5.3: Listening Styles and Types
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If listening were easy and if all people went about it in the same way, teaching listening would be much easier. One reason for the complexity of teaching listening is that people have different ways of listening. The Greek philosopher Aristotle, as long ago as 325 BC, recognized that listeners in his audience were varied in listening styles. Part of the potential for misunderstanding is the difference in these listening styles. As you read through these styles, try to identify your own preferred style.
Styles of Listening
A listening style is a manner or way in which an individual attends to messages. In an article in the International Journal of Listening, authors Watson, Barker, and Weaver identified four listening styles: people, action, content, and time.
People
Action
Content
Time
Listening Types
Just as there are different listening styles, there is more than one type--or purpose--of listening. Different situations may require us to use different strategies, depending on whether we are engaged in discriminative, informational, critical, or empathetic listening.
Discriminative Listening
Discriminative listening usually occurs at the receiving stage of listening and is used to monitor and focus on particular sounds. For example, we may focus our listening on a dark part of the yard while walking the dog at night to determine if the noise we just heard presents us with any danger. Or we may listen for a particular paralanguage cue to let us know our conversational partner received our message. In the absence of hearing impairment, we have an innate and physiological ability to engage in discriminative listening. Although this is the most basic form of listening, it provides the foundation on which more intentional listening skills are built. This type of listening can be refined and honed. Think of how musicians, singers, and mechanics exercise specialized discriminative listening to isolate specific sounds and how parents train themselves to listen to sounds from their baby's room that might indicate the baby is in distress.
Informational Listening
Informational listening is listening to understand and remember information. This type of listening is common in contexts ranging from a student listening to an instructor to an out-of-town visitor listening to directions to the nearest gas station. We also use informational listening when we listen to news reports, voice mail, and briefings at work. Since retention and recall are important components of informational listening, good concentration and memory skills are key. These also happen to be skills that many college students struggle with, at least in the first years of college, but will be expected to have mastered once they are in the workplace. Most college professors provide detailed instructions and handouts with assignments so students can review them as needed, but many supervisors and managers will expect employees to take the initiative to remember or record important information. Additionally, many bosses are not as open to questions or requests to repeat themselves as professors are.
Critical Listening
Critical listening is listening to analyze or evaluate the quality or accuracy of a message. You can see judges employ critical listening on talent competition shows like Rupaul’s Drag Race, America’s Got Talent, and The Voice. In college, you may be expected to use critical listening to evaluate a classmate's speech or to analyze and react to comments made in group discussions. In your personal life, you engage in critical listening when you listen to political candidates asking for your vote. Here are some helpful guidelines for critical listening:
- Listen to the entire message before making a judgment. Listen to the entire message. Withhold judgment or decision-making until the speaker is finished. Sometimes speakers will surprise you.
- Listen for evidence. Does the communicator present research that reinforces their message, such as references to research or studies conducted by credible authors and organizations, or does the message consist solely of the speaker's unsupported statements and opinions? Sociologist and former United States Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan is credited with saying, “Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but they are not entitled to their own facts.” An important part of critical listening is learning to separate unsubstantiated opinions from facts. This is not to say that speakers should not express their opinions. Many of the greatest speeches in history include personal opinions. Consider, for example, Martin Luther King Jr.’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech, in which he expressed his wish for the future of American society. Critical listeners may agree or disagree with a speaker’s opinions, but the point is that they know when a message they are hearing is based on opinion and when it is factual.
- Analyze the speaker's credibility, including possible hidden agendas. Speaker credibility refers to the listeners' judgment about whether the communicator is trustworthy and qualified to speak about the topic. Consider whether the speaker has educational background or experience on the topic. Do the speaker's prior actions and reputation convince you the speaker can be trusted? Other than the speaker's qualifications and trustworthiness, another important consideration is whether the speaker has a hidden agenda, a motive that is not shared with listeners. For example, assume you are watching a television program that has promised to inform the audience about the properties of Vitamin D. The program features a number of doctors with impressive credentials. At first, you are convinced that these doctors are trustworthy and the information they are presenting is solid and unbiased. However, several minutes into the broadcast, a commercial and then the doctors themselves urge viewers to buy a particular brand of Vitamin D--one developed by the doctors on the program. At this point, a good critical listener will realize the program, although it at first appeared to be informative, is actually persuasive and that the supposedly unbiased doctors have a hidden agenda. This calls into question the claims made in the program.
- Consider the communicator's nonverbal communication, not just their words. Sometimes a communicator's body language or paralanguage will add important clues to the message itself. Although we want to be fair about judging unfairly, it is still important to consider how the speaker presents the message.
As students and as constant consumers of social and mass media, we need to use critical listening to assess the intent of the message and to evaluate the message itselfal urges viewers to buy a particular brand of Vitamin D--one developed by the doctors themselves. At this point, a good critical listener will realize the program, although it at first appeared to be informative, is actually persuasive in nature. This should call into question the credibility of the doctors and the claims made in the program.
You can see judges employ critical listening on talent competition shows like Rupaul’s Drag Race, America’s Got Talent, and The Voice. In college, you may be expected to use critical listening to evaluate a classmate's speech or analyze and react to comments made in group discussions.
Empathetic Listening
Empathetic listening is listening to understand and experience what a speaker feels and provide emotional support. This is a difficult type of listening for many since it's often easier to tell our own story or to give advice than to try to understand and show support for what the communicator has experienced. In order to be empathetic listeners, people should strive to be open-minded, patient, and genuine. We should keep in mind that sometimes others just need to be heard and our feedback isn’t actually desired. Empathetic listening is important for understanding others and building strong interpersonal relationships.
Key Takeaways
- Discriminative listening is the most basic form of listening, used to distinguish between and focus on specific sounds. Informational listening is when we seek to comprehend and retain information. Through critical listening, we analyze and evaluate messages at various levels. We use empathetic listening to try to understand or experience what a speaker is feeling and provide emotional support.