COMMUNICATION PROCESS

COMMUNICATION PROCESS

In order to develop a deep understanding of the subject of communication, it is important that everyone understands the complete process of communication. Broadly, it has two parts:
 Process at communicator‟s end (Senders‟ Part)
 Process at communicatee‟s end (Receivers‟ Part)

These have been described below:

 PROCESS AT COMMUNICATORS‟ END (SENDERS‟ PART)

The process at communicators‟ end can also be looked at in two halves as below:
(1) Inward journey
It entails the following steps:

(i) As received by senses

A human being perceives the world around him from spoken words, written words, visuals and cues from body language in terms of sounds, gestures, expressions, signs, signals etc through the five human senses of seeing, smelling, hearing, tasting and touching.
These are the external five senses – our antennas. However, ultimately senses only capture feelings, images etc and convey them to the human brain which is main receptacle of what is perceived by the five senses. That is why it is said that it is not the eyes that see but the brain; it is not the nose that smells, it is the brain; it is not the ears that hear, it is the brain; it is not the tongue that tastes, it is the brain and it is not the skin or hands that feel, it is the brain.

All that is captured by the human senses from environments are far from ideal i.e., without noise or distractions. On the contrary all kinds of distractions intervene and messages transmitted to the brain are far from perfect.

Additionally, there is also the problem of sensitivity of the senses. How sensitized they are varies very widely from one person to another. Someone remembers a scene from a movie very vividly after many years and another person cannot recall the scene from a movie seen a few minutes ago. Some people can detect a smell from long distance while others would not notice it even when they are passing besides its source. Some singers can hear a small variation in a note very clearly while others cannot. Thus this process of perceiving is very heavily dependent upon the faculty of receivers. Human beings vary widely in their ability to perceive different sensual inputs.

(ii) Influence of sources of distraction

If one is hearing music, even a small level of noise can be very disparaging – no wonder, music recording studious are noise proof. Similarly, speech delivered in noisy circumstances can be very difficult to understand and absorb. Noisy classrooms can be lethal for good learning. Even visuals placed in noisy room fail to make the impact they are intended to. Similarly, listeners may miss many cues from the body language that normally forms a major chunk of the message being delivered. A shabbily dressed person cannot make as good an impression as a well-dressed one.
If there are too many distractions behind or besides the speaker, the message may fall flat. The situation is similar to a young man having gone to see a bride at a place where there are many more beautiful girls present, finds very difficult to decide!

(iii) Receiving information by the brain

When information arrives at the brain, it passes through a kind of sieve that separates out difficult, strange or awkward words and simplifies them into familiar words. This is a part of the process of abstraction that takes place before the message is classified and stored

(iv) Searching for similar material in the brain memory

This is the second part of the process of abstraction that goes on in the brain – it is somewhat like classifying the message before storing. Once this search is completed, the material is stored next to the similar stuff already in the memory. Rarely, one can get identical material and one should be happy to get as near to the one in memory as possible. If it is totally new or alien material, it may not be possible to retrieve it when required!

(v) Storing the material in the brain

This is a complex stage. Needless to say that human memory is still the fastest to retrieve and recall. Owing to overload or bounded rationality, there is
 always a limit to what and how much can be stored in the human memory. This faculty or capacity to store also varies widely among individuals and has a significant influence on ones‟ competence to communicate.

(2)Outward journey

When an individual has the need to communicate with others, the process starts with the happenings in the brain of the sender who is already subjected to a lot of experiences, emotions, knowledge and opinions.

(i) Retrieval of information from human memory

This is very much like pulling a file from the filing cabinet. Since it is in response to a need, the file pulled out may not always be the one most appropriate to the stimuli. This may bring in variations in interpreting the message received.

(ii) Choosing the right words and phrases

This stage is highly subjective and is greatly influenced by the mastery of the sender over the language used for communication. Besides, linguistic competence extends to proper use of form of verbs, adjectives, adverbs etc

(iii) Delivery of message

Role of sender continues to be important as the style, speed and manner of speaking decide the impact of the message. The body language and ability of the sender to throw his voice towards the audience form the major part of the message delivered.

(iv) Sources of distraction

Once again, the message passes through a medium that may have one or several sources of distraction, impairing the message as received by the communicatee