BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES - Universitatea de Medicină şi Farmacie

Barriers and Cleavages in Communication
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Chapter 6
A barrier to communication is something that keeps
meanings from meeting. Meaning barriers exist between all
people, making communication much more difficult than
most people seem to realize. It is false to assume that if one
can talk he can communicate. Because so much of our
education misleads people into thinking that communication
is easier than it is, they become discouraged and give up
when they run into difficulty. Because they do not understand
the nature of the problem, they do not know what to do. The
wonder is not that communicating is as difficult as it is, but
that it occurs as much as it does."
6.1 Communication Distorting Factors
Reuel Howe, theologian and educator
Every time people inject voluntary or involuntary barriers into
their communication. These barriers can exist in any of the three
components of communication (verbal, paraverbal, and nonverbal). Any
one of the components of the communication model (sender, message,
receiver, context, code, channel etc) can become a barrier to
communication. For this reason, it is worthwhile to describe some of the
common responses that will, inevitably, have a negative effect on
communications. The most common of them are listed and analyzed
below.
a. Barrier of communication on the level of message Muddled
messages
Muddled messages are a barrier to communication because the
sender leaves the receiver unclear about the intent of the sender. Contrast
these two messages: "Please be here about 7:00 tomorrow morning."
"Please be here at 7:00 tomorrow morning." The one word difference
makes the first message muddled and the second message clear. Muddled
messages have many causes. The sender may be confused in his or her
thinking. The message may be little more than a vague idea. The problem
may be semantics, e.g., note this muddled newspaper ad: "Dog for sale.