listening with your eyes

"Take time to listen to what is said without words."

-- Lao Tzu, The Hua Hu Ching

Indeed, for in today's world, nonverbal communication is probably the single most powerful form of communication. More than voice or even words, nonverbal communication cues us in to what is on another person’s mind. The best communicators have to be sensitive to the power of the emotions and thoughts communicated nonverbally.

During this week's COM101 lectures, we have learnt that nonverbal communication ranges from facial expression to body language. Gestures, signs, and use of space are also important in nonverbal communication as multicultural differences in body language, facial expression, use of space, and especially, gestures, are enormous and enormously open to misinterpretation.

For instance, have you ever seen how a male international student from India attempts at striking a conversation with perhaps one of your female lecturers at school? Once, I witnessed a nonverbal exchange occurring in a classroom back during the time when I was a student at Temasek Polytechnic, School of Engineering. I vaguely recall a foreign Indian pupil trying his best to communicate his problem to a female tutor. However, as he unconsciously narrowed the distance between himself and the female teacher while gesticulating constantly to punctuate his communication (where the work of kinesics - the study of body movement comes into play), she kept backing away to maintain her level of spacial comfort.

The lecturer's body language including the tiniest facial expressions and movement gave her true thoughts and feelings away. As such, one could easily come to the conclusion that she was obviously uncomfortable being in close proximity to the student despite the gesture being unintentional. There was a need for her to create boundaries sort of like a portable territory. Simply put, she felt her personal space was being invaded.

Another thing I would like to point out is that one of the possible reasons why the Indian student moved in to close the space between the female lecturer and himself could be due to the fact that India is so overcrowded with people that the citizens there are very used to living and interacting in such close vicinity to each other. My guess is that they probably couldn't help themselves as it is their nature of interaction.

Let us now look into another simple illustration of non-verbal interaction, shall we?

My my, that was peculiarly intense, wasn't it? The heated exchange of restful gazes, the ferocity of emotions, the heightening and unnerving passion, all of which were simply signals encoded into wordless messages - messages that was understood as clearly as words - travelling through an invisible channel between both communicators and receivers nonverbally. What we have just observed in the short clip shown above is an example of both oculesics and possibly even affect displays in action, which refers to the use of the eyes and impetus for observable expression of emotion in a communication setting respectively. Isn't it amazing how neither Tom Cruise nor Thandie Newton had the need to say anything at all?

So we see here how potently effective and impactful nonverbal communication really is. This is because their messages are likely to be more genuine. Nonverbal behaviors cannot be controlled as easily as spoken words. It is very much like a silent infiltrator, having broad influence over our social environment. We are able to infer emotion without the use of words and influence other's perception of our competence, power and vulnerability. It also plays a role in the perception of the actual message we are trying to convey.

To sum it all up, nonverbal communication affects all of our lives in a myriad of ways from childhood throughout adulthood, as long as we intend to communicate with others.