Barriers to Communication

Part 2

Breaking free from roadblocks to communication. 12 ways to  identify the undesirable responses that cause break down in communication and barriers to be built.

1.  Criticizing

2.  Name Calling

3.  Diagnosing

4.  Praising Evaluatively

5.  Ordering

6.  Threatening

7.  Moralizing

8.  Excessive/Inappropriate Questioning

9.  Advising

10. Diverting

11.  Logical Argument

12.  Reassuring.

These twelve ways of responding are viewed as high-risk responses.  They are more likely to block conversation, thwart the other person’s problem-solving efficiency, and increase the emotional distance between people when one or the other communicator is experiencing stress.  Knowing this we as communicator should try to avoid all roadblocks when under any kind of stress.

Please do not misunderstand me, there are times when people use these responses with little or no obvious negative effect but that usually happens when stress is absent and trust has been built so be aware of miss using these barriers.

The twelve barriers can be divided into three major categories:

1. Judging/ criticizing, name-calling, diagnosing, praising evaluatively

2. Sending Solutions/ ordering, threatening, moralizing, excessive/inappropriate questioning

3.  Avoiding the other’s concerns/ diverting, logical argument, reassuring

Join me tomorrow as I share in detail the major categories of high risk responses.

Cris