Exam 1: A: Communication: Essential Human Behavior

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Answers to this question will vary, as the student is required to identify a personal example. Ideal answers will demonstrate a clear understanding of the transactional nature of communication and the impact of the relational context, situational context, and cultural context on their expectations of the other, the choices they made, and the way they interpreted the other's behavior. Strong answers will also demonstrate an ability to question initial assumptions about what was expected of themselves and others and an ability to reinterpret the other's behaviors based on this awareness. At this point, students should not be expected to have mastery of these abilities but should be able to demonstrate some self-reflexive questioning of their assumptions as well as a basic awareness of the process. This question can be repeated toward the end of the course to assess whether or not students can synthesize what they have learned in subsequent chapters into the model and can provide a sense of cohesion and continuity between the various topic areas covered throughout the text.

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Ideal answers will acknowledge that the desire and the need to communicate are innate and that we begin communicating the moment we are born. Communication is essential to beginning, maintaining, and ending our relationships. It is through these interdependent communication relationships that we get the things we need. We communicate to express affiliation, manage relationships, and influence others.

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Ideal answers will recognize an understanding of the following ideas or concepts: •Linear model-The most basic model depicts communication as being linear and unidirectional. A sender encodes a message and sends it to a receiver through a channel, and the receiver decodes it. Along the way, noise may change the message leading to misunderstanding. Although the model is limited, it does portray certain forms of communication and provides the basic elements for more complex models of communication. •Interaction model-Building on the linear model, the interaction model acknowledges that the receiver also responds to messages with feedback. Although more complex, this model portrays the sender and receiver as being locked into their roles and the communication process as being disjointed with the receiver having to wait until the sender finishes encoding to begin decoding and the sender having to wait until the receiver has finished decoding the message to respond with any feedback. •Competent communication model-This model is the most complex of the three, portraying communication as being transactional, with all communicators simultaneously sending and receiving messages within a relational context, a situational context, and a cultural context. This model allows for flexibility in roles and for the focus to shift to the transaction rather than just isolated messages that are being sent back and forth.