Significance of Communication: A Personal Experience

This essay discusses the significance of communication based on a personal experience, highlighting theories of communication, non-verbal communication, self-identity, listening, and feedback.

Communication Theory
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Introduction
In this essay, the significance of communication will be discussed. The essay is prepared
based on an event encountered, the kind of communication taken place and the message that
the event signified. While narrating the event of communication in this essay, the related
theories of communication and practice, non-verbal communication and self-identity,
listening and feedback that involved in the event will be highlighted. This essay is solely
prepared based on the personal experience witnessed, and the impact of communication the
encounter had brought about. As rightly stated by Keech et al. (2016), communication is of
paramount importance and getting involved in the process of communication is crucial to
understanding the whole process. Thus, this essay will revolve around the personal
experience and what has been learnt from it.
Body
Few days ahead of festive season, I went to a mall to buy some gifts for myself, friends and
families. The stores in the mall were packed with flocks of shoppers and it was hectic and
tiresome up to some extent. I encountered a young mother engaged in a deep conversation
with the salesperson regarding an outfit she picked for her little child. The salesperson,
despite of the rush of many customers coming in and going out of the store, showed no signs
of being bothered rather showed genuine communication skills by perceiving the customer’s
messages interpreting into his actions. ‘We have many more varieties of this kind’, ‘but if
you don’t like this I will show you what suits your daughter best’ was what the salesperson
said with genuineness less like a salesperson and more like a close friend. From this event,
the theory of social marketing theory is linked with communication theory and how it is
practiced. Under this theory, the main feature include target of right people which the
salesman rightly targeted the young mother by paying more attention than those who
reluctantly visited the store. The salesman then reinforced the message into the customer’s
perspective to choose from the varieties of options that she find best suitable and cultivates
impression of the product she chose by showing more related products, which leads to
stimulation of interest by the customer’s perception that the salesperson is really concerned
about the correct pick of her daughter’s outfit. Hence, the effort of the salesperson to induce
desired result in the customer is fulfilled on deriving to decision of purchase. From this
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event, it can be understood that the theory analyses and incorporates verbal-cognitive; non-
verbal-emotional; and dimensions of communication.
Kinesics theory of non-verbal communication advocated by Ekman and Friesen emphasizes
on the analysis of facial and hand expressions. It is originally a source of act and is coded as
an act-meaning relationship used to convey a message or information (Kumari and Gangwar,
2018). The salesperson’s strategy of concisely depicting its emphasis on urging the customer
to purchase is an example of emblem. The salesperson depicting the message verbally into
inducing the customer to come to a point of decision shows the behavior of illustrator.
Further, the non-verbal communicative behavior of adapter and regulator is showcased by
facilitating the customer to release bodily tension by supplying a friendly behavior and the
salesperson coordinating to the interaction with the customer as well as the little child. As
opined by Elliott et al. (2016), non-verbal communication is sometimes more reliant than
verbal communication in human relations. The concepts of discourse theory are explained in
many perspectives such as cognitive linguists, anthropologists, systemic functional
linguists, and sociolinguistics (Stavrakakis, 2017). In this context, sociolinguistics
perspective is more related as it regards the language to be communicative and interactional
by nature, which is seen in the communication process between the customer and the
salesperson. The facial and eye communicator is said to be extremely expressive in
conveying number of emotions and feelings without sayings words verbally (Ali et al., 2018).
In this context based on the scenario, the paralanguage component of communication is
expressed by gesture and a facial expression by the salesperson is more witnessed and the
customer responds to it. As provided in Scu.edu.au (2017), the importance of non-verbal
communication is applicable in daily lives and business operations profit widely by
appropriately emphasizing on it.
Interpersonal communication is a lifelong process that involves finding meaning, purpose of
relationship and relies on the communicator which is not a separate set of method (Burgoon
and Buller, 2015). In context to the scenario of event, the self-concept theory can be looked
at to understand and overarching idea of who we are socially, emotionally and in regards of
any other aspects that makes up who we are. There are many components to self-concept
theory and all that makes it up affects interpersonal communication. The continual cycle on
the idea of who we are, what others form an idea about us, how they react according to their
idea about us and what impacts our ideas of who we are is a circling loop. On self-
identification, one is able to interact and communicate at ease in any given situations (Berg
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and Kaye, 2017). It is important to identify ourselves our weakness and strengths by listening
so that we are open to constructively establish as a better person. The modern age has
imposed us to speak more than to listen. But it is said that listening is one of the most
important interpersonal skills a person can have (Ranjan et al., 2015). The process of giving
and receiving feedback entails the subtleties of interpersonal response to communicative
input.
Conclusion
This essay has been developed based on the encounter I experienced. The communication
theory covering its practice through verbal, non-verbal, self-identity and feedback, it is
brought to the understanding that the process is a fundamental life-long process. Non-verbal
communication is important in day-to-day lives and it has been identified that organizations
are infusing with their strategies through many ways. Individuals with appealing
interpersonal skills are identified to be more successful in their means of conduct including
personal and professional. This essay also concludes by deriving the importance of self-
identity, listening and feedback that helps in improving interpersonal communication skills.
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References
Ali, M.R., Sen, T., Crasta, D., Nguyen, V.D., Rogge, R. and Hoque, M.E., 2018, May. The
What, When, and Why of Facial Expressions: An Objective Analysis of Conversational Skills
in Speed-Dating Videos. In 2018 13th IEEE International Conference on Automatic Face &
Gesture Recognition (FG 2018) (pp. 203-209). IEEE.
Berg, J. and Kaye, K.L., GM Global Technology Operations LLC, 2017. Methods, apparatus,
and systems for identification of cells in a network. U.S. Patent 9,586,541.
Burgoon, J.K. and Buller, D.B., 2015. Interpersonal deception theory. The International
Encyclopedia of Interpersonal Communication, pp.1-6.
Elliott, A.M., Alexander, S.C., Mescher, C.A., Mohan, D. and Barnato, A.E., 2016.
Differences in physicians' verbal and nonverbal communication with black and white patients
at the end of life. Journal of pain and symptom management, 51(1), pp.1-8.
Keech, W., Kelly, J., Dowling, A., McBride, K. and Brown, A., 2016. The Importance of
Effective Communication in Hospital Between Aboriginal Cardiac Patients and Health
Professionals. Heart, Lung and Circulation, 25, pp.S316-S317.
Kumari, R. and Gangwar, R., 2018. Use of expression based digital pictograms in
interpersonal Communication: a study on social media and social apps. International Journal
of Innovative Knowledge Concepts, 6(11), pp.167-179.
Ranjan, P., Kumari, A. and Chakrawarty, A., 2015. How can doctors improve their
communication skills?. Journal of clinical and diagnostic research: JCDR, 9(3), p.JE01.
Stavrakakis, Y., 2017. Discourse theory in populism research. Journal of language and
politics, 16(4), pp.523-534.
Scu.edu.au (2017). COM00207 - Communication in Organisations – 2019. [online]
Scu.edu.au. Available at: https://www.scu.edu.au/study-at-scu/units/com00207/ [Accessed 8
Mar. 2019].
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