Communication and Perception
Read this chapter, which explains that interpretation is the part of the perception process in which we assign meaning to our experiences using mental structures known as schemata. Our previous knowledge and experience help us make sense of the perceptual cues around us. The perception process affects our communication because we respond to stimuli differently based on how we perceive them. Take time to review the questions at the end of each section.
Improving Perception
Learning Objectives
- Discuss strategies for improving self-perception.
- Discuss strategies for improving perception of others.
- Employ perception checking to improve perception of self and others.
So
far, we have learned about the perception process and how we perceive
others and ourselves. Now we will turn to a discussion of how to improve
our perception. Our self-perception can be improved by becoming aware
of how schema, socializing forces, self-fulfilling prophecies, and
negative patterns of thinking can distort our ability to describe and
evaluate ourselves. How we perceive others can be improved by developing
better listening and empathetic skills, becoming aware of stereotypes
and prejudice, developing self-awareness through self-reflection, and
engaging in perception checking.
Improving Self-Perception
Our
self-perceptions can and do change. Recall that we have an overall
self-concept and self-esteem that are relatively stable, and we also
have context-specific self-perceptions. Context-specific
self-perceptions vary depending on the person with whom we are
interacting, our emotional state, and the subject matter being
discussed. Becoming aware of the process of self-perception and the
various components of our self-concept (which you have already started
to do by studying this chapter) will help you understand and improve
your self-perceptions.
Since self-concept and self-esteem are so
subjective and personal, it would be inaccurate to say that someone's
self-concept is "right" or "wrong". Instead, we can identify negative
and positive aspects of self-perceptions as well as discuss common
barriers to forming accurate and positive self-perceptions. We can also
identify common patterns that people experience that interfere with
their ability to monitor, understand, and change their self-perceptions.
Changing your overall self-concept or self-esteem is not an easy task
given that these are overall reflections on who we are and how we judge
ourselves that are constructed over many interactions. A variety of
life-changing events can relatively quickly alter our self-perceptions.
Think of how your view of self changed when you moved from high school
to college. Similarly, other people's self-perceptions likely change
when they enter into a committed relationship, have a child, make a
geographic move, or start a new job.
Having a child can lead to a major change in a person's self-concept.
Aside from experiencing life-changing events, we can make slower changes to our self-perceptions with concerted efforts aimed at becoming more competent communicators through self-monitoring and reflection. As you actively try to change your self-perceptions, do not be surprised if you encounter some resistance from significant others. When you change or improve your self-concept, your communication will also change, which may prompt other people to respond to you differently. Although you may have good reasons for changing certain aspects of your self-perception, others may become unsettled or confused by your changing behaviors and communication. Remember, people try to increase predictability and decrease uncertainty within personal relationships. For example, many students begin to take their college education more seriously during their junior and senior years. As these students begin to change their self-concept to include the role of "serious student preparing to graduate and enter the professional world," they likely have friends that want to maintain the "semiserious student who doesn't exert much consistent effort and prefers partying to studying" role that used to be a shared characteristic of both students' self-concepts. As the first student's behavior changes to accommodate this new aspect of his or her self-concept, it may upset the friend who was used to weeknights spent hanging out rather than studying. Let's now discuss some suggestions to help avoid common barriers to accurate and positive self-perceptions and patterns of behavior that perpetuate negative self-perception cycles.
Avoid Reliance on Rigid Schema
As we learned earlier, schemata are sets of information based on cognitive and experiential knowledge that guide our interaction. We rely on schemata almost constantly to help us make sense of the world around us. Sometimes schemata become so familiar that we use them as scripts, which prompts mindless communication and can lead us to overlook new information that may need to be incorporated into the schema. So it's important to remain mindful of new or contradictory information that may warrant revision of a schema. Being mindful is difficult, however, especially since we often unconsciously rely on schemata. Think about how when you're driving a familiar route you sometimes fall under "highway hypnosis". Despite all the advanced psychomotor skills needed to drive, such as braking, turning, and adjusting to other drivers, we can pull into a familiar driveway or parking lot having driven the whole way on autopilot. Again, this is not necessarily a bad thing. But have you slipped into autopilot on a familiar route only to remember that you are actually going somewhere else after you've already missed your turn? This example illustrates the importance of keeping our schemata flexible and avoiding mindless communication.
Be Critical of Socializing Forces
We
learned earlier that family, friends, sociocultural norms, and the
media are just some of the socializing forces that influence our
thinking and therefore influence our self-perception. These powerful
forces serve positive functions but can also set into motion negative
patterns of self-perception. Two examples can illustrate the possibility
for people to critique and resist socializing forces in order to
improve their self-perception. The first deals with physical appearance
and notions of health, and the second deals with cultural identities and
discrimination.
We have already discussed how the media presents
us with narrow and often unrealistic standards for attractiveness. Even
though most of us know that these standards don't represent what is
normal or natural for the human body, we internalize these ideals, which
results in various problems ranging from eating disorders, to
depression, to poor self-esteem. A relatively overlooked but
controversial and interesting movement that has emerged partially in
response to these narrow representations of the body is the fat
acceptance movement. The fat acceptance movement has been around for
more than thirty years, but it has more recently gotten public attention
due to celebrities like Oprah Winfrey and Kirstie Alley, who after
years of publicly struggling with weight issues have embraced a view
that weight does not necessarily correspond to health. Many people have
found inspiration in that message and have decided that being healthy
and strong is more important than being thin. The
"Healthy at Every Size" movement and the National Association to Advance
Fat Acceptance have challenged the narrative put out by the
thirty-billion-dollar-a-year weight-loss industry that fat equals lazy,
ugly, and unhealthy". Conflicting scientific
studies make it difficult to say conclusively how strong the
correlation is between weight and health, but it seems clear that a view
that promotes healthy living and positive self-esteem over
unconditional dieting and a cult of thinness is worth exploring more
given the potential public health implications of distorted body image
and obesity.
The "Healthy at Every Size" movement strives to teach people that being thin doesn't necessarily mean a person is healthy.
Cultural influences related to identities and difference can also lead to distorted self-perceptions, especially for people who occupy marginalized or oppressed identities. While perception research has often been used to support the notion that individuals who are subjected to discrimination, like racial and ethnic minorities, are likely to have low self-esteem because they internalize negative societal views, this is not always the case. In fact, even some early perception research showed that minorities do not just passively accept the negative views society places on them. Instead, they actively try to maintain favorable self-perceptions in the face of discriminatory attitudes. Numerous studies have shown that people in groups that are the targets of discrimination may identify with their in-group more because of this threat, which may actually help them maintain psychological well-being. In short, they reject the negative evaluations of the out-group and find refuge and support in their identification with others who share their marginalized status.
Beware of Self-Fulfilling Prophecies
Self-fulfilling
prophecies are thought and action patterns in which a person's false
belief triggers a behavior that makes the initial false belief actually
or seemingly come true. For example, let's say a student's biology lab
instructor is a Chinese person who speaks English as a second language.
The student falsely believes that the instructor will not be a good
teacher because he speaks English with an accent. Because of this
belief, the student doesn't attend class regularly and doesn't listen
actively when she does attend. Because of these behaviors, the student
fails the biology lab, which then reinforces her original belief that
the instructor wasn't a good teacher.
Although the concept of
self-fulfilling prophecies was originally developed to be applied to
social inequality and discrimination, it has since been applied in many
other contexts, including interpersonal communication. This research has
found that some people are chronically insecure, meaning they are very
concerned about being accepted by others but constantly feel that other
people will dislike them. This can manifest in relational insecurity,
which is again based on feelings of inferiority resulting from social
comparison with others perceived to be more secure and superior. Such
people often end up reinforcing their belief that others will dislike
them because of the behaviors triggered by their irrational belief. Take
the following scenario as an example: An insecure person assumes that
his date will not like him. During the date he doesn't engage in much
conversation, discloses negative information about himself, and exhibits
anxious behaviors. Because of these behaviors, his date forms a
negative impression and suggests they not see each other again,
reinforcing his original belief that the date wouldn't like him. The
example shows how a pattern of thinking can lead to a pattern of
behavior that reinforces the thinking, and so on. Luckily, experimental
research shows that self-affirmation techniques can be successfully used
to intervene in such self-fulfilling prophecies. Thinking positive
thoughts and focusing on personality strengths can stop this negative
cycle of thinking and has been shown to have positive effects on
academic performance, weight loss, and interpersonal relationships.
Create and Maintain Supporting Interpersonal Relationships
Aside from giving yourself affirming messages to help with self-perception, it is important to find interpersonal support. Although most people have at least some supportive relationships, many people also have people in their lives who range from negative to toxic. When people find themselves in negative relational cycles, whether it is with friends, family, or romantic partners, it is difficult to break out of those cycles. But we can all make choices to be around people that will help us be who we want to be and not be around people who hinder our self-progress. This notion can also be taken to the extreme, however. It would not be wise to surround yourself with people who only validate you and do not constructively challenge you, because this too could lead to distorted self-perceptions.
Beware of Distorted Patterns of Thinking and Acting
You
already know from our discussion of attribution errors that we all have
perceptual biases that distort our thinking. Many of these are common,
and we often engage in distorted thinking without being conscious of it.
Learning about some of the typical negative patterns of thinking and
acting may help us acknowledge and intervene in them. One such pattern
involves self-esteem and overcompensation.
Some people have speculated that men who have a midlife crisis may overcompensate for a perceived loss in status or power due to age by purchasing material things that make them appear more youthful.
People with low self-esteem may act in ways that overcompensate for their feelings of low self-worth and other insecurities. Whether it's the businessman buying his midlife crisis Corvette, the "country boy" adding monster tires to his truck, or the community leader who wears several carats of diamonds everywhere she goes, people often turn to material possessions to try to boost self-esteem. While these purchases may make people feel better in the short term, they may have negative financial effects that can exacerbate negative self-perceptions and lead to interpersonal conflict. People also compensate for self-esteem with their relational choices. A person who is anxious about his career success may surround himself with people who he deems less successful than himself. In this case, being a big fish in a small pond helps some people feel better about themselves when they engage in social comparison.
People can also get into a negative thought and action cycle by setting unrealistic goals and consistently not meeting them. Similar to a self-fulfilling prophecy, people who set unrealistic goals can end up with negative feelings of self-efficacy, which as we learned earlier, can negatively affect self-esteem and self-concept. The goals we set should be challenging but progressive, meaning we work to meet a realistic goal, then increase our expectations and set another goal, and so on.
Some people develop low self-esteem because they lack accurate information about themselves, which may be intentional or unintentional. A person can intentionally try to maintain high self-esteem by ignoring or downplaying negative comments and beliefs and focusing on positive evaluations. While this can be a good thing, it can also lead to a distorted self-concept. There is a middle ground between beating yourself up or dwelling on the negative and ignoring potentially constructive feedback about weaknesses and missing opportunities to grow as a person. Conversely, people who have low self-esteem or negative self-concepts may discount or ignore positive feedback. To wrap up this section, I'd like to turn to one of my favorite shows and a great source for examples relevant to the perception process: American Idol.
I've always enjoyed showing clips from American Idol auditions in my class when I teach about self-perception. As you probably know, the season always starts with audition footage shot in various cities. The range of singing abilities, not to mention personalities, of those who show up for a chance to sing in front of the judges leads millions of viewers to keep tuning in. While it's obvious that the producers let some people through who they know don't have a chance at making it on the show, they also know that certain personalities make for good reality television viewing. I've often found myself wondering, "Do these people really think they can sing?" The answer is sometimes a very clear "Yes!" Sure, some are there just to make a spectacle and hopefully make it on TV, but there are many who actually believe they have singing abilities - even to the point that they challenge and discount the judges' comments.
Some contestants on American Idol find it difficult to accept the constructive criticism they receive from the judges because they have distorted self-perceptions about their singing abilities.
During the contestant's tearful and/or angry postrejection interview, they are often shown standing with their family and friends, who are also surprised at the judges' decision. These contestants could potentially avoid this emotional ending by following some of the previous tips. It's good that they have supportive interpersonal relationships, but people's parents and friends are a little biased in their feedback, which can lead to a skewed self-concept. These contestants could also set incremental goals. Singing at a local event or even at a karaoke bar might have helped them gain more accurate information about their abilities and led them to realize they didn't have what it takes to be an "American idol".
Overcoming Barriers to Perceiving Others
There are many barriers that prevent us from competently perceiving others. While some are more difficult to overcome than others, they can all be addressed by raising our awareness of the influences around us and committing to monitoring, reflecting on, and changing some of our communication habits. Whether it is our lazy listening skills, lack of empathy, or stereotypes and prejudice, various filters and blinders influence how we perceive and respond to others.
Develop Empathetic Listening Skills
As
we will learn "Listening", effective listening is not
easy, and most of us do not make a concerted effort to overcome common
barriers to listening. Our fast-paced lives and cultural values that
emphasize speaking over listening sometimes make listening feel like a
chore. But we shouldn't underestimate the power of listening to make
someone else feel better and to open our perceptual field to new sources
of information. Empathetic listening can also help us expand our self-
and social awareness by learning from other people's experiences and
taking on different perspectives. Empathetic listening is challenging
because it requires cognitive and emotional investment that goes beyond
the learning of a skill set.
I didn't know what a lazy listener I
was until I started teaching and realized how much time and effort
teachers have to put into their jobs. Honestly, at first it was
challenging to attentively listen to student issues, thoughts, and
questions, but I immediately saw the value in it. To be a good teacher, I
had to become a better listener. As a result, I also gained more
empathy skills and became a lot more patient. A valuable lesson I
learned during this time is best stated as follows: "Everyone's biggest
problem is his or her biggest problem". If one person's biggest problem
is getting enough money together to buy a new cell phone and another
person's biggest problem is getting enough money together to get much
needed medication, each of these people is likely experiencing a similar
amount of stress. As an outsider, we might look at this example and
think about how a cell phone isn't necessary to live but the medication
is. But everyone's reality is his or her reality, and when you can
concede that someone's reality isn't like yours and you are OK with
that, then you have overcome a significant barrier to becoming more
aware of the perception process.
I recently had a good student
inform me that he was leaving school to pursue other things. He had
given speeches about wildfire firefighting and beer brewing and was
passionate about both of those things, but not school. As an academic
and lover of and advocate for higher education, I wouldn't have made
that choice for myself or for him. But I am not him, and I can't assume
his perceptions are consistent with mine. I think he was surprised when I
said, "I think you are a smart and capable adult, and this is your
decision to make, and I respect that. School is not going anywhere, so
it'll be here when you're ready to come back. In the meantime, I'd be
happy to be a reference for any jobs you're applying for. Just let me
know". I wanted to make it clear that I didn't perceive him as
irresponsible, immature, misguided, or uncommitted. He later told me
that he appreciated my reaction that day.
Beware of Stereotypes and Prejudice
Stereotypes
are sets of beliefs that we develop about groups, which we then apply
to individuals from that group. Stereotypes are schemata that are taken
too far, as they reduce and ignore a person's individuality and the
diversity present within a larger group of people. Stereotypes can be
based on cultural identities, physical appearance, behavior, speech,
beliefs, and values, among other things, and are often caused by a lack
of information about the target person or group. Stereotypes can be
positive, negative, or neutral, but all run the risk of lowering the
quality of our communication.
While the negative effects of
stereotypes are pretty straightforward in that they devalue people and
prevent us from adapting and revising our schemata, positive stereotypes
also have negative consequences. For example, the "model minority"
stereotype has been applied to some Asian cultures in the United States.
Seemingly positive stereotypes of Asian Americans as hardworking,
intelligent, and willing to adapt to "mainstream" culture are not always
received as positive and can lead some people within these communities
to feel objectified, ignored, or overlooked.
Stereotypes can also
lead to double standards that point to larger cultural and social
inequalities. There are many more words to describe a sexually active
female than a male, and the words used for females are
disproportionately negative, while those used for males are more
positive. Since stereotypes are generally based on a lack of
information, we must take it upon ourselves to gain exposure to new
kinds of information and people, which will likely require us to get out
of our comfort zones. When we do meet people, we should base the
impressions we make on describable behavior rather than inferred or
secondhand information. When stereotypes negatively influence our
overall feelings and attitudes about a person or group, prejudiced
thinking results.
Prejudice surrounding the disease we now know as AIDS delayed government investment in researching its causes and developing treatments.
Prejudice is negative feelings or attitudes toward people based on their identity or identities. Prejudice can have individual or widespread negative effects. At the individual level, a hiring manager may not hire a young man with a physical disability (even though that would be illegal if it were the only reason), which negatively affects that one man. However, if pervasive cultural thinking that people with physical disabilities are mentally deficient leads hiring managers all over the country to make similar decisions, then the prejudice has become a social injustice. In another example, when the disease we know today as AIDS started killing large numbers of people in the early 1980s, response by some health and government officials was influenced by prejudice. Since the disease was primarily affecting gay men, Haitian immigrants, and drug users, the disease was prejudged to be a disease that affected only "deviants" and therefore didn't get the same level of attention it would have otherwise. It took many years, investment of much money, and education campaigns to help people realize that HIV and AIDS do not prejudge based on race or sexual orientation and can affect any human.
Engage in Self-Reflection
A
good way to improve your perceptions and increase your communication
competence in general is to engage in self-reflection. If a
communication encounter doesn't go well and you want to know why, your
self-reflection will be much more useful if you are aware of and can
recount your thoughts and actions.
Self-reflection can also help
us increase our cultural awareness. Our thought process regarding
culture is often "other focused," meaning that the culture of the other
person or group is what stands out in our perception. However, the old
adage "know thyself" is appropriate, as we become more aware of our own
culture by better understanding other cultures and perspectives.
Developing cultural self-awareness often requires us to get out of our
comfort zones. Listening to people who are different from us is a key
component of developing self-knowledge. This may be uncomfortable,
because our taken-for-granted or deeply held beliefs and values may
become less certain when we see the multiple perspectives that exist.
We
can also become more aware of how our self-concepts influence how we
perceive others. We often hold other people to the standards we hold for
ourselves or assume that their self-concept should be consistent with
our own. For example, if you consider yourself a neat person and think
that sloppiness in your personal appearance would show that you are
unmotivated, rude, and lazy, then you are likely to think the same of a
person you judge to have a sloppy appearance. So asking questions like
"Is my impression based on how this person wants to be, or how I think
this person should want to be?" can lead to enlightening moments of
self-reflection. Asking questions in general about the perceptions you
are making is an integral part of perception checking, which we will
discuss next.
Checking Perception
Perception checking is a
strategy to help us monitor our reactions to and perceptions about
people and communication. There are some internal and external
strategies we can use to engage in perception checking. In terms of
internal strategies, review the various influences on perception that we
have learned about in this chapter and always be willing to ask
yourself, "What is influencing the perceptions I am making right now?"
Even being aware of what influences are acting on our perceptions makes
us more aware of what is happening in the perception process. In terms
of external strategies, we can use other people to help verify our
perceptions.
The cautionary adage "Things aren't always as they
appear" is useful when evaluating your own perceptions. Sometimes it's a
good idea to bounce your thoughts off someone, especially if the
perceptions relate to some high-stakes situation. But not all situations
allow us the chance to verify our perceptions. Preventable crimes have
been committed because people who saw something suspicious didn't report
it even though they had a bad feeling about it. Of course, we have to
walk a line between being reactionary and being too cautious, which is
difficult to manage. We all know that we are ethically and sometimes
legally required to report someone to the police who is harming himself
or herself or others, but sometimes the circumstances are much more
uncertain.
The Tony Award–winning play Doubt: A Parable and the
Academy Award–winning movie based on it deal with the interplay of
perception, doubt, and certainty. In the story, which is set in a Bronx,
New York, Catholic school in 1964, a young priest with new ideas comes
into the school, which is run by a traditional nun who, like many, is
not fond of change. The older nun begins a campaign to get the young
priest out of her school after becoming convinced that he has had an
inappropriate relationship with one of the male students. No conclusive
evidence is offered during the course of the story, and the audience is
left, as are the characters in the story, to determine for themselves
whether or not the priest is "guilty". The younger priest doesn't fit
into the nun's schema of how a priest should look and act. He has longer
fingernails than other priests, he listens to secular music, and he
takes three sugars in his tea. A series of perceptions like this lead
the nun to certainty of the priest's guilt, despite a lack of concrete
evidence. Although this is a fictional example, it mirrors many
high-profile cases of abuse that have been in the news in recent years.
Hopefully we will not find ourselves in such an uncertain and dire
position, but in these extreme cases and more mundane daily
interactions, perception checking can be useful.
"Getting Competent"
Perception Checking
Perception
checking helps us slow down perception and communication processes and
allows us to have more control over both. Perception checking involves
being able to describe what is happening in a given situation, provide
multiple interpretations of events or behaviors, and ask yourself and
others questions for clarification. Some of this process happens inside
our heads, and some happens through interaction. Let's take an
interpersonal conflict as an example.
Stefano and Patrick are
roommates. Stefano is in the living room playing a video game when he
sees Patrick walk through the room with his suitcase and walk out the
front door. Since Patrick didn't say or wave good-bye, Stefano has to
make sense of this encounter, and perception checking can help him do
that. First, he needs to try to describe (not evaluate yet) what just
happened. This can be done by asking yourself, "What is going on?" In
this case, Patrick left without speaking or waving good-bye. Next,
Stefano needs to think of some possible interpretations of what just
happened. One interpretation could be that Patrick is mad about
something (at him or someone else). Another could be that he was in a
hurry and simply forgot, or that he didn't want to interrupt the video
game. In this step of perception checking, it is good to be aware of the
attributions you are making. You might try to determine if you are
overattributing internal or external causes. Lastly, you will want to
verify and clarify. So Stefano might ask a mutual friend if she knows
what might be bothering Patrick or going on in his life that made him
leave so suddenly. Or he may also just want to call, text, or speak to
Patrick. During this step, it's important to be aware of punctuation.
Even though Stefano has already been thinking about this incident, and
is experiencing some conflict, Patrick may have no idea that his actions
caused Stefano to worry. If Stefano texts and asks why he's mad (which
wouldn't be a good idea because it's an assumption) Patrick may become
defensive, which could escalate the conflict. Stefano could just
describe the behavior (without judging Patrick) and ask for
clarification by saying, "When you left today you didn't say bye or let
me know where you were going. I just wanted to check to see if things
are OK".
The steps of perception checking as described in the previous scenario are as follows:
- Step 1: Describe the behavior or situation without evaluating or judging it.
- Step 2: Think of some possible interpretations of the behavior, being aware of attributions and other influences on the perception process.
- Step 3: Verify what happened and ask for clarification from the other person's perspective. Be aware of punctuation, since the other person likely experienced the event differently than you.
- Getting integrated: Give an example of how perception checking might be useful to you in academic, professional, personal, and civic contexts.
- Which step of perception checking do you think is the most challenging and why?
Key Takeaways
- We can improve self-perception by avoiding reliance on rigid schemata, thinking critically about socializing institutions, intervening in self-fulfilling prophecies, finding supportive interpersonal networks, and becoming aware of cycles of thinking that distort our self-perception.
- We can improve our perceptions of others by developing empathetic listening skills, becoming aware of stereotypes and prejudice, and engaging in self-reflection.
- Perception checking is a strategy that allows us to monitor our perceptions of and reactions to others and communication.
Exercises
- Which barrier(s) to self-perception do you think present the most challenge to you and why? What can you do to start to overcome these barriers?
- Which barrier(s) to perceiving others do you think present the most challenge to you and why? What can you do to start to overcome these barriers?
- Recount a recent communication encounter in which perception checking may have led to a more positive result. What could you have done differently?