There are five levels of communication: 1. Intrapersonal Communication 2. Interpersonal Communication 3. Mediated Communication 4. Person-to-Group Communication 5. Mass Communication The word - "Intrapersonal" - means within the person. Intrapersonal communication processes happen inside of you. For example, each morning you decide how to dress, what to eat, where to go, etc. The role the self plays in communication is vital and complex. In order to be able to identify the complex levels of the self, you first need to understand how such complexity becomes such an intimate part of the communication process. Self-concept is your image of who you are. Put another way, self-concept is the total picture of who you are. Or how you see your whole self. It is your psychological self, your physical self, your spiritual self, your social self, and your intellectual self. Self-concept is how you perceive the different parts of yourself that combine to form a total picture. At the same time self-concept also means knowing how others see you, how your colleagues see you, how your parents see you. When you interact with different groups and individuals and they see you and react to you, you pick up signals and eventually you change yourself as a result of this feedback. Self-concept is made up of two components, selfimage, and self-esteem Self-image is literally a picture, or image, of who you are. Self-image describes you. If you take out a piece of paper and list the various roles that you play in life, you could come up at least six, eight, maybe ten different roles that you assume in your daily life. For example, the different roles that you play in life could include, you are a student, you are a son, you are a brother, you are a colleague, you are a friend……these are all different roles that you play in life. Most of our roles can be categorized in one of two categories – either achieved roles, or ascribed roles. Achieved roles are roles that you work to accomplish or to achieve, such as, professor, honor student, etc. Ascribed roles are roles that you are born into, son, brother, and sister. What’s important about identifying the different roles you play in life is that you communicate differently in each one of these roles. To be an effective communicator, you should. So self-image is how you see yourself and how you describe the roles that you play in life. Self-esteem is also how you evaluate yourself in those roles. How do you see yourself as a brother, as a friend, as a best friend? How do you rate your performance in the various roles you play in life? On a scale of one to ten, are you good to bad, great to terrible, positive to negative, effective to ineffective? No matter what evaluative scale you want to use, self-image is measured by how you evaluate yourself in those roles. Self-esteem is the process of selfevaluation; it is how you feel about yourself in each of those roles. Self-esteem is certainly affected by how others evaluate your performance in a particular role. To be found lacking in the performance of a particular role results in hurt feelings and diminished self-esteem. Intrapersonal communication processes depend upon communicators': 1. Frame of reference 2. Creativity 3. Self-talk 4. Risk-taking behavior Your frame of reference refers to the way you view your world. Your frame of reference is your structure for encoding and decoding messages. Your frame of reference consists of all that you bring internally to the communication situation: your beliefs, attitudes, and values; your memory of experiences; your cultural background; your stereotypes and expectations; your self-concept; your feelings and level of stress; your thinking patterns; and other psychological factors. One of the most important skills you can shape is that of creativity. Basically, creative thinking involves visualizing something in an innovative, new, or unique way. Humans have long valued artists because their creativity provides new ways of imagining or conceptualizing our world. In our personal and work lives, creativity can be important to each of us, particularly when solving problems. You can increase your creativity by learning to think in less traditional ways. Habitual and routine thinking patterns and structures prevent free, open problem solving. The extent to which you have developed your creative thinking affects the way you send and receive messages, the way you interact with others, and your potential for success in new situations. Another key aspect of intrapersonal communication is sometimes called selftalk or imagined communication. In imagined communication, individuals talk to someone else or to themselves as if they were another person. However, the communication takes place in their minds (internally instead of externally). Practical example of imagined conversations could be of students imagining communicating before it takes place. For example, while they plan their classroom presentations, they see themselves in front of the audience, imagine how fantastic they look, see some classmates listening attentively, and picture their instructor making a positive response. This approach, by the way, can help most speakers to succeed in public communication situations by reducing their anxiety. Your willingness to take risks is largely dependent on your interpretation of past experience. If you have found risk-taking to be fun, adventure-some, or thrilling, then you are more inclined to make risky moves. At least a minimum amount of risk is necessary for growth and development. Some people consider as risk-taking behaviors only ones that are lifethreatening, such as driving fast cars, or doing dangerous stunts. For our purposes, we are focusing on risk-taking in communication. Your intrapersonal processes about risktaking are influenced by your past experiences and interaction with others. Your decisions about whether or not you should, or how you will, choose to interact with others are major areas of your internal or intrapersonal communication processes.
