We all need to communicate. But sometimes it is so hard to build a positive, constructive dialogue. Most of us have never been taught this on purpose, so here I shall try to give a little information about what is needed for you to come away from a conversation feeling that you managed to get across what mattered to you, and that you were heard and understood correctly. A little hard going, then, but important!
What does a constructive dialogue consist of?
Any dialogue usually involves a speaker, a listener and a (verbal or non-verbal) message, which is encoded by the sender and decoded by the receiver. It also includes feedback, the receiver's response to the message.
Encoding is the speaker's job: he turns his thoughts into messages that can be transmitted. The listener interprets what he hears as a message - both the verbal and the non-verbal part. Although in theory this looks simple, as you can imagine a great deal happens in between, and no message is ever decoded without distortion.
To put it more simply: very often we encipher what we want to get across to the person listening, and the person listening tries to decipher it and understand.
The way we decipher a message often does not coincide with objective reality. We all have our own filters and explanatory styles, which create the picture of the world as we see it.
What makes the process of communication more complicated still is the fact that a speaker's message is hardly ever merely factual information.
"We speak not only to tell other people what we think, but to tell ourselves what we think. Speech is a part of thought" Oliver Sacks
Friedemann Schulz von Thun's communication model
In his four-sides model of communication, Friedemann Schulz von Thun (1981) points out that every message has four aspects:
- Factual information: what I am informing about (data, facts, statements);
- Self-revelation: what I reveal about myself (information about the speaker);
- Relationship: what I think about you (information about how the two of us get along);
- Appeal: what I want to get you to do (an attempt to influence the listener).
A speaker practically never puts equal emphasis on each of the four sides, and the emphasis can be meant one way and understood another. For example:
The sugar tin is empty
said the wife, meaning that her husband should go and buy some sugar.
But the listener plays an enormous part in a dialogue too, and what he hears is often nothing like what we said or what we meant. So if the husband is in a bad mood, he may decode the sentence as:
You are so unreliable, you cannot manage anything, you cannot even buy sugar in time
thought the husband when he heard his wife's remark
And then he will certainly go on the defensive, and the two of you will get no dialogue at all.
A familiar situation? Unfortunately I see it very often in my work with couples. When people cannot come to an agreement, cannot build a
constructive dialogue
- their relationship begins to fall apart.
It is important to understand that what we hear may not coincide with what the other person was trying to get across.
In order to start communicating in a healthy way, we need to keep in mind the four components of a message:
- Factual information
- Self-revelation
- Relationship
- Appeal
So next time you feel that a dialogue is heading for a dead end or stirring up too much emotion, go back to the original statement and think about the four components (aspects) of the message. How else could you interpret it? Concentrate on the actual facts of the message and use questions to check whether you have understood what the other person was trying to tell you.
An example of constructive dialogue
One more dialogue by way of example: your partner is late and you are starting to get annoyed. To get a positive result out of the conversation, take the following four steps:
1. Observation
First, try to report your observations without attaching labels to them and without interpreting them. If your partner is late, then that is precisely what it is: he is late.
Your interpretation may be that the date (or you) does not mean much to him, or that something else was more important.
So instead of getting annoyed straight away at your own interpretation, you can simply say: "I see that you are late for our date". That is a factual observation without any judgement at all.
2. Feelings ≠ Thoughts
Second, it is very important that you speak about your feelings. An argument often grows out of hidden emotions. Make sure you understand your emotions and express them without blame.
In the case of your partner's late arrival you can say "I feel annoyed" or "it bothers me, because it makes me wonder whether you want to spend time with me".
3. You need a strategy
Third, you have to understand and express your needs. By doing so you give your partner the chance to decide whether he can and wants to meet them. For example, you can say: "I would like to be treated with respect, and I would like to feel that I matter to you".
4. Put the request clearly
The fourth step is to put your request clearly. What does your partner have to do for you to feel that your needs have been met? You could simply say: "and that is exactly why I am asking you not to be late".
Ready to practise?
At first sight it may look simple, only four steps. But once you start using them you will notice that it is not that simple. Constant practice, though, will certainly help you build a constructive dialogue and get communication going.
