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Models of Interpersonal Communication
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Interpersonal communication is communication that occurs between two persons
who have a relationship between them. It occurs when you send or receive messages and when you assign meaning to such messages. Interpersonal communication is always distorted by noise, occurs within a context, and involves some opportunity for feedback.
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| 2 |
Interpersonal communicators
are conscious of one another and of their connection with one another.
They’re interdependent; what one person thinks and says impacts on what
the other thinks and says. Interpersonal communication includes the conversations
that take place between an interviewer and a potential employee, a son
and his father, two sisters, a teacher and a student, two lovers, and
two friends. Even the stranger asking for directions from a local resident
has a relationship with that person. |
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In early theories, the communication process was viewed as linear. In this linear
view of communication, the speaker spoke and the listener listened; after the speaker finished speaking, the listener would speak. Communication was seen as proceeding in a relatively straight line. Speaking and listening were seen as taking place at different times; when you spoke, you didn’t listen, and when you listened, you didn’t speak.
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This linear model
was soon replaced with an interactional view in which the speaker and
the listener were seen as exchanging turns at speaking and
listening. For example, A spoke while B listened and then B (exchanging
the listener’s role for the speaker’s role) spoke in response
to what A said and A listened. Speaking and listening were still viewed
as separate acts that did not overlap and that were not performed at the
same time by the same person. |
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A more satisfying
view and the one held currently sees communication as a transactional
process where each person serves simultaneously as speaker
and listener. At the same time that you send messages, you’re also
receiving messages from your own communications and from the reactions
of the other person. At the same time that you are listening, you’re
also sending messages. In a transactional view, each person is seen as
both speaker and listener, as simultaneously communicating and receiving
messages. Also, in a transactional view the elements of communication are
seen as interdependent (never independent). Each exists in relation to
the others. A change in any one element of the process produces changes
in the other elements. For example, you’re talking with a group of
your friends, and your mother enters the group. This change in “audience” will
lead to other changes; perhaps you’ll change what you say or how
you say it. Regardless of what change is introduced, other changes will
be produced as a result. (Devito, Joseph A. Messages: Building
Interpersonal Communication Skills, 4th ed. New York: Longman, 5-6). |
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