Communication Barriers

What is communication barrier

This is anything that distorts, blocks or interferes with the communication to be effective

Types of communication barriers

 The use of jargon.

 Emotional barriers and taboos

 Lack of attention, interest, distractions, or irrelevance to the receiver.

 Differences in perception and viewpoint.

 Physical disabilities

 Physical barriers to non-verbal communication

 Language differences and the difficulty in understanding unfamiliar accents.

 Expectations and prejudices which may lead to false assumptions or stereotyping.

 Cultural differences.

 Wrong channel

 Wrong place or time

 Level of intelligence

Semantic barriers

• Semantic is the science of meaning. Most of the communication is carried through symbols or
words spoken or written.

• Since the same words or symbols carry different meanings, they may confuse the receiver while
interpreting.

• Communication would be effective if the sender and the receiver interprets the message in the
same way.

TYPES OF SEMANTIC BARRIERS IN COMMUNICATION

1. Denotative Barriers

• Direct meaning of any word which must be shared by two people to understand each other is
the denotative meaning.

• The barriers that arise due to the definition or meaning of a word used differently by sender and
receiver is denotative barriers of communication. They disagree on the meaning of a word as
they are unaware of the other persons' meaning.
 • E.g. Chick-literally means a "baby bird," but is often used as a somewhat derogatory term for a
woman.

2. Connotative barrier in communication

• This refers to the difference of meaning according to different abstract situations, contexts,
actions and feelings.

• Both the communicators know the meanings of the word, but use only one meaning according
to the context in which the words are being used.

• E.g. the word god which is used differently by people following religions.

Causes of Semantic Barriers in Communication

• Homophones are the words with same pronunciation but different meaning which might have
different spelling too. For example: Words buy, by and bye.

• Homonyms are the words which have the same pronunciation and their spellings are mostly
same, but the intended meaning is different. For example, the noun "bear" and the verb "bear"

• Homographs are the words that have the same spelling but the pronunciation and meaning are
different. For example, "The research lead to the discovery of lead".

• Differences in use of words - words can mean something different in two different languages
even though the words have the same pronunciation and spelling.

How to overcome communication barriers?

• Use simple, direct, jargon free language.

• Keep the messages brief and clear to avoid misunderstanding.

• Providing free and open and minded atmosphere to share views.

• Allowing mind to accept suggestions and adopt different cultures.

• Keeping aside the prejudice and not allowing the emotions to rule the judgments.

• Elimination or reduction of noise levels.

• Be an active listener.

• Selection of proper communication channel.

• Avoid overloaded information.

• Use actions more than words in oral communication.

Non-verbal communication

• This is the communication without spoken words.

• Written communication is also part of non-verbal.

Types of non-verbal communication

• Facial expression - a gesture executed with the facial muscles e.g. a smile when you are happy
and a frown when you are sad.

• Body posture - the way in which your body is positioned when you are sitting or standing.

• Orientation – facing the other person or facing away from them.

• Eye contact - The visual contact with another person's eyes.

• Body contact - A pat on the back or an arm round the shoulder.

• Proximity – the distance we stand or sit from someone or something.

• Head nods – to indicate agreement to something or to encourage others to keep on speaking.

• Appearance – physical grooming and choice of clothes.

Planning a message

• There are questions to ask yourself before you start planning a message: They also called the
WH questions.

They are: Why, who, where, when, what, how

Why?

• This is the reason for your communication (purpose).

• Reasons for communicating can be: to inform, to ask, to educate, to warn, to command etc.

Who?

• Who exactly are your audience (listener or reader). What sort of people are they? The way you
prepare your message varies according to the type of audience you have. Age, status, education
etc.

Where

• This refers to the place where you are going to address your audience. This helps you in
preparing your venue for example if it is in a large hall you might need public speaking
equipment such as loud speakers or a public address system.

When?

This is the date and time that you are going to give your speech or to address your audience. This
helps you to know how much time you have to prepare

What?

• This refers to what you are going to communicate to your audience.(The subject)
• What exactly you are going to say.

How?

• This refers to the means through which you are going to deliver your message. Words, pictures
and presentations are the most common.

Eight (8) important steps to carry out when planning a message.

1. Write down your purpose – this is the reason why you are creating your message.

2. Assemble your information – gather the information that you might require from different
sources.

3. Group the information – put the information that you have gathered in a certain order so that
your message does not become confusing because of jumbled up information.

4. Put the information in a logical sequence – this is similar to stage 3 but at this stage you group
your information in the order in which things are supposed to happen.

5. Produce a skeleton outline- this is an outline of your message but it does not contain all the
details of your message.

6. Write the first draft – this is the stage where you roughly write what you are going to present
or the message that you intend to send. This is called the rough draft, where you can make all
your mistakes before writing the final draft.

7. Edit the rough draft – at this stage you make corrections on all the mistakes made in the rough
draft.

8. Write the final draft – this is where you write you final presentation having corrected all the
mistakes