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Prepared by HAH
Non Verbal
Communication
IMD 121- COMMUNICATION SKILLS FOR INFORMATION
PROFESSIONAL
Chapter Goals 2

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► Identify the major channels of nonverbal communication and give
examples of the messages sent and received through these
channels.
7 CHANNELS OF NON-VERBAL 3
COMMUNICATION

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► Body communication
► Facial and eye communication
► Spatial communication
► Artifactual communication
► Touch communication
► Paralanguage and silence
► Time communication
NONVERBAL COMMUNICATION 4

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► Nonverbal communication is communication without words.
► Anything beside words that can communicate a message is called
nonverbal message.
► It can be identify through bodily action, gesture, facial expression, eye
movements, spatial relationship, clothing and color, touch, vocal rate,
volume and even the way you treat time and etc.
► The topic focuses on how nonverbal used in communication.
► The 7 channels of non-verbal communication;
► Body Messages
► Facial & Eye Movement
► Spatial Messages
► Artifactual Communication
► Touch Communication
► Paralanguage and Silence
► Time Communication.
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BODY COMMUNICATION

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Two areas of the body are especially important in communicating
messages;
1. Body movement (body gesture)
2. Body appearance
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BODY COMMUNICATION (cont)

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1. Body movement (body gesture)
i. Emblems - body gestures that directly translate words or phrases.
ii. Illustrators - nonverbal behaviors that accompany and enhance (literally ‘illustrate’) verbal
messages.
iii. Affect displays - nonverbal movements of the face, hands and body that communicate
emotional meaning.
iv. Regulators - behaviors that monitor, control, coordinate or maintain the speaking of others.
v. Adaptors – gestures that satisfy some personal need, such as scratching to relieve and itch
or moving your hair out of your eyes.
a. Self-adaptors - self touching movements.
b. Alter-adaptors - movements directed at the person with whom you are speaking.
c. Object-adaptors - gestures focuses on objects.
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BODY COMMUNICATION (cont)

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2. Body appearance
► General body appearance and attractiveness also
communicates.
I. Heights and weight.
II. Hair length, color and style.
III. Skin color.
IV. Attractiveness.
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FACIAL AND EYE COMMUNICATION

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Facial Communication – communicates the degree of
pleasantness, agreement, sympathy felt.
► facial movements communicate at least 8 emotions - happiness,
surprise, fear, anger, sadness, disgust, contempt and interest.
► Facial management techniques;
► Intensifying to exaggerate a feeling.
► Deintensifying to underplay a feeling.
► Neutralizing to hide a feeling.
► Masking to replace or substitute the expression of one emotion for another.
► Simulating to express an emotion you didn’t feel.
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FACIAL AND EYE COMMUNICATION

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(Cont)
Eye Communication – the eyes are regarded as the most
important nonverbal message system.
► The messages communicated by the eyes vary depending on
duration, direction and the quality of the eye behavior.
 
► The functions of eye movements;
► To seek feedback.
► To signal openness in the communication channel.
► To signal the nature of a relationship.
► To change the psychological distance between you and another.
► To help others maintain privacy through ‘civil inattention’ (eye avoidance).
► To signal lack of interest through eye avoidance.
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SPATIAL COMMUNICATION

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Edward T. Hall (1959,1963,19760 pioneered the study of
spatial communication and call this research area
proxemics (the way you treat and communicate through
space).
Space communication;
❑ Proxemic distances (spatial distances)
❑ Territoriality
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SPATIAL COMMUNICATION (cont)

Prepared by HAH
Space communication;
❑ Proxemic distances (spatial distances)
❑ the distances that define types of relationships between people;
I. Intimate – actual touching to 18 inches (intimate
relationship).
II. Personal – 18 inches to 4 feet (personal relationship).
III. Social – 4 feet to 12 feet (social relationship).
IV. Public – 12 feet to 25 feet
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SPATIAL COMMUNICATION (cont)

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Space communication;
❑ Territoriality - a possessive reaction to an area or to
particular objects.
❑ Human basically interact with three types territories;
❑ Primary territories – your own area; your exclusive preserve areas
❑ Secondary territories – areas that don’t belong to you but which you
have occupied and with which you’re associated.
❑ Public Territories – areas that open to all people and may be owned
by some person or organization.
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SPATIAL COMMUNICATION (cont)

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Space communication;
❑ Territoriality
❑ Human uses three types of markers to signal ownership;
► Central markers – marker used to reserve territory.
► Boundary markers – boundaries set between your territory and
the others.
► Ear markers – marker used to identify one’s possessions.
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ARTIFACTUAL COMMUNICATION

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► Message that convey through objects or arrangements made by
human.
► Color Communication – evidence suggests that colors may influence our
physiologically, perceptions and behaviors.
► Clothing, Body adornment and Odor – people make inferences about who
you are- in part – by the way you dress.
► Space Decoration – how you decorate your private spaces communicates
who you are.
► Smell Communication (Olfactory) – the communicative function of odor;
► Basically, smell communicates two important messages;
► Attraction messages – smell used to enhance attractiveness.
► Identification messages – smell often used to create an image or an identity for a
product.
► Memory messages
► Taste messages
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TOUCH COMMUNICATION

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► Touch Communication (tactile) - the communication
function of touch and touching behavior.
► The meanings of touch;
► Positive emotions.
► Playfulness.
► Control.
► Ritual.
► Task-relatedness.
► Touch avoidance – our desire to avoid touching and being touched
by others.
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PARALANGUAGE AND SILENCE

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► Paralanguage – the vocal (but nonverbal dimension of
speech).
► It has to do with how we say something rather than what we say.
► It includes vocal characteristics to communicate your meanings and
to add interest and color your messages.
► Emphasizing the same term with different paralinguistic features
(vocal characteristics) will result different meaning received by
different people.
► The use of paralanguage enables other peoples make inference
about other peoples’ personality;
► Judgments about people – you make judgments about another’s
personality on the basis of that person’s paralinguistic cues.
► Judgments about communication effectiveness – how fast you talk
influence how others perceive you.
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PARALANGUAGE AND SILENCE

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(cont)
► Silence – the absence of sound (but not of
communication).
► Functions of silence;
► Allows the speaker time to think.
► May be used to hurt others.
► May be used as a response to personal anxiety, shyness or
threats.
► May be used to prevent communication of certain messages.
► Used to communicate emotional responses.
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TIME COMMUNICATION

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► Time Communication (Chronemics) – the use of time;
how you treat, organize and react to time.
► Cultural time
► Psychological time
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TIME COMMUNICATION (cont)

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► Cultural time – Culture influences time communication in
a variety of ways;
► Informal time – general time terms (e.g. forever, immediately,
soon).
► Monochronism and Polychronism.
► Monochronism people or cultures compartmentalize time (e.g
USA, Germany, Switzerland).
► Polychronism people or cultures schedule several things at a time
(e.g. Latin America, Mediterranean countries, Arabic countries).
► The Social clock – the right time according to your culture and
society to do a variety of important things (e.g. dating,
graduating from college, having children).
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TIME COMMUNICATION (cont)

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► Psychological Time – the relative importance we place
on the past, present or future.
► Past orientation – people that have a particular reverence for
the past.
► Present orientation – people who live in the present-for now and
without planning for tomorrow.
► Future orientation – people who look toward and live for the
future.