Active listening is an intent to "listen for meaning".

Active Listening is not just an automatic response to sounds. It requires the listeners to understand, interpret, and evaluate what they heard. Today, the ability to listen is an important skill in interpersonal communication. It improves personal relationship through reducing conflicts, strengthening cooperation, as well as fostering understanding.

When interacting, people often are not listening attentively to one another. They may be distracted, thinking about other things, or thinking about what they are going to say next, (the latter case is particularly true in conflict situations or disagreements).

Active listening is a structured way of listening and responding to others. It focuses attention on the speaker. Suspending one’s own frame of reference and suspending judgment are important in order to fully attend to the speaker.

Contents 1 Tactics 2 Use 3 Barriers to Active Listening 4 Overcoming Listening Barriers 5 See also 6 References 7 External links

[edit] Tactics

It is important to observe the other person's behavior and body language. Having the ability to interpret a person's body language allows the listener to develop a more accurate understanding of the speaker's words.^[1] Having heard, the listener may then paraphrase the speaker’s words. It is important to note that the listener is not necessarily agreeing with the speaker—simply stating what was said. In emotionally charged communications, the listener may listen for feelings. Thus, rather than merely repeating what the speaker has said, the active listener might describe the underlying emotion (“you seem to feel angry” or “you seem to feel frustrated, is that because…?”).

Individuals in conflict often contradict one another. This has the effect of denying the validity of the other person’s position. Either party may react defensively, and they may lash out or withdraw. On the other hand, if one finds that the other party understands, an atmosphere of cooperation can be created. This increases the possibility of collaborating and resolving the conflict.

In the book Leader Effectiveness Training, Thomas Gordon states "Active listening is certainly not complex. Listeners need only restate, in their own language, their impression of the expression of the sender. ... Still, learning to do Active Listening well is a rather difficult task..."^[2]

[edit] Use

Active listening is used in a wide variety of situations, including public interest advocacy, community organizing, tutoring,^[3] medical workers talking to patients,^[4] HIV counseling,^[5] helping suicidal persons,^[6] management,^[7] counseling and journalistic settings. In groups it may aid in reaching consensus. It may also be used in casual conversation to build understanding, though this can be interpreted as condescending.

The benefits of active listening include getting people to open up, avoiding misunderstandings, resolving conflict and building trust. In a medical context, benefits may include increased patient satisfaction,^[4] improving cross-cultural communication,^[8] improved outcomes,^[4] or decreased litigation^[9].

Active listening can be measured by the Active Listening Observation Scale.^[10]

[edit] Barriers to Active Listening

All elements of communication, including listening, may be affected by a barrier(s) that can impede the flow of conversation between individuals. Some of these barriers include distractions, trigger words, vocabulary, and limited attention span to name a few^[11].

There are many different types of listening barriers. they could be psychological and physical. Emotions can influence the effectiveness of listening. Noise and visual distraction are two other common physical barriers as well. Moreover, cultural differences often obstruct listening process. For instance, the speaker's accents, vocabulary, and the misunderstanding due to the difference of culture background.

In fact, other than the barriers listed above, the listener's personal interpretation also plays an important role. Frequently, the attitude, individual bias, and prejudice of the listener will lead to an ineffective communication.

[edit] Overcoming Listening Barriers

To improve interpersonal communication through listening, one should put down personal emotions aside during the conversation, ask questions and paraphrase back to the speaker in order to clarify understanding, and also try to overcome all types of environment distractions. Furthermore, the listener should considers the speaker's background, both cultural and personal, for benefiting as much as possible from the communication process. Also, eye contact and appropriate body languages would help.

[edit] See also

• Informational listening
• Reflective listening

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Listening is powerful medicine, National Public Radio, February 2009
• Active Listening International Online Training Program On Intractable Conflict: Conflict Research Consortium, University of Colorado, USA
• Empathic listening skills How to listen so others will feel heard, or listening first aid (University of California). Download a one hour seminar on empathic listening and attending skills.
• Exercise 4 — Active Listening, Center for Rural Studies, University of Vermont, Montpelier
• What is active listening?
• Active listening: A communication tool
• Homepage of the International Listening Association The professional organization whose members are dedicated to learning more about the impact that listening has on all human activity
• Better communication through better listening Eight barriers to effective listening
• [http://www.Listening-skills.com Expert guide to Active Listening and Listening skills