10
IMPROVING
COMMUNICATION CLIMATES
CHAPTER TOPICS
• Communication Climate: The Key to Positive
Relationships
• Defensiveness: Causes and Remedies
• Saving Face
Looking Out/Looking In
Thirteenth Edition
Communication Climate
• Communication Climate
• Refers to the emotional tone of a relationship
• Levels of Message Confirmation
• Confirming Communication
• Describes messages that convey valuing
• Disconfirming Communication
• Describes messages that show a lack of regard
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Communication Climate
• Disconfirming Messages
• Impervious Responses
• Doesn’t acknowledge the other person’s message
• Interrupting
• Beginning to speak before the other person has
finished
• Irrelevant Responses
• A comment unrelated to what the other person has
just said
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Communication Climate
• Disconfirming Messages
• Tangential Responses
• The speaker uses the other’s remarks as a starting
point to shift the conversation
• Impersonal Responses
• Loaded with clichés and other statements that
never truly respond to the speaker
• Ambiguous Responses
• Contain messages with more than one meaning,
leaving the other party unsure
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Communication Climate
• Disconfirming Messages
• Incongruous Responses
• Contains two messages that seem to deny or
contradict each other.
• “Darling, I love you.”
• “I love you, too.” (Said in a monotone while watching TV)
• Disagreeing Messages
• Aggressiveness
• Complaining
• Argumentativeness
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Communication Climate
• Confirming Messages
• Recognition
• Recognize the other person
• Acknowledgement
• Includes asking questions, paraphrasing and
reflecting
• Endorsement
• The most obvious form of endorsement is agreeing
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Communication Climate
• How Communication Climates Develop
• When two people start to communicate, a
relational climate begins to develop
• Verbal and nonverbal communication can be
climate-shaping
• After a climate is formed, it can take on a life
of its own and become a self-perpetuating
spiral
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Communication Climate
• Spirals
• A reciprocating communication pattern in
which each person’s message reinforces the
others
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Communication Climate
• Spirals
• Escalatory conflict spirals
• A: (Mildly irritated) “Where were you? I thought we
agreed to meet here a half-hour ago.”
• B: (Defensively) “I’m sorry. I got hung up at the
library. I don’t have as much free time as you do.”
• A: “I wasn’t blaming you, so don’t get so touchy.”
• B: “Who’s getting touchy? I just made a simple
comment.”
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Communication Climate
• Spirals
• De-escalatory conflict spirals
• Rather than fighting, parties slowly lessen their
dependence on each other, withdraw and become
less invested in the relationship
• Rarely go on indefinitely
• Most relationships pass through cycles of
progression and regression
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Defensiveness: Causes and
Remedies
• Face-Threatening Acts
• Messages that seem to challenge the image
we want to project
• Defensiveness becomes the process of
protecting our presenting self, our face
• Preventing Defensiveness in Others
• Jack Gibb isolated six types of defensearousing communication and six contrasting
behaviors
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Defensiveness: Causes and
Remedies
• The Gibb Categories of Defensive and
Supportive Behaviors
Defensive Behaviors
Supportive Behaviors
1. Evaluation
1. Description
2. Control
2. Problem Orientation
3. Strategy
3. Spontaneity
4. Neutrality
4. Empathy
5. Superiority
5. Equality
6. Certainty
6. Provisionalism
Table 10.3 Page 350
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Defensiveness: Causes and
Remedies
• Gibb Categories
• Evaluation versus Description
• Evaluation: “You don’t know what you’re talking
about!”
• Description: “I don’t understand how you came up
with that idea.”
• Evaluation: “This place is a mess!”
• Description: “When you don’t clean up, I have to
either do it, or live with your mess. That’s why I’m
mad!”
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Defensiveness: Causes and
Remedies
• Gibb Categories
• Control versus Problem Orientation
• Controlling: “You need to stay off the phone for
the next two hours.”
• Problem orientation: “I’m expecting some
important calls. Can we work out a way to keep the
line open?”
• Controlling: “There’s only one way to handle this
problem.”
• Problem orientation: “Lets work out a solution we
can both live with.”
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Defensiveness: Causes and
Remedies
• Gibb Categories
• Strategy versus Spontaneity
• Strategy: What are you doing Friday after work?”
• Spontaneity: “I have a piano I need to move
Friday after work. Can you give me a hand?”
• Strategy: “Tom and Judy go out to dinner every
week.”
• Spontaneity: “I’d like to go out to dinner more
often.”
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Defensiveness: Causes and
Remedies
• Gibb Categories
• Neutrality versus Empathy
• Neutral: “That’s what happens when you don’t
plan properly.”
• Empathic: “Ouch – looks like this didn’t turn out
the way you expected.”
• Neutral: “Sometimes things just don’t work out.
That’s the way it goes.”
• Empathic: “I know you put a lot of time and effort
into this project.”
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Defensiveness: Causes and
Remedies
• Gibb Categories
• Superiority versus Equality
• Superior: “You don’t know what you’re talking
about.”
• Equal: “I see it a different way.”
• Superior: “No, that’s not the right way to do it!”
• Equal: “If you want, I can show you a way that has
worked for me.”
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Defensiveness: Causes and
Remedies
• Gibb Categories
• Certainty versus Provisionalism
• Certain: “That will never work!”
• Provisional: “I think you’ll run into problems with
that approach.”
• Certain: “You don’t know what you’re talking
about!”
• Provisional: “I’ve never heard anything like that
before. Where did you hear it?”
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Saving Face
• The Assertive Message Format
• The five parts of the assertive message
•
•
•
•
•
Behavior
Interpretation
Feeling
Consequence
Intention
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Saving Face
• The Assertive Message Format
• Behavior
• Describes the raw material to which you react
• Example:
• “One week ago John promised me that he would ask my
permission before smoking in the same room with me.
Just a moment ago he lit up a cigarette without asking for
my OK.”
• The statement only describe facts
• There is no observer meaning attached
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Saving Face
• The Assertive Message Format
• Interpretation
• Describes the meaning you’ve attached to the
other person’s behavior
• Example (two interpretations):
• “John must have forgotten about our agreement that he
wouldn’t smoke without asking me first. I’m sure he’s too
considerate to go back on his word.”
• “John is a rude, inconsiderate person. After promising not
to smoke around me without asking, he’s just deliberately
done so. This shows that he only cares about himself.”
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Saving Face
• The Assertive Message Format
• Feeling
• Consider the difference between saying:
• “When you laugh at me (behavior), I think you find my
comments foolish (interpretation), and I feel
embarrassed.”
• “When you laugh at me, I think you find my comments
foolish, and I feel angry.”
• Some statements seem as if they’re expressing
feeling but are actually expressing interpretations
or statements of intention
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Saving Face
• The Assertive Message Format
• Consequence
• What happens as a result of the situation
• What happens to you, the speaker:
• “When I didn’t get the phone message yesterday
(behavior), I didn’t know that my doctor’s appointment
was delayed and that I would end up sitting in the office
for an hour when I could have been studying or working
(consequences). It seems to me that you don’t care
enough about how busy I am to even write a simple note
(interpretation), and that’s why I’m so mad (feeling).”
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Saving Face
• The Assertive Message Format
• Intention
• Can communicate three kinds of messages
• Where you stand on an issue
• “I want you to know that it bothers me.”
• Requests of others
• “I’d like to know if you are angry.”
• Descriptions of how you plan to act in the future
• “I want you to know that unless we clear this up now,
you shouldn’t expect me ever to lend you anything
again.”
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Saving Face
• Using the Assertive Message Format
• The elements may be delivered in mixed
order
• Word the message to suit your personal style
• When appropriate, combine two elements in a
single phrase
• Take your time delivering the message
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Saving Face
• Responding Nondefensively to Criticism
• Seek more information
•
•
•
•
•
•
Ask for specifics
Guess about specifics
Paraphrase the speaker’s ideas
Ask what the critic wants
Ask about the consequences of your behavior
Ask what else is wrong
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Saving Face
• Responding Nondefensively to Criticism
• Agree with the critic
• Agree with the facts
• “You’re right, I am angry.”
• “I suppose I was being defensive.”
• “Now that you mention it, I did get pretty sarcastic.”
• Agree with the critic's perception
• “It’s silly to be angry.”
• “You have no reason for being defensive.”
• “You were wrong to be so sarcastic.”
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Chapter Review
• Communication Climate: The Key to
Positive Relationships
• Defensiveness: Causes and Remedies
• Saving Face
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