My
partners in the experiment said it was hard to communicate with me. When I was gesturing, they did stop talking
and looked at me. Although they did try to figure out what I was
saying I was not successful in getting my point across. I could clearly understand their words but
they had trouble understanding me. I
wanted my daughter to tell her dad about cheer practice and how they learned a
new stunt. It was pretty much impossible
for me to communicate that as it was complex and beyond the simple gestures of “no”,
“stop”, “eat”, “drink”, and “look”.
The
culture that uses symbolic language clearly has the advantage in explaining
complex ideas. They can quickly respond
to each other with little effort unlike a culture that does not use symbolic
language. I noticed that my partners became impatient with me as they could not
understand what I was trying to convey. They
eventually kept their own conversation going and although I tried, I was unable
to really be part of what they were saying.
We did
the experiment for 15 minutes, however, I was not able to last the full 15
minutes without raising my eyebrow. I
apparently raise my eyebrow much more often than I ever thought. My daughter really enjoyed watching me and
waiting for me to move. It was a
challenge to keep my voice at an even tone and not make any facial movements,
but at least I could join the conversation!
Holding a conversation and not being able to show any type of emotion or
movement in relation to your conversation is difficult but less difficult than
the first experiment. During the second experiment I was able to use words and
ask my daughter about cheerleading. However, not using voice inflections was
difficult when I responded to her. I felt
like a computer and sounded like Siri.
My
husband thought that listening to me speak in an even tone was like reading a
text or email. The conversation had no emotion.
My daughter on the other hand completely enjoyed the experiment.
Voice
inflections, eye contact, and hand gestures play an important part in our
communication. Our society relies
heavily on emails and text messages and often I see misunderstandings occur
from this type of communication. These
emails and text messages can come across harsh. Without the human emotion and
body language there are misunderstandings that occur.
Body language is very relevant to all aspects
of our lives. It plays an important part
in our personal lives with our families and friends as well as business lives
and careers. For example, my daughter may say “Okay” but she rolls her eyes when
she says it. To me the word “okay” is an agreement that I was heard and she
agrees to do what I asked, but when she rolls her eyes when she answers then it
means she is annoyed and not being sincere.
Another example would be a face-to-face meeting versus a conference call
at work. A face-to-face meeting is always
more beneficial than a conference call as the body language and facial
expression can be seen. On a conference call the parties rely only on words and
vocal tones and the parties cannot see the facial expressions of either
excitement or disapproval.
A scenario where I can imagine that body language would
not be a benefit would be if you are doing a job interview and you are nervous.
Instead of showing confidence you are showing that you are nervous and uncertain
and do not make good eye contact.
In conclusion, body
language is very important as it promotes clearer communication in our everyday
lives.
One of the best descriptions of Part 1 I've read so far. Good job picking on the difficulty of initiating a topic of conversation. Without symbolic language, you are relegated to a passive form of conversation, responding but not taking charge of the path it takes. Another interesting thing is that you were ignored after a while. Students who choose to run this experiment with only one person don't experience this, but it is common for those who run this with two or more partners. It is just easier for the "speakers" to talk amongst themselves, but it is easy to see how this gets enacted on a daily basis who struggle with limits on their communication skills.
ReplyDeleteGood discussion on how this reflects on cultural interaction and I appreciate how you pulled your own personal experiences into the post.
Kids are more open to novel experiences (Part 2). Adults have less patience for it! But it isn't just an issue of miscommunication. Humans use body language to validate what they are hearing. Is that person telling the truth? What does their body language tell me? Without that confirmation, we don't know if we can trust what we are hearing, like a missing lie detector. That makes us uncomfortable.
There are groups of people that have difficulty reading body language, such as those in the autism spectrum.
The job interview is a situation where would want to control your own body language, not where you would not want to read body language. Are there any circumstances where body language might mislead you? Can it be misinterpreted? Do all cultures use the same system of body language?
Good description! I was very difficult to keep up a complex conversation in the first part and it is easy to see that the culture that uses symbolic language has the advantage. I also found the second part to be very difficult and think that the movements and gestures along with voice tone are necessary to communicate efficiently.
ReplyDeleteHey Susan
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading your post especially part 1 where you compared not being able to talk to persons who have English as a secondary language. English is also my second language and sometimes I have difficulty communicating with friends and co-workers. The first part of the experiment reminded me of these difficulties. Good post!
Susan,
ReplyDeleteYour post is really amazing and it is very interesting to read, I like your about the interview, actually I did not think about it, but it is so true, and when you get nervous you start moving your hands in front of your face, some researchers say that it is a way to avoid some eye contact with the person in front and to grab their attention to something else other than your face! and it is so funny that in part two we did the same thing, I raised my eyebrow an my partner caught me doing it !