Interpersonal and Group Communication

Inter-personal communication and group communication is essential in all the fields. Inter-personal means face to face communication and Group communi

Human communication is a process of exchanging verbal and nonverbal messages. It is a two-way traffic and continuous process involving some obvious components: 

  Components of Human Communication

a. Source

b. Message

c. Channel

d. Receiver

e. Feedback

f. Noise

g. Encoder

h. Decoder

i. Context

Source:

The source is a person or organization that functions as the producer and sender of a message. The source is initiator of communication. The source may be a speaker, a writer, a painter or any person or organization. A source is the primary element of a communication process.

Receiver:

The receiver is a person or organization who receives a message. A receiver can be a listener, a reader or an audience.

Message:

Message denotes any kind of information or content communicated with receiver. A message can be both verbal and nonverbal. Again it can be visual and non visual. It can be written, unwritten or aural. For example, lecture of a class teacher, song of a singer, paintings of a painter, footprint of animals, reports of a TV channels and newspaper, music of a composer. Actually, a message is a dealing point between the source and receiver.

While developing message, a source should focus on the interest and needs of the receiver otherwise the maybe of distraction. A message should be designed in a way so that it conveys the meaning to the receiver as it is meant by the source. For developing of a successful message, communicator should take into the following factors:

1. Easy and simple sentence

2. Level of education and awareness of the receiver

3. Communication context

4. Interest of the receiver

5. Needs-based

6. Culturally viable

7. Cost effectiveness

8. Befitting with the channel.

Channel:

The channel is the medium of communication between a source and a receiver. Different channel can be used at a time in disseminating a message. In our real life situations, we largely depend on airwave, friends, relatives, colleagues, newspaper, TV and radio, internet, mobile phone etc. which as a channel.

Feedback:

Feedback denotes that information or message which is sent back to the source by the receiver or other persons assigned by the receiver. Feedback allows a source to understand to what extent the message is accepted or rejected by the receiver. Feedback can be immediate or delayed, positive or negative.

Encoder:

Encoding is done by the encoder. The act of producing message, for example, speaking or writing by using common symbols is called encoding.

Decoding:

Decoding is done by the decoder. Decoding is a process of translating the ‘codes’ into ideas. For example, speaker and writers is encoder and the listeners and readers are the decoders.

Communication context:

Communication takes place in a particular context. In this regard, communication context means the circumstances or the background situation of a communication activity. The pattern of communication varies in line with the context. For example, the way of talking to our teachers is different from our talking style to our students.

Noise:

The term noise gives us a negative impression of anything. But, it has significance and different meaning in human communication. Noise is not always negative or positive. Noise is inevitable in any communication process. 

In the early development of communication history, noise was viewed as a disturbance in the channel, for example, in the telephone cables connecting a speaker and a hearer. Noise, in the broader sense, is an element of human communication which distorts or hampers the effectiveness of the acceptance of a message. 

However, noise can take place in any attempt or stage of the communication process. For example, noise can occur when a source chooses language (symbols, words, and sentence). A source might fail to choose the appropriate word to describe his/her expression due to sudden fail to recall the word s/he looks for. In communication, various types of noise take place. 

Communication and social-psychologists have mentioned of three types of noise:

1. Physical Noise:

Physical noise is related to the transmission of the signal or the message. For example, sudden power cut may not allow us to send an email to our expected receiver. Similarly, the cell phone sometimes hangs for which we cannot call our friends.

2. Psychological Noise

Psychological noise is related to preconceptions, prejudices, biases, subjectivity and narrowness of thinking of a communicator or a source. This type of noise leads distortions in preparing, disseminating and receiving information or message.

3. Semantic Noise

Semantic noise is linked with meaning of words. For this type of noise, gap between a source and a receiver is created in terms of commonness of meaning and understanding. The source extremely fails to communicate with the receiver due to semantic noise. This type of noise is very common between the sources and receivers from two different cultural and linguistic backgrounds. 

If person A from Thailand says “mi pen rai tilluk(I did not mind, my friend)” to the person B from Bangladesh having no background of the language, it will not produce any meaning to the person B.

Noise can be minimized by using a common language and symbols, simple words and sentences having similar meaning to both the parties, the source and the receiver Use of nonverbal communication, improvement of perception and attitude, development of listening and feedback skills and above all readiness for communication can reduce noise.

Decoding   – It is the process of translation of an encoded message into ordinary understandable language. Receiver converts the symbols, words or signs received from the sender to get the meaning of the message. 

Feedback - Feedback is the main component of communication process as it permits the sender to analyze the efficacy of the message. It helps the sender in confirming the correct interpretation of message by the decoder. Feedback may be verbal (through words) or non-verbal (in form of smiles, sighs, etc.). It may take written form also in form of memos, reports, etc.