ENG 1 – PURPOSIVE COMMUNICATION

Lesson No. 2 Aspects, Levels, & Barriers of Communication

Learning Objectives
At the end of the lesson, the student should be able to:
1. Classify instances of communication events into verbal or
non-verbal types;
2. Discuss non-verbal communication within context of the
importance of learning its non-linguistic/paralinguistic
elements and how these affect communication;
3. Given samples of situations, generate a diagram that
illustrate the different levels of communication enhanced
by definitions or features of the levels, the given and
relevant drawings;
4. Create a group chat where a school activity plan is tackled
and the group discussion is assessed relative to such
factors as miscommunication, barriers to communication
and measures to avoid/prevent these barriers.

Aspects of Communication

Have you observed on how people communicate and how they shifted from one topic to
another? It is because people is concerned with communication. We as a social being is always
concerned with how we communicate and build relationship with other people.
Communication is simply the act of transferring information from one place to another.
Although this is a simple definition, when we think about how we may communicate the subject
becomes a lot more complex.
Communication has two aspects: (1) Verbal or Linguistic Aspect and (2) Non-verbal or
Extralinguistic Aspect.
A. Verbal or Linguistic Aspect: This is the aspect that makes used of words. It may be oral or
written, formal or informal.
B. Non-verbal or Extralinguistic Aspect: This aspect does not make use of words but may
enhance or change the linguistic code.

Non-verbal or Extralinguistic Aspect is categorized into two elements. These are (a) Non-
linguistic Elements and (b) Paralinguistic Elements
A. Non-linguistic Elements
A.1. Kinesics- language of body movements. For example, hand gestures
A.2.Proxemics- language of distance or space. For example, public space, social space,
personal space, and intimate space
A.3. Chronemics- language of time. For example, you came late in an interview, the
interviewer interpreted it that you are inefficient employee.
A.4. Haptics- language of touch. For example, you caress the back of your friend who is
lonely.
A.5. Olfactics- language of smell. For example, you identify the food that your
neighborhood is cooking because you smell its flavorings
 A.6. Oculesics- language of eye movement.
A.7. Gustatory- language of taste
A.8. Physical Appearance- how the person appears suggests his/her personality
B. Paralinguistic Elements: the meaning of what the persons says changes when
paralinguistic is used.
B.1. Vocal Quality- quality of the voice. The way the person speaks can tell his/her
personality depending on the quality of the voice. Being soft spoken may mean that a person is
shy type.
B.2. Pitch- the highness and the lowness of the voice
B.3. Tempo- the speed of the voice
B.4. Volume- the loudness of the voice
B.5. Juncture- these are the pauses while speaking
Levels of Communication

There are various types of communication and more than one may occur at any time. These
types of communication can be determined depending on the number of communicators involve in
the communication process and the purpose of communication.

These are the levels communication:

1. Intrapersonal Communication- it is a communication within yourself. It happens when you are

talking to yourself. For example when you are reviewing your lessons, when making decision, when
you have a deep thought about something among others

2. Interpersonal Communication- this is a communication between one person to another person. It

oftentimes refers to a face-to-face communication. It involves two or small group of people who are
exchanging thoughts and ideas.

3. Public Communication- this is a communication from one person to a huge group of people. The
public is composed of heterogeneous audience. For example, miting de avance, state of the nation
address

4. Mass Communication- this is a type of communication which involves the mass media such as
newspaper, television, and radio. Like public communication, the audience is also heterogeneous.

5. Organizational Communication- from the term itself, it is a form of communication which takes
place inside the organization. However, it does not involve informal communication among the
members of the organization. As a formal communication, it follows strict policies on communication
flow and channels in the organization. For example, business meeting, written communications like
formal letters, memorandum, bulletin, announcement etc.

6. Intercultural Communication- it is a form of communication that involves person-to-person,

person-to-group, or group-to-group from different cultures. It is important that one has to understand
cultural differences for it may result to offending other culture when communicating. For example in a
certain culture, they find it offending when someone is making a direct eye contact with them or a
handshake may sometimes unnecessary.

7. Technology-Mediated-Communication- this is any form of communication that uses technology

when communicating like like cellphone, telephone, facsimiline, computer. So, when you are using
social media when communicating to other people, it is a form of technology-mediated-
communication
Barriers to Effective Communication

Communication barriers is one of the elements of communication process. It is inevitable to be

eliminated in communication. Taylor et. al (2013) enumerate the following barriers to effective
communications, which are as follows:

1. Ethnocentrism. It happens when people implicitly believes that their way of doing things and
seeing things are the right and only way. This resulted judging the behaviours negatively which do not
actually conform on their own vision. People that possess “ethnocentrism” perceive other’s
behaviours as odd and improper. Ethnocentrism also creates an “us versus them” mentality that can
be detrimental.

2. Stereotyping. It occurs when people rely on oversimplified clichés about people from different
cultures. This can also be observed on how other people attach particular cultural practices that is not
actually observed on a particular group. On negative note, if stereotyping of a culture is perceived to
be offensive on other culture, people will also think of the same thing because of the reinforced
stereotypes by other people. Learning about differences can be useful as a starting point. But
individuals are unique; you can never predict a person’s behaviour based on his or her nationality.
Stereotyping is the process of creating a picture of a whole culture, overgeneralizing all people
belonging to the same culture as having similar characteristics and categorizing people accordingly. It
is a belief about a certain group and is mostly negative.

3. Psychological Barriers. This barrier involves the undermining of one’s confidence. For the
indigenous people, they often feel that they are always left behind because most of them did not finish
their studies. They feel intimidated with the way others interact with them. Cultural differences
causes behavior and personality differences like body language, thinking, communication, manners,
norms, etc. which leads to miscommunication.

4. Language Barrier. Commonly, people who are less fluent in English or other language tend to
withdraw from communication, which means the team may not get all the input it needs.
Understanding what’s said can be challenging if people speak too fast or use too much slang.

5. Conflicting Values. Culture is like an iceberg: what you see are the behaviors, and those are
influenced by the invisible values under the water line. Cultural clashes happen when other people’s
behavior compromises others values.