Notes on Notes. Chapter 5- Verbal Messages

Here we are again...
Chapter 5: Verbal Messages

Verbal Messages: messages sent with words. Duh...

Principles of Verbal Messages
1. Meanings are in people
-Bypassing: the miscommunication pattern which occurs when the sender and the receiver miss each other with their meanings.
    a. Different words, same meaning
    b. Same words, different meaning
2. Language is Denotative and Connotative
-Snarl Words: highly negative connotation (Insults)
-Purr Words: high positive connotation (Compliments)
3. Meanings Depend on Context
-Cultural Context
The Principle of Cooperation
    a. The maxim of quality
    b. The maxim of relation
    c. The maxim of manner
    d. The maxim of quantity
The Principle of Peaceful Relations
    a. Primary goal is to maintain a peaceful and respectful relationship
The Principle of Face-Saving
    a. You should never embarrass anybody, especially in public.
The Principle of Self-Denigration
    a. Advises you to avoid taking credit for accomplishments in conversation. Don't brag.
-Gender Context
4. Messages Vary in Politeness
-Direct Messages: less polite and indirect messages.
-Indirect Messages: allow you to express a desire without offending anybody.
5. Messages Vary in Assertiveness
-Describe the problem.
-State how this problem affects you.
-Propose a solution.
-Confirm understanding.
6. Messages Can Deceive
-Lying: the act of sending messages with the intention of giving another person information you believe to be false.
    a. Pro-social Deception: To Achieve Some Good.
    b. Self-Enhancement Deception: To Make Yourself Look Good
    c. Selfish Deception: To Protect Yourself.
    d. Anti-Social Deception: To Harm Someone.
-Truth Bias: assuming somebody is telling the truth.
-Lie Bias: assuming somebody is lying.

Disconfirmation and Confirmation
-Disconfirmation: a communication pattern in which we ignore someone's presence as well as that person's messages.
-Rejection: disagreeing with the person, and not willing to accept what the other person is offering.
-Confirmation: the opposite of disconfirmation-acknowledging.
-Racism: negative attitudes and beliefs about certain races.
    a. Avoid derogatory terms
    b. Avoid stereotyping
    c. Don't refer to race when it is not necessary
    d. Avoid appointing problems to races
-Heterosexism: attitudes, behaviors, and language that disparage gay men and lesbians as well as a belief that all sexual behavior that is not heterosexual is unnatural and deserving of criticism.
-Ageism: prejudice against age.
-Sexism: prejudice against sexes.
Cultural Identifiers:
-Race and Nationality
-Affectional Orientations
-Age and Sex

-Intensional Orientation: the tendency to view people according to the way they're talked about.
-Extensional Orientation: the tendency to look first at the actual person and only afterwards look at their labels.
-Allness: forgetting that language symbolizes only a portion of reality.
-Fact-Inferences Confusion: barriers to clear thinking when inferences are treated as facts.
-Inferential Statement: statement made based on what you infer.
-Factual Statement: a statement you make based on what you observe.
-Static Evaluation: the tendency to retain evaluations without change while the reality to which they refer is changing.
-Indiscrimination: the failure to distinguish between similar but different people.
-Polarization: the tendency to look at the world in terms of opposites and to describe it in extremes.

Thank God that is finally over...