Role of Perception in Communication

Before I say anything, I would like you to watch this video.

We know that communication is an integral part of our life. Communication is critical to our success both in terms of growth in professional fields and happiness in personal life. We keep communicating by talking or by writing to our friends, family members or professional colleagues. Has anyone ever asked you the question, “What do you mean?” or “What do you want me to do?” Sometimes you must have found yourself saying, “But I mean to say . . .”, or someone who is talking to you says, “No, no, what I wanted to say . . .”. Have you ever found yourself talking to your superior about your subordinate, “Sir, I told him several times, but I don’t know why he does not listen” or “I don’t know why he does not do it”? All these questions and statements point out only one thing: “Communication is not as easy as we think it is.” This is because, most of the times our listeners create barriers which prevent us from communicating effectively. Nevertheless, will you believe that we ourselves create barriers for ourselves? Yes, it is funny but true, most of the time we create barriers for ourselves.

For example, if the receiver has preconceived notions about you, it will become a barrier to your communication. An example for this would be: if your senior has an opinion about you that you are a casual person or your team members have a notion that you are not a person whom they can trust or who trusts them. In both the cases your spoken words alone will not help you to communicate your message until they change their notion about you. The notion acts as a barrier.

Perception is the psychological process of selecting, organizing and interpreting stimuli from the environment. Perceptions are individual and vary from person to person. Apart from being responsible for our attitudes, our perception also decides our effectiveness while putting across our message. Though all the steps in the process of communication are important, the most important step is when a receiver receives and interprets your message. This is the stage where the message may be understood or misunderstood, depending upon the perception of the receiver.

We develop perceptions based on their past experiences. The decisions made in the past, whether consciously or unconsciously, get registered in our memory. These decisions are responsible for our perceptions. These perceptions create most of our beliefs. It is the initial experience with others – be it with our senior or subordinate, husband or wife, daughter-in-law or mother-in-law – that determines our perception about them. If these experiences are good, we tend to believe everything as positive about others and feel happy. In such a case even if the other person says or does something wrong, it is overlooked. On the contrary if our initial experiences give rise to sour feeling about each other, it leads to the development of perceptions that are negative. These negative perceptions either compel the individual to stop communicating with the other person or camouflage his emotions about him. Whatever the other person may say or do is taken as negative and results in the widening of the gulf between them... 

For more about role of perception in communication, you may like to refer to my book, 'Why My Horse Doesn't Listen - Learn to communicate effectively.