Common Faults of Listening:
Research studies shows that our listening
efficiency is no better than 25-30 per cent. This clearly means that the
considerable information is lost in the listening process.
Here
are some reasons:
1. Prejudice against the speaker:
It
may happen that the listener has some conflicts in his mind about the speaker.
Because of this reason a listener don’t listen to the speaker properly.
2. Rehearsing:
An
attention of listener is on the designing his own next comment. He looks
interested but his mind is preparing his comment and he misses some important
points. He is thinking about what to say next.
Some people rehearse whole chain of responses: I’ll say, and then he’ll
say, and so on.
3. Judging negatively:
Labeling
people can be extremely limiting. If you prejudge somebody as incompetent or
uninformed, you don’t pay much attention to what that person says. A basic rule
of listening is that judgments should only be made after you have heard and
evaluated the content of the message.
4. Advising:
People
do not hear more than a few sentences before they searching for the right
advice. However, while they are coming up with suggestions and convincing someone
to just try it; they may miss what is most important.
5. Sparring:
This
block most of the time happens because of arguing and debating with people who
will never feel heard because the listener is too quick to disagree. In fact
the main focus of listener is finding things to disagree with.
6. Being right:
Being
right suggests that the listener will go to great lengths to avoid being wrong
(twist the facts,, start shouting, make excuses or call up past sins). It represents the attitude of listener that,
‘you can’t listen to criticism, you can’t be corrected, and you can’t take
suggestions to change.
7. Derailing:
This
listen blocks involves suddenly changing the subject. You derail the train of
conversation when you get uncomfortable or bored with the topic. Another way of
derailing is to joking.
8. Placating:
This
block suggests that the listener wants to present himself as the nice person so
he agrees with everything what the speaker says by saying,
‘Right,
absolutely, I know, of course you are, incredible, really?’
9. Dreaming:
When
a listener dream, he pretends to listen, but actually the listener has tune the
speaker out and he is lost in himself. When as a listener we don’t think that
the subject is interesting, we turn the channel to a more entertaining subject.
10. Thinking speed:
Most
of the times people speak between 60-180 words per minute and the capacity to
think is 500-800 words per minute. This difference leaves us with the great
deal of mental spare time. While it is possible to use this time to explore the
speaker’s ideas, but we most often let our mind wander to other matters.
11. Premature evaluation:
It
often happens that we interrupt the speakers before they complete their
thoughts or finish their ideas sentence or state their conclusion. Sometime
because of this, the conclusion of listener is totally different with what the
speaker intended.
12. Semantic stereotypes:
The
way certain kinds of people bother us, so does certain words. When those words
are repeated time and again, they cause annoyance in the mind and effective
listening is impaired.
13. Delivery:
A
monotonous delivery of speaker can put listeners to sleep or cause them to lose
interest.
14. External distractions:
The
entire physical environment affects the listening. Among the negative factors
are noisy fans, poor and glaring lights, distracting background music,
overheated or cold rooms and conversation going on nearby.
Reference book:
- Business Communication. Sathya Swaroop Debasish & Bhagaban Das. PHI Learning Private Limited. New Delhi.
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