Interpersonal Communication

Interpersonal Communication 7th Grade Health

Standard 4: Interpersonal Communication • Effective communication enhances personal, family, and community health. • This standard focuses on how responsible individuals use verbal and nonverbal skills to develop and maintain healthy personal relationships. • The ability to organize and convey information and feelings is the basis for strengthening interpersonal interactions and reducing or avoiding conflict.

Message Strategies • Clear, organized ideas or beliefs • Use of “I” messages • Tone • Body Language

Clear, organized ideas • Might need advanced planning • If there are too many thoughts, you will lose the listener • Ideas are told in sequential order • Not jumping from idea to idea • Easy to follow

Use of “I” messages • Used with the intent to be assertive without putting the listener on the defensive • Used to take ownership for one's feelings rather than implying that they are caused by another person • Example • “I really am getting backed up on my work since I don't have presentation outline yet," rather than: "you didn't finish the presentation outline on time!“

I- Message construction I feel... (Insert feeling word) when... (tell what caused the feeling). I would like... (tell what you want to happen instead).

Tone • Emotions • Respectful vs. aggressive and confrontational • It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it

Body Language • Research has suggested that more than 85 percent of all meaning is derived from nonverbal behavior. • Body language may provide clues as to the attitude or state of mind of a person • Eye contact • Body position- open or closed • Relaxed appearance

Barriers to Communication • External barriers • Environmental distractions (sound) • Visual distractions (sight) • Internal barriers • Not paying attention • Not listening • Boredom • Lack of interest

ACTIVE listening • Stop thinking about your own thoughts and force yourself to listen to what the speaker is saying. • These techniques will help you focus: • Clarifying • Acknowledging • Summarizing • Framing

Clarifying Ask for clarification to ensure you understood the message. • Clarify by asking specific questions • Restating, • paraphrasing, or • “mirroring” • Examples • “Do I understand you correctly that…” • “Did you say…” • “What I think I’m hearing you say is…”

Acknowledging • Let the speaker know you have understood and heard the message and appreciate the speaker’s point of view. • You don’t have to agree with the speaker. • Your comment can be neutral and noncommittal. • Examples: • “I understand that you believe…” • “I appreciate the fact that you are…” • “I understand that you feel…”

Summarizing • Similar to restating • A way to review progress in the conversation • Touch on the main ideas or conclusions, not all the individual points you discussed • Restate the main ideas very briefly • Examples • “OK, so we agreed that…” • “We’ve agreed that I will…”

Framing • Use framing to see if the speaker is open to hearing your ideas and to draw suggested solutions from the speaker. • It allows you to present information in a neutral way, find areas of agreement that you can focus on, and shape the conversation.

Practice active listening • With a partner, take turns talking about your favorite thing you did over the summer. • Vacations • Classes taken • Activities • Sporting events • Museums • Each partner will get two minutes to discuss their summer while the other partner practices active listening. After two minutes, we’ll switch.

Skill Check Practice

Your friend has a problem and is very upset. He is very emotional when telling you about his problem. The best way to communicate in this situation is to: • Listen to everything your friend has to say • Interrupt your friend with some ideas • Tell your friend about your problems • Tell your friend how to solve the problem

To improve communication when a friend is talking, a person should do all of the following EXCEPT: • Give verbal or non-verbal signs that you are listening • Ask questions to understand what is said • Try to understand how your friend is feeling • Look behind your friend to see if anything else is happening

The best way to communicate positive body language when someone else is talking is to: • Look down at the ground • Roll your eyes • Look the person in the eye • Look to the side and face your shoulder to the person

The best way to communicate positive body language when someone else is talking is to: Look down at the ground Roll your eyes Look the person in the eye Look to the side and face your shoulder to the person

The purpose of “I” messages is to: • Look the listener in the eye while you’re talking • Be assertive without making the listener defensive • Imply that your feelings are caused by another person • Talk about yourself as much as possible

Refusal skills • Set of skills designed to help people avoid participating in high-risk behaviors • Discourage crime, drug use, violence, and/or sexual activity • Help to resist peer pressure while maintaining self-respect

Refusal skills • Clear “no” statements • Walk away • Provide a reason • Delay, change the subject • Repeat refusal • Provide an excuse • Put it off

Practice Refusal Skills • With a partner, write up a dialogue using a health-related situation. • A person is presented with a health-related problem and they need to refuse. • Give the background of the problem, then include a dialogue of how the person can refuse to participate in the health-related risk.

Interpersonal Communication