Q: Review the six types of nonlistening discussed in this chapter. Are any
of them common in your communication? Make a plan to overcome this
type of nonlistening you have engaged in. Describe the type of
nonlistenging you engage in, and discuss how you plan to fix is.
A: The six types of nonlistening are: pseudolistening, monopolizing, selective listening, defensive listening, ambushing, and literal listening. Pseudolistening means that it looks as if you are listening, but you actually zoned out into our own thoughts. I often do this when I am speaking to someone that enjoys gossiping or talks about unintellectual subjects such as the clothes they saw at the mall, what he said/she said, and gossip. I mind the subjects very boring and resort to saying "uh-huh, uh huh" so it would get boring talking to me. Monopolizing means to keep the center of attention on yourself. For example, I have a few friends in high school whom always found a way to weave theirselves or their own experiences into the topic we, or our group, was discussing. So, one person would talk about the new iPhone 5 that had just come out and she would but in with her thoughts and saying that her Samsung Galaxy 3 is way better and how much fun she has using it and etc etc...Pretty much to a point where everyone just wanders off elsewhere or starts their own topic. Selective listening means we go in and out of the conversation and focus only on the things we want to hear. For example, my current math professor sort of has a monotone voice, but he teachers amazingly well. I start to zone out and keep copying the notes, but I am not "listening" to a single word he is saying. He suddenly says "the quiz on Thursday is on..." and everyone, including me automatically perks up their head and ears to hear what he has to say. Defensive listening means to be very aware of any critique you might receive and take it personally. I personally do not encounter this often. I am very careful with my choice of words to not insult or compare anyone to another person, but I do see this happening a lot with others where they accidentally let slip something that angers another. Ambushing means to find holes in another speakers words so you can "stuff a sock" in their mouth and hopefully watch them struggle to get out of it. For example, a lot of times when we are buying a used car the sales person will keep pushing you and trying to sell you the car. They could be talking about how good the mileage is or something but never really get into if the car has been in previous accidents or if someone died in the car from a car accident. Literal listening means you ignore the relationship which you have with the person. I often encounter this with my managers and supervisors. It seems sometimes that all they care about is getting their paycheck and if you can't make it during your shift go find someone to cover for you. I suppose the most common one in my life is pseudolistening and I do it intentionally mainly because I honestly don't care for those topics and my friends know that. By just responding "uh huh uh huh" they know that I have zoned out and I am not their gossip partner.
I like that you included many examples with your definitions; it made things really clear! After reading this chapter, I realized that I engage in pseudolistening the most. I don’t intentionally do it, it just happens with my lack of interest in the conversation. Like you, I don’t find gossip interesting so when my friends try to fill me in on the latest celebrity news, etc. my mind wanders. This especially happens in classes that I lack interest in. For example, I took a business law class last semester and although the professor was very interesting, the material was just really dry. I would often find myself daydreaming and nodding my head here and there so it wouldn’t be obvious that I wasn’t paying attention. I think to fix my pseudolistening issues, I just need to avoid getting myself into dry conversations and find a way to make the topics more interesting.
ReplyDeletehi there, i find it really funny that you said you use psuedo listening when you hear people gossiping to you. ahhahahaha like really. i do the same thing with the uhh huh and uhh-huh but when i go like that people think i'm being sarcastic. Gossiping to me is whatever and i hate when they turn out to be rumors because thats just messed up because you know that gossip got around. I feel that way too with the iphone 5 and the samsung galaxy. i mean i did get the iphone 5 but i don't talk about it or anything and argue about what phone is better and whatever. I hear people being like that and whoever thinks their phone is better would be the one using monopolzing since people just don't care. I really liked how you gave an example of each thing. It helped me understand each from a lot better.
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