The Nature of Listening

Wednesday, 5 October 2022 11:28 am

I hear a sound (innate, natural, effortless) - initial stage of listening

I listen to the sound (process - focused) - cannot occur accidentally,

Hearing is effortless, Listening is mindful and intentional

Schema - prior knowledge

Factors that can affect listening:

Attention Span
Noise:
- Environmental or Physical Noise
- Semantic Noise/ Language Barrier
- Physiological Noise
- Psychological Noise
Biases:
- Topic and People

Communication
• has been defined as a continuous process of meaningful interaction between two or more people
who are trying to inform or persuade each other.
• This implies that while one person is speaking, the other person is expected to listen.
• Later on, the listener become the speaker and vice versa. This is referred to as turn-taking.
Therefore, one major characteristics of a good communicator is in his/her ability to listen. That is, a
poor listener is as good as a poor communicator. Hence, it will be impossible to achieve our
communication objectives without listening to others. There are about 4 major communication
skills which are further subdivided into 2.

1. Expressive skills, which allows people to be able to express themselves properly. These skills are the
writing and speaking skills

2. Receptive skills, which include listening and reading

Listening
• is a receptive communication skill that involves the process of creating meaning through
understanding and interpretation of messages in a communication process.\
• is also a process of receiving, interpreting and reacting to the messages received from the
communication sender.
• Like every other communication skill, listening is an art that must be cultivated consciously and
carefully.
• involves active efforts of interpreting the sounds, verbal and non-verbal cues as well as the ability to
retain information and respond or react to the message.

Hearing
• refers to the sounds that enter the ears.
• It is a physical process that is passive and unconscious.
• Hearing helps you to perceive sound. You can often hear even when you do not want to.

Listening
• is an active and deliberate activity.
• Listening begins with hearing, but goes beyond hearing
• An active listener pays attention to the language, tone and body language of what is being said.

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 • An active listener pays attention to the language, tone and body language of what is being said.
Active listening process begins when the listener pays attention to the verbal and non-verbal
messages and also interprets the message.
• Listening requires focus and concerted efforts, sometimes mental and physical efforts. Listening
brings about a pleasant and productive conversation. Therefore, listening skills are learnt and
developed over time.

Hear
ability / sounds coming to our ears
Ex. I can hear the sound of the air conditioning.
Listen
(to)
focusing on sounds
Ex. I hope you're listening to me.

Listening is important to an effective communication. Without the ability to listen effectively, messages are not
properly understood, which can lead to misunderstanding.

According to the diagram, adults spend an average of 70% of their time in some communication activity. They
are either reading, speaking, writing or listening. Research further shows that an average of 45% of this time is
spent on listening compared to 30% speaking, 16% reading and 9% writing.

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The Listening Process
Wednesday, 5 October 2022 12:28 pm

Listening is a complex process. Let us understand the complex nature of listening by examining the
different stages of listening as presented in the Brooks’ (Figure 1), De Vito's (Figure 2), and Hurier's
(Figure 3) Listening Models.

The Stages of Listening

Brook's Listening Model
According to W. Brooks (1993), listening consists of three stages: hearing, identifying and
recognizing, and auding.

1. Hearing is the process of reception of sound waves by the ear.

Three important factors which affect the hearing of sound
• Auditory acuity is the ability of the ear to respond to various frequencies or tones at various
intensities, referred to as levels of loudness.
• Masking occurs when the background noise received by the ear falls within the same
frequency range as the message one is intending to receive.
• Auditory fatigue results from continuous exposure to sounds of certain frequencies.

2. Identifying and recognizing patterns and relationship

3 factors that may affect this stage of listening
• Auditory analysis is the process of comparing the sounds that are heard with the ones that
are familiar to the listener. The sounds are recognized according to their likenesses and
differences.
• Mental reorganization, the listener uses a system that will help him retain and structure the
incoming sounds. He may recode, regroup or rehearse these sounds in his mind. He may
syllabify the word while pronouncing it; he may group numbers in batches or he may repeat
the series several times.
• Even as the listener hears the sounds, he is making associations in his mind. He links these
sounds with previous experiences, memories and backgrounds

3. Auding The listener assimilates the words and responds to them with understanding and feeling.
Aside from the listener’s “experiential background,” some skills in thinking can be useful to make the
assignment of meaning an easy task
Five Thinking Skills that the listener can engage in
• Indexing is arranging the listening material according to importance. As the information

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 • Indexing is arranging the listening material according to importance. As the information
comes in, the listener searches for the main ideas as well as the subordinate ones. He also
distinguishes the relevant material from the irrelevant. He may arrange the parts of the
message to form the complete whole.
• Making comparisons is another thinking skill.
• Noting sequence is arranging the material according to time, space, position or some other
relationship. The framework thus created will facilitate the assignment of meaning as well as
the recall of the information or material.
• Forming sensory impressions is translating the material to sensory images. When we listen,
we often react with our different senses. We may form a visual impression thus adding an
interesting dimension to the meaning of the verbal message. Although sight is the most
frequently used, we may also create other impressions so that we may perhaps taste, or smell
or feel the message.
• Appreciating is a final function that the listener can engage in during the auding stage.
Appreciating is “responding to the aesthetic nature of the message.” This may take place
when the listening material (e.g. special occasion speeches) demands an emotional response.

Joseph DeVito's Stages of Listening

Stage 1: Receiving
Receiving is the intentional focus on hearing a speaker’s message, which happens
when we filter out other sources so that we can isolate the message and avoid the
confusing mixture of incoming stimuli. At this stage, we are still only hearing the
message.
Stage 2: Understanding
In the understanding stage, we attempt to learn the meaning of the message, which is
not always easy. Understanding or comprehension occurs when both the speaker and
audience share an experience of meaning, and constitutes the first step in the listening
process. This is the stage during which the audience determines the context and
meanings of the words they hear. Determining the context and meaning of individual
words, as well as assigning meaning in language, is essential to understanding
sentences, and, thus, both are essential to understanding a speaker’s message.
Stage 3: Remembering
In the listening process, the remembering stage occurs as the audience categorizes and
retains the information they’ve gathered from the speaker for future access. The
result—memory—allows the person to record information about people, objects, and
events for later recall. This process happens both during and after the speaker’s
delivery.
Stage 4: Evaluating
This stage of the listening process is the one during which the listener assesses the
information they received, both qualitatively and quantitatively. Evaluating allows the
listener to form an opinion of what they heard and, if necessary, to begin developing a
response.
During the evaluating stage, the listener determines whether or not the information they
heard and understood from the speaker is well constructed or disorganized, biased or
unbiased, true or false, significant or insignificant. They also ascertain how and why the
speaker has come up with and conveyed the message that they delivered. This process
may involve considerations of a speaker’s personal or professional motivations and
goals.
Stage 5: Responding
The responding stage is the stage of the listening process wherein the listener provides
verbal and/or nonverbal reactions based on short- or long-term memory. Following the
remembering stage, a listener can respond to what they hear either verbally or non-
verbally. Nonverbal signals can include gestures such as nodding, making eye contact,
tapping a pen, fidgeting, scratching or cocking their head, smiling, rolling their eyes,
grimacing, or any other body language. These kinds of responses can be displayed
purposefully or involuntarily. Responding verbally might involve asking a question,
requesting additional information, redirecting or changing the focus of a conversation,
cutting off a speaker, or repeating what a speaker has said back to her in order to verify
that the received message matches the intended message.

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Hurier's Listening Model
Just like other aspects of communication, listening is a multi-faceted process. Judi Brownell
(2010), author of Listening: Attitudes, Principles, and Skills, proposes the HURIER model as a
description of the listening process. The HURIER acronym stands for:

H = hearing
U = understanding
R = remembering
I = interpreting
E = evaluating
R = responding

The HURIER model is not a series of steps; the model functions to process interdependent
components of stimuli.

• Hearing is our ability to focus on and perceive the stimuli itself. In addition to the basic,
physical process of capturing and processing the stimuli, the hearing stage also addresses
our need to focus and concentrate on the message.
• Understanding is decoding the message. We attach meaning to the symbols we receive, so
we are focusing only on the verbal message.
• Remembering is retaining what we have heard to be able to act on the message.
• Interpreting is taking the message we have decoded, consider the whole communication
package of nonverbal and verbal, and look deeper at what was meant and what underlying
messages may be involved.
• Evaluating is making judgments about what we have heard. In a critical listening situation,
we obviously need to make careful judgments about what we are being told. In an
interpersonal setting, we need to make judgments of the degree of the emotion and what our
role as a friend may be.
• Responding refers to how we react to the message. We need to consider what is more
appropriate or less appropriate as feedback. We also need to realize our comments,
questions, or even nonverbal feedback can send strong messages about the worth of the
other person and the importance of their concerns.

Self-Reflect:

• Reflect on your listening in class or in other settings where remembering information is

important.
What helps you remember important information?
What helps me to remember important information is through active recalling. This is a study
method I learned on Tiktok when I was in Senior High School. Active recall involves taking a
topic you wish to learn, creating questions based on that topic, and then repeatedly testing
yourself on those questions. By forcing your brain to retrieve the information, it ensures that
you actively learn it instead of passively reading it.

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 you actively learn it instead of passively reading it.
What keeps you from remembering important information accurately?

• Give an example of a time when you felt that your message was misunderstood or you felt as
though the listener dismissed it. How did you know your message had been misunderstood or
rejected? As a communicator, is there anything you could have done differently?
In eighth grade, I asked my friends who were going to the canteen to also buy me a hotdog in
a bun since I could not go because I don't feel well. It took them a long time to come back and
when they did, they said they forgot or that there wasn't any hotdogs left. I got really mad at
them because I felt like they didn't care and they could've bought me other food because they
knew I haven't eaten yet. However, I realized that as a communicator, I could have told them
to just buy me other food in case there aren't any left because they didn't know if I'd like them
to buy other food instead.

• Make a list of positive formative feedback you and other listeners could give during a lecture
or a classmate's speech. How might this positive feedback affect the communicator?
By telling the communicator that he/she did well and his/her message was clearly understood
by us listeners, I believe that the communicator will feel happy and confident because he/she
received positive feedback from his/her listeners.

• Make a list of negative feedback you and other listeners might give during a lecture or speech.
How might this negative feedback affect the communicator?

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Types of Listening
Sunday, 9 October 2022 6:28 pm

When we engage in listening we are doing so for many different reasons depending upon the goals in
which we are trying to achieve. There are four different types of listening that are essential to know
when deciding what your goal as the listener is. The four types of listening are appreciative, empathic,
comprehensive, and critical.

4 Types of Listening
1. Appreciative listening
is a type of listening behavior where the listener seeks certain information which they will
appreciate, and meet his/her needs and goals. One uses appreciative listening when listening to
music, poetry or the stirring words of a speech.
2. Empathic listening
is the practice of being attentive and responsive to others' input during conversation. Listening
empathically entails making an emotional connection with the other person and finding similarities
between their experience and your own so you can give a more heartfelt response.
3. Comprehensive listening
is about interpreting the words and ideas of the speaker. Examples of comprehensive listening
examples include watching the news, listening to a peer give a presentation, or taking notes
during a meeting. Because our brains work differently, sometimes comprehensive listening can
be complicated
4. Critical listening
is a process for understanding what is said and evaluating, judging, and forming an opinion on
what you hear. The listener assesses the strengths and weaknesses of the content, agrees or
disagrees with the information, and analyzes and synthesizes material.

Active Listening
Active listening means, as its name suggests, actively listening. When actively listening, you are
fully concentrating on what is being said and not thinking about what you will say next. It means
listening with a genuine desire to understand the speaker’s feelings and perspective without
placing judgment. In addition, active listening involves listening with all your senses.

8 Tips for ACTIVE LISTENING

PARAPHRASE.
Try to paraphrase what the student said to make sure you understand and to show that you are
paying attention.

ASK QUESTIONS.
Ask questions to encourage the student to elaborate on their thoughts and feelings.

USE POSITIVE BODY LANGUAGE.

Show that you are engaged and interested by nodding, facing the other person, and maintaining
an open and relaxed body posture.

LISTENING MAY BE ENOUGH.

We may be tempted to "fix" the problem, but at times, students just want us to listen.

EVALUATE THE CONVERSATION.

After you have fully taken in what the student has said, take a moment to evaluate the
conversation.

DON'T GIVE ADVICE TOO QUICKLY.

Allow the student to finish speaking before attempting to give advice. You want to make sure that

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 Allow the student to finish speaking before attempting to give advice. You want to make sure that
you fully understand them first.

SHOW EMPATHY.
If the student voices negative feelings, try to validate them. Consider why they feel this way and
put yourself in their shoes.

AVOID JUDGMENT.
Your goal is to understand your student's perspectives. Try not to interrupt with your own
opinions while the student is speaking.

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