Running head: ELEMENTS OF CULTURE & LISTENING AS BARRIERS
Elements of Culture and Listening That Are Barriers to Interaction
Institution Affiliation
Date
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ELEMENTS OF CULTURE & LISTENING THAT ARE BARRIERS TO INTERACTION
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Elements of Culture and Listening
The world is diverse in terms of cultures that are represented. Culture defines who a set
of individuals are and what they believe in. As individuals grow up and interact with different
environments, they are bound to find new cultures which they may adopt. Cultures are learned
through communication, that is, through nonverbal cues as well as perceptions that mold the
behaviors of others. There must be two or more parties that relay messages and receive feedback
to be able to understand the culture. The main elements of culture are; the language in which the
words and ideas are shared and are common among a particular group. The second is a symbol
which is used to represent a specific culture. Third is norms, which are the rules and guidelines
of the behaviors of people. The fourth is values that define what people of one culture are and
what they believe in. The fifth is beliefs, and lastly, cognitive elements which define how a
person copes in an environment (Bodie, 2012).
Elements of Culture that are Barriers to Effective Listening of Different Cultures
Listening to people of different cultures is a way of learning about their cultures.
However, this can become difficult because of various elements of culture that cause barriers to
listening and interaction. The first and significant barrier is language as an element of culture.
Various communities with different cultures speak different languages. To listen and understand
another language requires one to be familiar with the language. Therefore, a language barrier is a
significant difficulty in listening and interacting with the people of other cultures. A language
barrier also leads to misinterpretation of information that is given, which may cause poor
judgment and misunderstanding between two people. Additionally, it becomes difficult to hire an
interpreter when interacting with other people of different cultures, as it is expensive and
ELEMENTS OF CULTURE & LISTENING THAT ARE BARRIERS TO INTERACTION
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tiresome. In the long run, all parties lose interest in communicating with each other (Andreatta &
Ferraro, 2012).
The second difficulty is as a result of beliefs and norms. When interacting with people
from different cultures, each person will practice their own beliefs and patterns. What one
believes in may not be what the second party believes in. Therefore, one may not listen
effectively since their interaction would be limited. They would not practice different beliefs; for
instance, the interaction between the Hindu culture and Christian culture is limited because both
have different beliefs. Norms and practices also cause interaction barriers as many people are not
willing to abandon their standards and adopt what others do. They may find their practices as a
taboo to their culture, which will cause them not to interact or communicate effectively.
The third element of culture that causes difficulty in listening to other cultures is making
prejudgments of the other person. When listening to people from different cultures, it is easy to
judge them without listening attentively to why they do what they do. If someone makes a
judgment without seeking a clear understanding, they tend not to listen effectively. The fourth
element is the cognitive element. When communicating and interacting with people from
different cultures, one must be able to adapt and cope with the existing social situation.
Therefore, if one's cognitive element is not active, they may not be able to have
constructive communication because they are not comfortable in the social setting of the other
person's culture. The last element that may cause a barrier in listening and in turn, hinder
interaction is value. Values define the culture of a group. If one is interested in learning a culture,
communication may be barred because of conflicting values. They may not be interested in
listening because they do not want to violate the values they believe in. This means one cannot
ELEMENTS OF CULTURE & LISTENING THAT ARE BARRIERS TO INTERACTION
separate culture and values, which causes a barrier to active listening between two parties of
different cultures and hence are unable to interact effectively (Bodie, 2012).
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ELEMENTS OF CULTURE & LISTENING THAT ARE BARRIERS TO INTERACTION
References
Andreatta, S., & Ferraro, G., (2012). Elements of culture: An applied perspective. Nelson
Education.
Bodie, G. D., (2012). Listening as positive communication. The positive side of interpersonal
communication, 109-125.
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Running head: PERCEPTION AND CIVILITY
Perception and Civility
Institutional Affiliation
Student’s name
Instructor’s name
Course
Date
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PERCEPTION AND CIVILITY
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Perception and Civility
News event in which perceptions reduced civil discourse
Civil discourse is usually caused by lack of knowledge on the controversial issues,
making it difficult for people to understand the whole concept due to different views that exist.
This explains the reason as to why people still argue on the same things for a long period,
without even getting closer to the right thing. One way which can be used in reducing civil
discourse in by use of perceptions. Perceptions refer to what people understand, believe or feel
is right concerning different matters. One of the current news event in which perception reduced
civil discourse on the issue of mental health among kids.
According to the news by Janice Davis which was published on 9th June 2019, the
perception was that drugs, social media, and transgenderism were the primary reasons as to why
most kids were suffering from mental health. This means that most desperate actions most
youths/kids get involved in like attempting suicide are usually caused by these three factors.
Actions which contributed to reducing the civic discourse include multiple research which was
carried out in identifying the major cause of mental issues among the youths/ children. Among
them, we have aspects like genetic disorder, child abuse, and inappropriate medical attention on
the affected kids, among other factors. All these different factors supported by the research in
one way or another tend to step out from the three significant perceptions made earlier, creating
a conclusion that drugs, social media, and transgenderism highly impact the mental status of
kids/ the youths.
PERCEPTION AND CIVILITY
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Aspects which affected the perception
There are various factors which facilitated that perception of the significant factors
affecting the mental status of the youths/kids. One of them is the first impression, in this case, in
almost every city we meet youths having psychological issues are mostly involved in drug abuse,
have genetic problems or are suffering from social media distress. Even by randomly depressed
youth about some of the reasons behind the mental state, these three factors are very common.
The stereotype that the current society is driven by social media and drug abuse among the
youths also contribute in coming up with the perception aiming at finding out the root cause of
mental issues among this group of people.
Limited exposure is also another issue that contributed in this common perception. Most
people find it difficult to research on issues related to psychology, making them rely on some of
the common issues they believe might be having an impact on the mental state of the youths.
Generalizing of health matters has facilitated more rise in different perceptions. This belief of
having mental issues among the users being caused by these three factors is also affected by
cultural beliefs. Other than genetic issues, most people believe that the influence of western
culture has highly contributed to mental and even general health of individuals, especially the
youths. Some of these practices like drug abuse are not very common in most culture, especially
among teenagers, and any health issues users tend to suffer from are directly linked to the use of
drugs. Basically, practices which conflict with the standard cultural practices.
PERCEPTION AND CIVILITY
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References
https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/drugs-social-media-transgenderism-no-wonder-kidsmental-health-is-suffering/
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Running head: COMMUNICATION
Communication model
Instructor name
Student name
Date
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COMMUNICATION
Communication model
Communication is very essential when it comes to exchange of Ideas, thoughts, opinion,
and expressions. The message received by the receiver is not always understood in the same
context as it was desired by the sender. One of the interpersonal interaction which I have
recently and was not as effective as it should be was an interaction with the head of the
department of my organization. The communication took place during the conduct of the
cultural festival in the organization. The head of the department organized a meeting and told
that all the members will be assigned a single task only. However, at the end of the day, the
mail was sent where it was given that I am supposed to perform two tasks instead of one. The
next day, a notice was circulated where it was given that I will be sharing one of my duties
with my colleagues. The model of communication is based on Linear model of
communication. (The linear model of communication, n.d.)
The communicators are the head of the department and myself. The sender of the
message was the head of the department and I was the receiver of the message. The
communication process completes once the sender sends the message to the receiver.
Sometimes the receiver gives the feedback to the sender which helps them to know if the
message was understood in the sense it was desired by the sender.
COMMUNICATION
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The three channels of communication were spoken words, written notice circulated,
and electronic mail. All the three channels communicated a different message. In the spoken
words, the message to me was the assigning of the single task. In the written notice circulated,
the message was assigning the two tasks. In the electronic mail, the message was sharing one
of the duties with my colleague.
Physical context means the actual settings life physical location, noise level,
time-of-day, etc. It had an impact on the interaction during the meeting in the form of noise
level from the people talking near the meeting room and the noise of the fan. Temporal
context means the expectations based on past experiences. It had an impact on the
international as it was expected that the single task will be a signed instead of the two tasks.
Social psychological context means the balance between the emotional state of people as well
as their personal relationships. There wasn't any effect of social psychological context.
(Communication in Organizations, n.d.)
There weren't many interferences present during the interaction. It was just the people
who were talking near the meeting room and the noise of the fans in the room. The meeting
was conducted one-to-one, that was the reason so many people gathered around the room for
their turn.
The three channels of communication created different perceptions based on the
experience. It created chaos and confusion as I was not able to identify the exact number of
tasks that I should do in the event.
The verbal messages used created both positive and negative effect on the interaction.
It was positive because it provided the expected information in the beginning. On the other
hand, It was negative because of interferences in the form of noise from other individuals and
COMMUNICATION
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from the nearby electrical devices. I used positive words as I agreed to the instructions given
by the way of verbal messages. There wasn't any ambiguity in the verbal messages.
The nonverbal messages affected the interaction in the form of confusion regarding the
duties to be performed. The international verbal message was that I have to do two tasks
instead of one during the Cultural Event. There wasn't any unintentional message during the
entire conversation.
Yes, I accurately decoded the messages that I received from the other individual but it
created confusion because the messages sent by the three different channels had three
different meaning.
Based on my feedback to the head of the department, the message was accurately
decoded by the receiver which intended to ask for the number of tasks that I am supposed to
do. As all the three channels created three different meanings, it necessitated to send feedback
regarding the clarification of the work to be done by me.
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COMMUNICATION
References
Communication in Organizations. (n.d.).
https://www.referenceforbusiness.com/encyclopedia/Clo-Con/Communication-in-Orga
nizations.html
The linear model of communication. (n.d.).
https://www.open.edu/openlearn/money-management/management/business-studies/ret
ail-marketing/content-section-3.2
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