The Basic Interpersonal Skills

1

Chapter 4

Talking and Listening:

The Basic Interpersonal Skills

Talking is used to refer to the processes involved in sending and

listening to refer to those involved in receiving messages

Culturally Competent Communications

Despite the fact that "everyone communicates," effective interpersonal communications are among the most difficult activities human beings undertake. The challenges for the worker-and-client in a professional encounter are even more challenging than those that occur in other kinds of relationships. The difficulties involve the various meanings that individuals have for the verbal and nonverbal conscious and unconscious messages they express. Cultural dimensions play a large part. Indeed, cultural competence is essential for effective communications.

Furthermore, the importance of culturally competent communications will increase with each passing decade. According to population projections of the U.S. Census Bureau, the 1999 U.S. population of approximately 280 million is expected to grow to about 480 million by the year 2075. The implications of a population that approaches one-half-billion - even in a country as resource-rich as the United States are staggering. Growth in overall size, however, reflects only part of the picture. The racial and ethnic composition will change dramatically as well.

By 2075, the Hispanic population in the U.S. is predicted to grow from 11.5 to 29.5% of the population, and the non-Hispanic Asian and Pacific Islander population from 3.8 to 11.0%. The Native American Indian and the non-Hispanic black populations are expected to reflect modest changes, from 0.7 to 0.8 and from 12.1 to 13.2%, respectively. The largest percentage change is anticipated among the non-Hispanic, white population, which is expected to decrease from 71.9 to 45.6% of the population (U.S. Census Bureau Population Division Population Projections Branch, 2002). At some point during the 21st century, non-Hispanic whites are expected to represent less than half the total U.S. population.

Use Hispanic Cultural Awareness

Life to work vs. work to live

The understanding of the meaning of words is, of course, only one aspect of the numerous challenges associated with intercultural communication.

"Multicultural three-step" stages of developing competence among counsellors: (1) awareness, (2) knowledge, and (3) skill.

Awareness refers to the recognition of your own

cultural patterns,

expectations,

perceptions, and

how they differ from and influence communication with people from different cultures.

Knowledge involves appreciating and understanding clients' cultures. Such understanding is based on knowledge gained from the professional and scientific literature, resource persons from other cultures, and findings from research studies about communications between your culture and your clients'.

Skill includes those interpersonal abilities based on awareness and knowledge that enable you to communicate effectively and provide helpful services to people from other cultures.

Without skill, you might be quite educated but unable to make a difference in others' lives and calls for a need to communicate both verbally and nonverbally with persons from other cultures

Cultural incompetence by social workers and other helping professionals might well lead members of certain cultural groups to avoid human service and mental health organizations altogether.

Powerfulness and powerlessness tend to remain significant phenomena for individuals and groups that have experienced either or both. Being a "somebody" or a "nobody" (Fuller, 2002) profoundly affects people and the way they communicate with others. Rankism to refer to the uses and abuses of power by those of higher rank toward those of lower rank. The feelings of shame, humiliation, indignity, or inferiority felt by a "nobody" when abused, oppressed, enslaved, imprisoned, or exploited or even when addressed with superiority, arrogance, or condescendence by a "somebody" are pretty much the same whether it appears as racism, sexism, ageism, ableism, lookism, heterosexism, or other insidious "isms."

In their efforts to understand and support clients, social workers may unwittingly adopt moral metaphors that actually hinder their professional efforts. Perhaps the most well known depiction of a common moral metaphor is the "dramatic triangle." Apparent in the Greek tragedies and many novels, plays, movies, TV soap operas, and in common gossip, the triangle reflects tension or conflict among three parties, forces, themes, or perspectives. A typical form includes a hero or heroine who confronts a villain or an obstacle to rescue a worthy or desirable victim. Wartime tends to emphasize moral metaphors and dramatic triangles where one country, tribe, people, or coalition is viewed as

"good,"

another as "bad,"

and a third as "victimized."

U.S. President George W Bush's reference to an "axis of evil" represents another illustration of the use of triangular moral metaphors. The governments of certain countries are categorized as "evil," their oppressed citizens as "innocent," and the United States and its allies as "beneficent protectors." As is common in such triangles, however, the roles often shift-sometimes quite rapidly. A victim’s view of a rescuer can quickly change from hero to persecutor or oppressor. Indeed, a victim can sometimes feel quite victimized by a rescuer soon after the purported rescue.

Communications within family systems often reflect triangular patterns, and they appear regularly within the context of social worker and client relationships as well. A typical form - at least from the point of view of the social worker - involves the assumption of the role of hero or heroine, the client as innocent victim, and selected other people or forces as villainous. Views derived from morally based triangles have enormous psychosocial, religious, political, and even advertising power. However, when unwittingly adopted by social workers, they can interfere with their professionalism and their helpfulness to clients.

Karpman referred to a common "drama triangle" in families, groups, and organizations that includes the roles or positions of Persecutor, Victim, and Rescuer (Karpman, 1968, 1971). Of course, these terms convey potentially negative connotations and simultaneously reflect rankism. The persecutor demeans and subordinates the victim; the rescuer - sometimes from a position of moral superiority - attempts to obtain the freedom and secure the safety of the vulnerable person or group.

To communicate productively with others, you require skills in talking-sending messages - as well as in listening-receiving messages. Skills in active listening are also needed. Active listening is that form of communication in which you expressively demonstrate that you have understood what the other has said.

Most people find it extremely challenging to communicate fully and accurately with one another. Social workers - and university professors - are no exception. Among the common errors social workers make in talking and listening are the following:

* Interacting in a patronizing or condescending manner

* Interrogating rather than interviewing by asking questions in rapid, staccato fashion

* Focusing on themselves (e.g., formulating questions before understanding the other's message, self-consciously monitoring their internal experiences, evaluating their own performance)

* Attending predominantly to a single dimension of a person's experience (e.g., just thoughts or just feelings; only the personal or only the situational; just the negative or just the positive)

* Interrupting frequently with a comment or question

* Failing to listen or remember, or selectively listening with an "agenda" so that messages are interpreted to match their own beliefs and opinions

* Neglecting to use a person's name, mispronouncing or changing it (e.g., referring to "Catherine" as "Cathy" or "Josef" as "Joe"), or assuming a degree of formality or informality that does not match that of the client's (e.g., "Mr. Juries" when he would prefer "Bill," or "Jane" when she prefers "Mrs. Smith")

* Neglecting to consider the cultural meaning of the interview for a particular person or family

* Failing to demonstrate understanding through active listening

* Using terms that stereotype people or groups

* Offering suggestions or proposing solutions too early in the process (on the basis of incomplete or inaccurate understanding of the person-issue-situation)

* Making statements in absolutist terms (e.g., always, never, all, or none)

* Disclosing one's own personal feelings and opinions or sharing life experiences prematurely

* Confronting or challenging a person before establishing a base of accurate understanding and a solid relationship

* Speculating about causes of issues before adequately exploring the person-issue-situation

* Pushing for action or progress from a person prematurely

* Using clichés and jargon

* Making critical or judgmental comments, including pejorative remarks about other persons or groups (e.g., other professionals, agencies, and organizations)

* Displaying inappropriate or disproportionate emotions (e.g., acting extraordinarily happy to meet a new client or sobbing uncontrollably when a person expresses painful feelings)

Especially during the early stages of work, be careful about sharing opinions or hypotheses. Hypotheses, inferences, speculation, and labels about people are risky at all times, especially during the early phases of a relationship. As you interact with others, try to adopt the frame of reference of the person who is communicating.

You may be tempted to make generalizations about people, perhaps because of their perceived membership in a certain class or group (e.g., male, female, poor, rich, black, white, Italian, disabled, diabetic, Catholic). All women are not the same; nor are all men, all people of colour, all children, all gay or lesbian persons, or even all professors! Therefore, be sensitive to and carefully consider the person's sex, class, ethnicity, able-ness, sexual orientation, religion, and cultural affiliation, but recognize that each individual client is unique. Each person will probably differ, at least to some extent, from common characteristics of the "average" member of his or her class or group.

As an interview proceeds, you may attempt to match the client's language mode. Some clients are more auditory than visual and vice versa. Some people favour words associated with hearing; others prefer those identified with seeing, still others like words that indicate sensing or touching. For example, if you use words such as hear, sound, noise, loud, or soft with people who favour an auditory language mode, you increase the probability of being understood and valued by them. A similarly favourable reaction is likely if you were to use see, view, and perceive with people who prefer a visual language mode, or feel, sense, and touch with those who favour tactile language (Bandler & Grinder, 1979, pp. 5-78).

Use example of student with Down’s Syndrome and the 10 professionals.

Yes, but what is unique about this particular students; what are his strengths?

Nonverbal Communications and Body Language

A great deal of human communication is nonverbal. As a social worker, you should be keenly aware of the significance of body language. Factors such as posture, facial expression, eye contact, gait, and body positioning represent important forms of communication (Ivey, 1988; Kadushin & Kadushin, 1997).[4] In professional encounters with others, your body language should generally be congruent with your verbal language. Clients often notice discrepancies and incongruities between what you say verbally and what you express nonverbally. When you present yourself in an incongruent fashion, others may be confused about you and your message. When you express yourself congruently, people are more likely to understand your communications and to experience you as genuine and sincere.

In addition to verbal and nonverbal congruence, your body language should communicate attention and interest in the other person, as well as caring, concern, respect, and authenticity. On many occasions, you will need to express your message in an assertive manner that conveys authority. To emphasize one element or another, changes in body language may be necessary.

The frequency and intensity of eye contact varies according to the people involved, the purpose of the meeting, the topic under discussion, and a host of other factors. In general, you should adopt seating or standing arrangements that allow for but do not force eye contact between the participants. Although it is common for social workers to attempt rather frequent eye contact, especially when clients are talking, the degree and intensity should vary according to the individual and cultural characteristics of the person, the issues of concern, and the context of the meeting. In many cultures, regular eye contact is experienced as positive, but in several others, it is not. "Some cultural groups (for instance, certain Native American, Eskimo, or aboriginal Australian groups) generally avoid eye contact, especially when talking about serious subjects" (Ivey, 1988, p. 27). Dropping one's eyes to avoid direct eye contact, in certain cultures, conveys respect, whereas steady, direct eye contact signifies disapproval. For some groups, eye contact is more likely when talking than when listening, but the exact opposite is true in other cultures.

Attending (Carkhuff & Anthony, 1979, pp. 31-60) is a term frequently used to describe the process of nonverbally communicating to others that you are open, non-judgemental, accepting of them as people, and interested in what they say. A general purpose of attending is, in fact, to encourage others to express themselves as fully and as freely as possible.
Counsellors should face their clients squarely, at a distance of three to four feet, without tables or other potential obstacles between the participants. They further recommend regular eye contact, facial expressions showing interest and concern, and a slight lean or incline toward the other person.

Listening

Listening involves the use of your sensory capacities to receive and register the messages expressed verbally and nonverbally by others.[6] The listening skills include hearing or receiving others' words, speech, and language; observing (Carkhuff & Anthony, 1979, pp. 42-47) their nonverbal gestures and positions; encouraging (Ivey, 1988, pp. 93-95) them to express themselves fully; and remembering what they communicate.

Listening, perhaps more than any other skill, is essential for effective social work practice. It requires two actions. First, you minimize attention to your own experiences (e.g., thoughts, feelings, and sensations). Then, you energetically concentrate on the client with a determination to understand - not to evaluate - what the client is experiencing and expressing.

For most people, being truly understood by another person is one of the genuinely humanizing events in life. It conveys respect. It demonstrates that you value them and are interested in what they have to say. In a real sense, careful listening is a gesture of love.

Because of this, listening is a dynamic factor in social work practice. It has several purposes.

First, effective listening enables you to gather information essential for assessment and planning.