- Today we're going to talk about
perception and communication.
Is our perception really reality,
especially in our relationships?
That's what we're goin' after today,
so let's get into those details.
(chiming music)
Alex Lyon here.
Everything on this channel
is here for your professional development,
and so we've gotta to talk about perception.
I'm sure it can feel like to us
that our perception of communication is the reality,
the one accurate way to see the world.
The problem is, people often have different perceptions
of the exact same situation,
and we really don't start our conversations
by naturally understanding each other.
In fact, there's one theory
called the coordinated management of meaning
that says that miscommunication in conversations
is really the norm.
Miscommunication, misunderstanding,
that's generally the starting place
for most of our interactions,
and we use communication as a process
to overcome that gap, to create shared meaning,
shared perception with other people.
Really, that's what we're looking for.
If you think about it,
if you already 100% understood the other person,
then you really wouldn't need to talk about it much.
That would be more like mind reading,
and that's not possible as far as we know.
So we need communication to bridge the gap.
So let's look at four overlapping influences that shape
the way we perceive communication.
These will help us ultimately
understand each other more effectively,
and help us to become better communicators.
So let's talk about these four.
Number one, the message itself.
There has to be some communication in the first place
to perceive some conversation.
We call this a speech act in certain circles.
When we're communicating,
words are an important part of the message,
words have shades of meaning.
So you might use, for example, warm relational words
versus cold task-driven words.
You might use specific words versus general words.
And if you're speaking generally,
for example, and say, I have a dog,
then you're leaving lots of wiggle room for interpretation
about what type of dog
the other person is picturing in their head.
But if you get more specific with your words,
and you say my three-year-old Golden Retriever,
then you have just nudged
the other person's likely perception
in a very specific direction
because you use specific language.
Another part of our message is our tone,
how we say things, our attitude.
How we express ourselves nonverbally.
I tell you many people have no idea
about how they come across in this way.
I know a person, for example,
and maybe you know people like this,
who has a very rude, abrasive tone,
and when somebody recently called them on it,
he said, "Well, I didn't say anything rude,
"I just said sure, no problem."
Even in talking about it,
he had no idea how he was coming across.
Now technically, the words sure, no problem, aren't rude,
but buddy, your nonverbals were horrible.
So how we act out our message
definitely shapes other people's perceptions of us
very profoundly.
If your nonverbals are always saying,
"I'm a jerk," then don't be surprised
if some people perceive you that way.
So words and nonverbal cues
shape other people's perceptions.
So question for you to consider.
How do you think people perceive you?
Have you ever gotten feedback, for example,
about how you come across?
I'll be interested to hear your comments
in the section below the video.
But now let's put ourselves
in the position of the listener.
There are a few more layers that come into play
that shape the way we are perceiving other people
when they communicate to us.
So number two, we all have
what you might call psychological filters.
Nobody absorbs communication in its purest form.
We arrive at conversations
with an already existing set of mental
and emotional filters.
So before that other person ever even spoke to us,
we had attitudes, beliefs, opinions.
So two people can hear the exact same message
and you might see the positive side
and the other person might see
the negative side of it.
Your life experience, or what we call anchors,
shape the way you see a topic.
You have positions or viewpoints already on topics.
So there's a theory called social judgment theory
that says we tend to have
one of three reactions to messages that we hear
depending upon those anchors.
We either accept a message when we hear it,
we reject a message,
or we might be non-committal
about how we feel about what somebody's saying.
Now, we don't always tell them
that this is our reaction,
but that's the way we filter it.
If we already have thought
a lot about a specific topic,
let's say a topic that's close to our hearts,
then we are really likely
to have a narrow range of acceptance,
but a very wide range of rejection.
So our minds are not blank slates when we listen.
We're not hearing things in a pure form,
and that whole perception process
shapes the way we understand
the communication that we're hearing.
Like, I used to be in rock bands when I was young,
and boy, if you started a conversation
about music or bands with me back then,
that topic could really set me off.
I had a lot of these psychological filters about it.
We all arrive at conversations like this.
We have a life's worth of experiences
that shape how we perceive what the person is saying
that have nothing to do
with the actual person who is talking to us.
We were like that
probably before we even met this other person.
So question.
Do you have any hot buttons that really set you off?
I know I do.
So if you do, keep in mind
that those psychological filters
are not the same as the other person's
psychological filters.
You're perceiving things differently.
So number three, relationships.
In any relationship, you have a shared history
with that person, roles that you understand.
You have dynamics that you take into account
when you're interpreting communication with that person.
So I have two brothers.
I'm in the middle.
There's one older and one younger,
and I love them both dearly,
and I hope they're watching.
But we have a lot of history together,
and so anything they say to me,
I would hear it through that relationship history
that I have with each of them.
Let's say we had some wicked argument
about sports at one point years ago.
I would probably hear any new conversations
about sports with my brothers
with that argument way in the back of my mind.
That relationship history
would shape our communication in the moment.
So here's the fascinating part to me.
You have a different individual relationship history
with each person that you know,
each person that is in your life.
New people are no exception.
So we have lots of uncertainty, for example,
when we're talking to someone we've just met,
someone we don't know that real well.
That uncertainty certainly makes us perceive
communication with that person differently
than we would perceive
the same exactly conversation
with someone we know and trust already.
So question for you, to put this to the test.
Do you have that person in your life
who you could tell just about anything to
and get away with it,
and they could say just about anything to you
and get away with it?
Maybe your other mother or father,
for me it's my wife.
Well that shows that those specifically relationships
shape our perception of communication.
Number four, culture is a powerful filter.
We all grow up learning norms,
values, and the language of our group,
and we use different expressions
depending upon where we grew up.
Those language norms shapes our perceptions.
So I grew up in Rhode Island,
and instead of saying drinking fountain,
we famously say bubbler,
but we say it with that Rhode Island accent,
we say bubbler, and it's the same thing.
But some places, they say soda.
Do you say soda or do you say pop
when you're talking about drinking a drink?
So I used to live in Arkansas,
and they literally call all soda Coke.
So here's a normal conversation with a server.
"I'll take a Coke,"
and then the server says, "What kind?"
You say, "Sprite."
If you're from a certain part of the south,
then you know exactly what that conversation means,
that's normal.
But at a deeper level,
there are unspoken cultural rules that signal to us
what certain kinds of communication mean.
We learn to tell, for example,
in my experience, what clowning is,
clowning around, versus an actual insult.
So again, in Rhode Island,
Rhode Island's a lot like Boston
or New York City in its attitude,
and in these places,
especially in the working class and middle class,
we will sometimes give each other a hard time,
and that's usually a sign
that we actually like each other, that we're friends.
So the expression is you're busting each other up.
That's the way we say it.
That's like a bonding experience in a way,
and it can get pretty rough,
but growing up, I would only do that type of interaction
with actual friends.
Now that may sound weird
because it can get a little mean,
but for people who didn't grow up that way,
it's a little strange,
and it's, you know, it's actually not like,
I would never do this
with somebody that I didn't know
and didn't like very well,
because that could actually lead to a conflict.
It's difficult to explain,
and there are shades of meaning even in there,
but when you live in a culture
and grow up in a culture,
you learn where that line is,
and you learn what those behaviors mean.
Really, every culture has its own set of rules
that we use to perceive things, unspoken rules.
So here's a question for you.
Can you think of a way
that the culture you grew up in
shapes the way you see the world?
I think you probably can if you give it a moment,
and I would love, again,
to hear your comments to how your culture
has shaped your perceptions.
So as I said at the beginning,
is perception reality in relationships?
I know based upon what I've said,
it sounds like I'm saying, no,
perception's not reality
because we have these filters.
But I, that's partially true.
But I wanna say it this way.
Our perception may not be the one reality,
but it is our reality,
and it is the other person's reality,
at least for the moment.
So in the short run,
we can literally only start with our perception.
But that does not make our perception perfectly accurate,
and we should not use our perception
as an excuse for poor communication in return.
In fact, our perceptions may not even be fair
in any given situation.
We may have a very warped perception, for example.
The key is to remember that communication
is that process that we all must use
to reach shared understanding with other people.
So be patient, and communication is not a one-time event
with some kind of fixed meeting.
If you don't understand each other,
consider that to be normal at first.
Misunderstanding is not some clear sign
that something has gone very wrong.
Miscommunication is usually a sign
that more communication still needs to take place.
So I'd love to hear your comments
in that section below the video.
I do read those comments and I respond.
So God bless, thanks, and I will see you in the next video.