Listening More Effectively

Submitted by Gabriela Martinez

Salt Lake Community College
COMM 1010-042
April 21, 2015

Listening is an essential part of communicating. While thinking about all of the topics I
could choose from for this assignment and for me to improve upon, I realized that while I might
lend an ear to people I dont actively participate in the listening process. Because I am a stay at
home Mom I spend a lot of time with my family, I believe they are the ones that will benefit
from me becoming a better listener the most. I will try to accomplish this by overcoming as
much as possible the physiological, environmental and attitudinal barriers for example rapid
thought, physical distractions, preoccupation and egocentrism.

Description of Problem:
I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis when I was 19 years old, sometimes its very
difficult for me to concentrate and focus. Rapid Thought as described in the Text, reads as
follows: Listeners can process information at a rate of about 500 words per minute, while most
speakers talk at around 125 words per minute. This difference leaves us with a great deal of
mental spare time (communicating at Work, Pg. 72). While in professional settings or at School
Ive developed a system that keeps me in the moment and allows me to be able to listen most of
the time. At home, because I feel more at ease, I tend to get distracted during conversations very
easily, sometimes frustrating both my husband and my children with my inability to keep up with
the conversation. My husband especially has a hard time with this, he has mentioned how Im
constantly interrupting him or changing topics. He makes a joke of it, but if I were in his place
this would be very obnoxious to me. Everyone deserves to be heard. I feel that by becoming a
better listener I could be a better mother and a better wife

Resources and Constraints:

The Text Book is a great resource, it contains an entire chapter dedicated to listening
more effectively. This chapter covers important listening topics some of them are Barriers to
Effective Listening, Rapid Thought, and recognizing different listening styles. These topics can
help me identify the type of listener that I am, in order to better address my inefficiencies as a
listener. The only constraint that would interfere with me becoming a better listener is my
neurological chronic illness. I will always have to work hard, it might not always be enough, but
Im willing to put forth the effort in order to have better communication with my family.

Recommendations:
Listening its a very big part of our daily lives Studies conducted more than 60 years ago
indicated that adults spent an average of 29.5 percent of their waking hours listening. This is
almost a third more time than they spent talking and virtually twice as much as time as they spent
reading. (Communicating at Work, Pg. 70). The text provides different components or set of
skills that I need to master in order to become a good listener. Chapter three, Listening, pages
68-86 is divided into three major categories. I am going to focus on Barriers to Effective
Listening.
The first step is, Physiological Barriers, this refers to physiological problems, such as
hearing problems. The one physiological problem that personally affects me is Rapid Thought.
To address this issue the text recommends mastering the art of Generative Listening which is
developing deeper silences in yourself, so you can slow your minds hearing to your ears
natural speed, and hear beneath the words to their meaning.(Communicating at Work, Pg. 7273) I wish the text would offer tips on how to accomplish this feat, since it does not explain it,

Im planning on bringing this up to my neurologist on my next visit; and hopefully he will be

able to shed more light on Generative Listening.
The second barrier, called Environmental Barriers covers issues like Physical Distractions
and Message Overload. Because I have two toddlers at home, these two issues are very present in
our family. I feel that theres a constant battle going on at home, my two boys want to be heard,
at the same time. With so many distractions is hard to concentrate on one person and on what
they need to communicate to me. After reading this section on the text I realized that I need to
prioritize the person Im having the conversation with; and try to avoid distractions by maybe
telling the speaker to give me a few minutes to organize myself, so that I can give them my
undivided attention.
The third barrier, known as Attitudinal Barriers and False Assumptions refers to our
attitudes or assumptions towards/about the speaker. The two concepts that rang true to me were
Egocentrism and Assuming that Effective Communication is the Senders Responsibility I
have to admit that one of the reasons why I dont socialize a lot with people outside of my
nuclear and extended family is because I dont want to have to appear interested in things that I
have no interest in. I dont know how to do it, most other Hispanic cultures are very polite and
they take their time communicating, whereas Argentinians dont or will not. We will let you
know if you are boring us or if we think your opinions are wrong, well even make fun of you for
speaking too slow. My culture is one where we expect the sender to keep us entertained and if
you fail to do so its acceptable to shut you down. This is something that is disrespectful, rude
and condescending. The book cites Management expert Peter Drucker It is the recipient who
communicates. The so-called communicator, the person who emits the communication, does not
communicate. (Communicating at Work, Pg.75) This has made me realize that I am a big part of

the problem, by not doing my part in the communication process I miss out on practicing my
listening skills and learning how to read other people and what they might need from me as a
listener, to help them become better senders. I now realize that the problem is not other people
being boring, its me detaching myself from the conversation to the point that the sender cant
read my signs thus creating a lot of noise in the dialogue.
The last barrier is Sociocultural Differences this focuses on cultural differences. As I
mentioned before, my husband and I come from different countries, sometimes our cultures
clash. In order to address this issue, we decided that when we need to have serious conversations,
Spanish is not allowed. We only speak in English so that the message stays intact, and theres
only one cultural meaning to the message. Its not a perfect solution, but I feel that by doing this
our communication has improved.

Conclusion:
This assignment has taught me the skills necessary to become a better listener. I have begun to
implement some of the concepts that Ive learned and I have already seen positive results. Im
looking forward to implementing this skills into my daily life and becoming more involved in the
communication process. By simply understanding what my personal listening barriers are I have
greatly improved my communication with my husband, my children, my circle of friends and
acquaintances.

Works Cited:
Adler, and Elmhorst. (2010). Communicating at Work, International Edition (10e). New York:
McGraw Hill.