpersonal communication occurs when two (or a few) people talk face to face. Conversations, dialogues, and small group discussions are interpersonal exchanges. Each person also operates interpersonally during the exchange. Thus, an exchange with just two people involves at least three communication elements – the unique thinking done by each person and the overriding process created by the interpersonal exchange.

For example, imagine that you accidentally met your friend after a long time. You had a brief chat with him. But you think of meeting him again next evening. Your friend at the same time too thinks of having another meeting with you, in the afternoon, as he is leaving by the evening flight. After some discussion you agree to meet at the breakfast time as you have a busy schedule the whole afternoon.

Behavior and Interpersonal Communication:

In its simplest form, interpersonal relations are the interactions between two or more persons. We keep coming in contact with other people for personal, professional, social or business reasons. Whatever the context, there is an interaction between personalities in all these situations. Our perception about each other is based on the displayed behavior. The environment in which personal interaction takes place is
largely determined by the behavior of the parties involved.

All behaviors are motivated. The motives however, may be known or unknown, clear or unclear, controlled or uncontrolled. The net result is the variety in behaviors. Behaviors determine the quality of
interpersonal relationships by directly influencing every transaction in interaction. In the organizational
context, interpersonal relations become extremely important for smooth functioning of the system, greater coherence, and convergence of effort and minimization of conflict.

To communicate well, we need to know our frames of reference and ourselves and to be able to assess
other people. Only then can we hope to find the best ways in which to communicate effectively with
them, both to pass information and build relationships. Some of the reasons we do not assess other people well are given below:
• We assume that people would behave the same way in every situation.
• We try too hard to put everyone into consistent categories.
• We are too influenced by first impressions.
• We are positively influenced where we have common characteristics with other people, e.g. same school, same function.
• We are too influenced by apparent negative points, e.g. if someone is not very good at short-term
decision making, we might assume that he/she is not going to be good at long-term planning either.
• We make constant errors because of our own limited frames of reference and self-concept.

The Contextual View
Interpersonal communication differs from other forms of communication in that there are few participants involved. The interact-ants are in close physical proximity to each other, there are many sensory channels used, and feedback is immediate. An important point to note about the contextual definition is that it does not take into account the relationship between the interact-ants.

Interpersonal communication is contextual
In other words, communication does not happen in isolation. There is:
• Psychological context , which is who you are and what you bring to the interaction. Your needs, desires, values, personality, etc., all form the psychological context. ("You" here refers to both participants in the interaction.)
• Relational context, which concerns your reactions to the other person--the "mix."
• Situational context deals with the psycho-social "where" you are communicating. An interaction that takes place in a classroom will be very different from one that takes place in a restaurant.
• Environmental context deals with the physical "where" you are communicating. Furniture, location, noise level, temperature, season, time of day, all are examples of factors in the environmental context.
• Cultural context includes all the learned behaviors and rules that affect the interaction. If you come from a culture (foreign or within your own country) where it is considered rude to make long, direct eye contact, you will out of politeness avoid eye contact. If the other person comes from a culture where long, direct eye contact signals trustworthiness, then we have in the cultural context a basis for misunderstanding.

The Developmental View:

We have many different relationships with people. Some researchers say that our definition of interpersonal communication must account for these differences. These researchers say that interacting
with a sales clerk in a store is different than the relationship we have with our friends and family members. Thus, some researchers have proposed an alternative way of defining interpersonal communication. This is called the developmental view. From this view, interpersonal communication is
defined as communication that occurs between people who have known each other for some time.

Importantly, these people view each other as unique individuals, not as people who are simply acting out social situations. Interpersonal channels include conversations and dialogues, interviews, and small groups.

Conversations involve unstructured, informal, and slightly purposive communication transactions. They
may not relate directly to business, but nonetheless contribute to smooth business functioning. Dialogues introduce purpose in relatively structured and formal transactions. The interview is a special type of dialogue. It involves purposes such as appraising an applicant for a job or disseminating information to the media.

In the directive interview, the interviewer commands the transaction. In the nondirective interview, both parties give direction to the interview. The stress interviewer uses emotion-laden questions to determine how well the stress interviewer handles stress. The depth interview involves a directive probe into the topic.

Small groups include four to ten people, with location, time, topic, purpose, formality, designation, and
cohesion having an impact on the transaction. Methods for conducting group meetings include problem-
solving, educating, brain storming, and role-playing.

Functions of Interpersonal Communication:

Interpersonal communication is important because of the functions it achieves. Whenever we engage in
communication with another person, we seek to gain information about them. We also give off information through a wide variety of verbal and nonverbal cues. The various functions of interpersonal
communication are:

Gaining Information:
One reason we engage in interpersonal communication is that we can gain knowledge about another individual. Social Penetration Theory says that we attempt to gain information about others so that we can interact with them more effectively. We can better predict how they will think, feel, and act if we know who they are. We gain this information passively, by observing them; actively, by having others engage them; or interactively, by engaging them ourselves. Self-disclosure is often used to get information from another person.


Building a Context of Understanding:

We also engage in interpersonal communication to help us better understand what someone says in a given context. The words we say can mean very different things depending on how they are said or in what context. Content Messages refer to the surface level meaning of a message. Relationship Messages
refer to how a message is said. The two are sent simultaneously, but each affects the meaning assigned to the communication. Interpersonal communication helps us understand each other better.

Establishing Identity:

Another reason we engage in interpersonal communication is to establish an identity. The roles we play in our relationships help us establish identity. So too does the face, the public self-image we present to others. Both roles and face are constructed based on how we interact with others.

Interpersonal Needs:

Finally, we engage in interpersonal communication because we need to express and receive interpersonal needs.

The three identified needs are:

1. Inclusion: the need to establish identity with others.
2. Control: the need to exercise leadership and prove one's abilities. Groups provide outlets for this need. Some individuals do not want to be a leader. For them, groups provide the necessary control over aspects of their lives.
3. Affection: the need to develop relationships with people. Groups are an excellent way to make friends and establish relationships.

Levels of Communication

Levels of Communication
There are five levels of communication:
1. Intrapersonal Communication
2. Interpersonal Communication
3. Mediated Communication
4. Person-to-Group Communication
5. Mass Communication

Intrapersonal Communication

When you think, you use intrapersonal communication. You initiate, receive, and process messages within yourself. You are playing both the roles of: sending & receiving. Human growth depends on this internal communication. Through it you know yourself and develop your self-concept, selfdetermination, and self-motivation. For example, each morning you decide how to dress, what to eat, where to go, etc. This kind of internal communication forms the foundation for the other four levels of communication.

The word - "Intrapersonal" - means within the person. Intrapersonal communication processes happen inside of you. Some people equate these processes with thinking. Although thinking is part of the process, intrapersonal communication includes more than what we think. More importantly intrapersonal processes include the way we think and the way we communicate with ourselves. Intrapersonal communication affects the way we receive messages from others and affects the way we send messages to others.

The Self:
The role the self plays in communication is vital and complex. In order to be able to identify the complex levels of the self, you first need to understand how such complexity becomes such an intimate part of the communication process. We need to recognize the complex role of the self, and how the self plays into how we communicate. At the center of how you communicate, is how you see yourself, or your sense of who you are. This sense of self is central to how you communicate with others. The term for that sense of self is self-concept.

Self-concept:
Self-concept is your image of who you are. Put another way, self-concept is the total picture of who you are. Or how you see your whole self. It is your psychological self, your physical self, your spiritual self, your social self, and your intellectual self. Self-concept is how you perceive the different parts of yourself that combine to form a total picture. At the same time self-concept also means knowing how others see you, how your colleagues see you, how your parents see you. When you interact with different groups and individuals and they see you and react to you, you pick up signals and eventually you change yourself as a result of this feedback. In fact, what research reveals is that most of our sense of self, thus, comes from interactions with other people (family, friends, co-workers).

Through feedback from the process of communicating with other people, or the sending of verbal and nonverbal indicators through involvement with friends and family, you acquire a sense of how others feel about you, how they perceive you, and what they like and what they don’t like about you. And as a result of this feedback, you develop a sense of self over the course of your life, this big picture of who you are, based on all of the human interactions that you’ve had in life. And you are also constantly modifying your sense of self. Until the day you die, you will constantly modify your self-concept. This is because we are always interacting with other people, and because we are always communicating with others, we are therefore always learning more about ourselves.

Self-concept is made up of two components, self-image, and self-esteem.

Self-image is literally a picture, or image, of who you are. Self-image describes you. If you take out a piece of paper and list the various roles that you play in life, you could come up at least six, eight, maybe ten different roles that you assume in your daily life. For example, the different roles that you play in life could include, you are a student, you are a son, you are a brother, you are a colleague, you are a friend……these are all different roles that you play in life.

Most of our roles can be categorized in one of two categories – either achieved roles, or ascribed roles. Achieved roles are roles that you work to accomplish or to achieve, such as, professor, honor student, etc. Ascribed roles are roles that you are born into, son, brother, and sister. What’s important about identifying the different roles you play in life is that you communicate differently in each one of these roles. To be an effective communicator, you should.

So self-image is how you see yourself and how you describe the roles that you play in life. Self-esteem is also how you evaluate yourself in those roles. How do you see yourself as a brother, as a friend, as a best friend? How do you rate your performance in the various roles you play in life? On a scale of one to ten, are you good to bad, great to terrible, positive to negative, effective to ineffective? No matter what evaluative scale you want to use, self-image is measured by how you evaluate yourself in those roles.
Self-esteem is the process of self-evaluation; it is how you feel about yourself in each of those roles.

Self-esteem is certainly affected by how others evaluate your performance in a particular role. To be found lacking in the performance of a particular role results in hurt feelings and diminished self-esteem. Intrapersonal communication processes depend upon communicators':
1. Frame of reference
2. Creativity
3. Self-talk
4. Risk-taking behavior
1. Frame of Reference

Your frame of reference refers to the way you view your world. Your frame of reference is your structure for encoding and decoding messages. Your frame of reference consists of all that you bring internally to the communication situation: your beliefs, attitudes, and values; your memory of experiences; your cultural background; your stereotypes and expectations; your self-concept; your feelings and level of stress; your thinking patterns; and other psychological factors. As a speaker, understanding the frames of reference of your listeners will allow you to adapt your message for high levels of clarity and/or persuasive impact. As a listener, attempting to understand the way the speaker's frame of reference may differ from your own can help you to better understand the speaker and your reaction to the speaker.

2. Creativity
One of the most important skills you can shape is that of creativity. Basically, creative thinking involves visualizing something in an innovative, new, or unique way. Humans have long valued artists because their creativity provides new ways of imagining or conceptualizing our world. In our personal and work lives, creativity can be important to each of us, particularly when solving problems. You can increase your creativity by learning to think in less traditional ways. Habitual and routine thinking patterns and structures prevent free, open problem solving. The extent to which you have developed your creative thinking affects the way you send and receive messages, the way you interact with others, and your potential for success in new situations.

3. Self-talk
Another key aspect of intrapersonal communication is sometimes called self-talk or imagined communication. In imagined communication, individuals talk to someone else or to themselves as if they were another person. However, the communication takes place in their minds (internally instead of
externally).

Practical example of imagined conversations could be of students imagining communicating before it takes place. For example, while they plan their classroom presentations, they see themselves in front of the audience, imagine how fantastic they look, see some classmates listening attentively, and picture their instructor making a positive response.

This approach, by the way, can help most speakers to succeed in public communication situations by reducing their anxiety. Imaginary communication is a phenomenon that most people avoid discussing. Most of us learned at an early age that people who talk to themselves are crazy. Yet, it happens with people often. Although you may not be taught to communicate interpersonally, you discover that it helps you to prepare for future communication, deal with your feelings, and learn from past communication. Imagined communication is an important aspect of your intrapersonal communication processes.

4. Risk-taking Behaviors
Your willingness to take risks is largely dependent on your interpretation of past experience. If you have found risk-taking to be fun, adventure-some, or thrilling, then you are more inclined to make risky moves. At least a minimum amount of risk is necessary for growth and development. Some people consider as risk-taking behaviors only ones that are life-threatening, such as driving fast cars, or doing dangerous stunts. For our purposes, we are focusing on risk-taking in communication. When we communicate, we risk rejection by others. Additionally, behaviors that threaten our self-concept or intrapersonal processes are "risky." Often before you speak, you consider the communication in terms of risk. When you talk in class, express your ideas in a business meeting, give a presentation, or decide to communicate (or not communicate), your behaviors will be interpreted by others. Others may agree or disagree, be interested or bored, understand or misunderstand, be persuaded or argue. Because the frame of reference is different for every individual, you never really know completely how other people will react to you. But effort on your part to understand and adapt to your listeners will reduce the risk of
rejection. The way we communicate is closely linked to our self-image. Most individuals find risky and threatening any efforts to change their self-image.

Your intrapersonal processes about risk-taking are influenced by your past experiences and interaction with others. Your decisions about whether or not you should, or how you will, choose to interact with others are major areas of your internal or intrapersonal communication processes.