How Much We Use Technology in a Day to Communicate?

How Much We Use Technology in A Day to Communicate?

Robin Stevenson

COM 200 Interpersonal Communication

Instructor's Name Lisa Teltler

September 5,2016

HOW MUCH WE USE TECHNOLOGY TO COMMUNICATE?

        Every day in some type of way we communicate with one another in some way. Communication is a vital tool for human beings to seek out self-actualization. Human beings are social butterflies. When we define communication it's defined as a “process where two individuals strive to generate a memory that’s shared using verbal or non-verbal messages in a variety of contexts. (Bevan & Sole 2014) Communication is important to society and civilization they depend on it. The willingness to talk opens doors for success. As Bevan states, communication can be verbal or non-verbal messages, but when we communicate messages they can be easily misunderstood when non-verbal gestures transfer the message reverses what we are trying to say. In my next few paragraphs I am going to survey my own computer-mediated-communication route during a 24-hour period of time.

        If we all took the time to investigate how often we communicate on our phones and computers, we might come to a conclusion it's more often than we think. During my survey I have come to the conclusion that most of my interaction was done on the computer by email and used mostly formal language and expressed myself more serious in thought. (Bevan & Sole 2014 section 4.1 para 2) The functions of my communication expressed confirming messages which means that I mainly focused on the situation. For example, the interaction between my doctor’s office and I when I received an email stating how important it was for me to contact my doctor’s office expressed that they were concerned about lab work I mainly focused on this situation and contacted the doctor’s office right away. ‘. Expressed Confirming and disconfirming messages “(Bevan & Sole section 4.1) During one interaction with friends on Facebook for two hours I used more informal language because I used more slang in one post I posted stated Bob your uncle mission achieved which means “there you have it” and my friends couldn’t understand my message. Expressed disconfirming message (Bevan &Sole 2014)

        Why does using Computer- mediated -communication matter because we can use devices that allow both verbal and non-verbal messages to be decoded or encoded. (Bevan &Sole 2014 section 4.4) Using mediated channels to communicate verbal messages either by text messages or email can provide you with time to construct your messages can be helpful especially in formal interactions. (Bevan & Sole 2014 section 4.4 fourth paragraph)

        We should pay special attention to our CMC because it's important to analyze your own communications and observe how others communicate and learn to adjust your skills in different contexts. However, research shows that another important skill is the ability to adjust language, and make appropriate language choices, and accurately interpret messages. (Halliday and Webster 2004). I believe that most of the day I used verbal communication through emails and text messages because it allowed me more time to construct what I wanted to say.

        I believe that the function of language that most of my interactions illustrates Expressed confirming and disconfirming messages because the senders and me as the receiver engaged in dialogue that expressed concern in a respectful way. (Bevan &Sole 2014 section 4.3) When I had an interaction with a friend by text message my friend engaged in a disconfirming message by expressing that what we were discussing wasn’t important to her.

        Advice that I found important or useful from Bevan and Sole to help improve my computer -mediated communications skills is to be sure that I am aware of the signals that I am sending and how they can be interpreted because then you are able to adjust your behaviors for different interactions. Over time this higher level of attention to both your verbal and nonverbal communication will help increase your overall interpersonal communication competency.

So whether we communicate verbally or nonverbally communication serves a wide range of needs in our lives and language is a primary code that we use to communicate with one another. As the option to communicate via mediated channels are continuously emerging providing us with more options to interact with one another. We communicate more than we think through mediated channel whether it be through email, text message or even Facebook. Make each interaction count.

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