Nikia Squire
November 10, 2013
Professor Pupchek
Movie Analysis: Think Like A Man
I. Introduction
This paper is going to focus on the how couples listen and respond to each other
in a relationship. Looking at four scenes from the movie Think Like A Man, I will show
how the movie illustrates the concepts of Personal Relationships (Chapter 10) and
Listening and Responding to others (Chapter 6) in Julia T. Wood's (2011) book
Communication Mosaics: An Introduction to the Field of Communication. After outlining
the aspects of each chapter, I will provide full descriptions of the scenes and then apply
the theories to show the connections.
II. Literature Review
Wood (2011) covers the communication theory basics about relationships in
Chapter 10. Personal relationships, friendships, romantic relationships, and so on are all
here. Researchers have found, for example, that a personal relationship is defined by
passion, commitment, investment, rules and a turning point (p. 199). Elaborating, passion
is an intense feeling based on the rewards of involvement with another person, the
"desire" to be with the person's significant other. Someone saying that they have
"butterflies" is an example of passion. But, Wood notes that passion is not the basis of
enduring relationships (p. 199). Another aspect of a personal relationship is
commitment, the decision to remain in a relationship. When times get hard, some people
can call it quits, but others are committed to fight. When two people want to stay
together, they will stay committed to each other no matter the circumstances. But,
commitment grows out of investment, that is, what a partner puts into a relationship that
cannot be given back, even if the relationship came to end. This could be time, energy,
thought, or feelings--anything that intone person gives to another person is considered
and investment.
Wood (2011) states that relationships should have rules that determine how
partners communicate and interpret each other's communications. Some rules are spoken
and others are unspoken. Constitutive rules define how to interpret communication, they
are usually worked out over time when people learn what things mean to each other.
Regulative rules basically say what is and what is not acceptable, in various kinds of
communication; for example, some romantic partners limit physical displays of affection
to only being in a private setting. That's how it "should" be anyways (p. 200).
Researchers have determined that personal relationships develop according to
similar patterns or stages (Wood, 2011, p. #). Some relationships start with two friends,
who then enter a romantic relationship. Such personal relationships reach the turning
point at which the relationship moves toward or away from intimacy. In a romantic
relationship, a turning point towards intimacy might occur when one partner says, "I love
you," or partners introduce each other to their parents. On the other hand, moving away
from intimacy might occur when a partner becomes addicted to drugs loses interest in the
other person for another reason.
In Chapter 6, Wood (2011) focuses on how people listen and respond to each
other. This paper interprets the forms of ineffective listening as indicators of the health of
personal relationships: ineffective listening behaviors such as pseudolistening,
monopolizing, selective listening, defensive listening, ambushing and literal listening all
indicate unhealthy relationships. Pseudolistening refers to the behavior of pretending to
listen. The listener might nod his or her head, even though his or her mind is focused on
something else. Monopolizing refers to controlling the conversation one’s self. The two
types of monopolizing are conversational rerouting and interrupting. Conversational
rerouting occurs when the person being spoken to eventually makes the conversation
about themselves or a topic they choose. Interrupting can occur in a combination with
rerouting. The listener interrupts the speaker and introduces a new topic, of their interest.
So, using the same example, the person is talking about their day at work, and at any
given moment the listener interrupts them and talks about their school day; both result in
the listener making the conversation completely about them. Selective listening when the
listener only focuses on specific parts of the conversation. An example in the book is how
people in the workplace seem to pay more attention to the parts of a conversation
involving raises/layoffs - nothing else seems to be important. Defensive listening is when
the listener feels attacked. Here's an example:
Mom: Did you do your homework?
Child: Yes, why do you always ask that? It never seems like you trust me.
Mom: I do trust you, I was just asking.
Child: Well stop asking!
Clearly the mother was just asking a simple question. There was no intention of an
argument. Ambushing is when the listener attacks the speaker. For example:
Girlfriend: ... so, I had a great day today! Oh yea, I saw you at the mall.
Boyfriend: Oh, so you're following me?
Girlfriend: No, I just happened to be there and you were there.
Boyfriend: Why were you even at the mall? To spend all the money I make?
Girlfriend: It's not that serious. I just went with my friend.
Boyfriend: Was it a guy? It better not have been a guy!
The boyfriend is obviously ambushing her with a lot of questions. Surely it wasn't the
focus of her conversation to begin with. The last form of ineffective listening is literal
listening is when the listener only listens to the content not the actually MEANING of the
conversation. If someone asked for a ride home and the person says, "I guess I'll drive
you," that doesn't mean that they're excited to drive you home; they probably didn't want
to but feel obligated to do so. So the entire ride home, there might be tension in the car.
Listening is extremely important when it comes to being in a relationship.
III. Method
I plan to analyze Think Like A Man according to the concepts of Personal
Relationships (Chapter 10) and Listening and Responding to others (Chapter 6) in Julia
T. Wood's book Communication Mosaics. I chose this movie because it has multiple
relationships that demonstrate concepts found throughout the two Chapters. There's the
Momma's Boy trying to get with the Single Mom, the "Ready to Marry" woman engaged
to the "I Just Want To Have Fun" man (Kristen & Jerry), the High Class woman falling
for a Middle Class cook (Lauren & Dominic), and last but not least the Player vs. the "90Rule" girl (Zeke & Mya). There is another couple, Cedric and Gail, whose not a main
focus in the movie but their relationship is important to this paper.
Although the movie is full of illustrations, for the analysis I narrowed the
movie down to four specific scenes. The scenes chosen illustrate each chapter precisely,
and also have more than one concept; some of the scene selection have an illustration of
both Chapter 10 and Chapter 6 in the same scene:

Scene One: KRISTEN CLEANS UP
This scene illustrates defensive, selective, literal and pseudo listening.

Scene Two: ZEKE MEETS MYA
This scene illustrates ambushing, literal listening and monopolizing

Scene Three: MYA AND ZEKE (CAR SCENE)
This scene illustrates passion

Scene Four: CEDRIC CALLS HOME
This scene illustrates investment and commitment.
IV. Data:
SCENE ONE: Jerry walks in the house with a box a pizza, looking around for
Kristen. Starts talking about his evening until he realizes something is missing in the
living room. He immediately drops the pizza box and starts panicking and yelling out
"OH MY GOD! ALL MY ANIMATED POSTERS! WE GOT ROBBED!" He begins
jumping around and calling for Kristen. Kristen comes downstairs and says, "Where's the
fire? What's going on?" Jerry responds with, "Did you not notice that we've been
robbed?" and Kristen says, "I just cleaned up a little bit, relax." Jerry asks about his
posters and wants reinsurance that they're safe. Kristen tells him that they're fine and
immediately Jerry is relieved. Kristen says she wanted to paint and redecorate. Jerry is
confused because he thought she loved the same things he loved. Kristen goes on about
how they are adults that make a decent amount of money and they need to invest and start
living as such. After talking about getting dishes that match, and glassware, the only part
Jerry hears is getting a new couch. In which he gets defensive because he sees absolutely
nothing wrong with his couch the way it is. Kristen is mad because he pulled it out of a
dumpster, there's cigarette burns, bong spills, etc. Jerry says she's being dramatic and
Kristen doesn't feel as that. She's mad that this ugly, smelly couch is still in the house.
Jerry wants the couch to stay because it has history, but Kristen says that she's getting rid
of it anyways. Kristen pulls out a book and starts talking about the redecorating ideas.
Jerry looks at her with a blank stare and eventually tells her to do it herself because he's
not good at those kind of things. He sits down on the couch and turns on the TV then tells
her that he trusts her.
SCENE TWO: Mya and her friend Sonia are sitting at the bar having drinks and
an interview of Steve Harvey about females having a 90-day rule started to come on TV.
Mya is agreeing with Steve Harvey because she's still mad she slept with a guy named
Alex that won't call her back nor can remember her name. Sonia disagrees because she
feels that a girl has needs, and then challenges Mya by asking if she could really contain
herself around a guy for 90 days. Mya's response is yes because she spent six months
dreaming about a guy she met once during a wedding weekend. Sonia says that even with
him she had sex, and Mya gets disappointed because he never called back either... which
makes her even more sure that she can wait 90 days. Mya says that she's tired of men and
makes a smart comment saying she should start dating women. A random guy at the bar
interrupts and says "I'll give you 50 bucks if you guys kiss, it has to be tongue," Sonia
tells him he needs to go and Mya says "What is wrong with the men in this generation."
Zeke walks up to the bar and he invites himself into their conversation, "I ask myself the
same question every day. Whatever happened to respect for women... Whatever happened
to decorum? May I have the honor of buying you two lovely ladies a drink?" Mya seems
disgusted but Sonia says, "Absolutely, thank you for asking. We would like..." and Mya
cuts her off, and says "Why? Is it because you crave scintillating conversation, or because
you want to discuss the politics and the nuances of a war." Zeke tries to respond politely
by saying, "I don't really discuss politics on the first encounter" Sonia tries to say, "And
neither do we" but Mya cuts her off saying "Oh no, I know what it is. It's a visual thing
right? You saw me, you want to sexualize me, you want to get inside my pants?" Zeke
cuts her off and says, "Absolutely not" Mya says, "Then what is it then? You don't know.
I could be a psycho, a serial killer... I could have 16 personalities" Zeke doesn't respond
to her, instead he orders 16 of the drinks Mya's been drinking while she's been at the bar,
and introduces himself to her. Sonia laughs and Mya tells him her name is Mya.
SCENE THREE: Mya and Zeke are in the car talking, listening to music. Mya
was talking about herself some and she asked Zeke what his long term goals were. He
says, "I'm kind of a fly by the seat of your pants kind of guy." That wasn't the answer that
she was looking for; she was looking for something similar to what the book said, so she
gets disappointed. Mya's favorite song came on the radio and she told Zeke to turn it up.
He was surprised that she knew the artist, and he tells her that his band opened up for
them once. Mya asked if he currently has a band, and Zeke said no, that he had a record
deal for a little while, and Mya asked to hear his CD. He is surprised that Mya knew he
had a CD in his car, and Mya said she didn't know anyone in an R&B band that does not
keep a CD of their music in their car. Zeke gets the CD and hands it to her. Mya looks at
it and is amazed, and asked him to play his favorite track. The music starts playing and
Mya immediately falls in love with the song. After it plays for a minute, she asked who
was the girl that broke his heart. He told her that he left all of that on the track. The scene
ends with the music fading out and Mya notices herself extremely attracted to Zeke.
SCENE FOUR: Cedric walks in the bathroom calling Gail. Gail picks up the
phone with an attitude and says "What!" Cedric says "Gail ain't nobody calling you to
fight with you right now." Still having an attitude, Gail wants to know why Cedric is
calling and Cedric says that he's coming home because it's his house and he pays the bills
there too. He says that he belongs there and that he's tired of the arguing and he misses
being at home with her. He's tired of being "out in the streets" at the strip club where
everyone knows him on a first-name bases. That he wants to be at home, in her arms.
That he's tired of being around all the guys, he just wants to be with her and Jesus. Gail
listens to what he's saying and allows him to come home. She asks him to come as soon
as possible. Cedric is relieved he can go home and that he finally has his woman back.
V. ANALYSIS

SCENE ONE: Jerry swears they got robbed! He’s worried about his toys
and everything, materialistic things that aren’t important to Kristen at all.
The moment Kristen tells him that she just cleaned up and his things aren’t
gone, he calms down and stops paying attention. Kristen starts talking,
saying that she wants to redecorate because she's tired of living with "an
immature adult" but Jerry doesn't really care, he's pseudo-listening. She
starts venting about things that bother her in the house, and Jerry starts
selective listening; the only thing he hears is her saying she hates his
favorite couch. He starts defensive listening for a while, but most of this
scene is him listening literally. He hears what she is saying, but isn't
taking in the content. Towards the end of the scene he gets tired of her
talking and says she can do whatever she wants – that he “trusts her” but
later in the movie when Kristen gets the home makeover he gets pissed
that she changed everything. Even though that's what Kristen was talking
about throughout the whole scene.

SCENE TWO: Mya’s mind is stuck on what Steve Harvey said about
waiting to have sex, she’s not listening to the content of the Zeke's
conversation. Zeke obviously does not fit Mya's stereotype. She is literal
listening. The first statement Zeke says agrees exactly with what Mya said
about men not respecting women, but Mya is so focused on what Steve
Harvey said, she decides to ambush him with questions. Zeke finds it
amusing, because he's trying to impress her so nothing she says makes him
become defensive. So while he's trying to buy Mya and Sonia a drink,
Mya spends the whole scene monopolizing the conversation. She is not
listening to what he is saying and will say anything to get her point across.

SCENE THREE: A relationship is nothing without having passion. Mya
had this prejudgment of men and placed Zeke in the category as soon as
she met him. She thought he was a player, and wanted nothing to do with
him when they met at the bar. This scene happens after a date. She is in
love with music and saw that he was too. Although she was using the book
to analyze him, she started to realize that she really did have feelings for
him. There was excitement, enthusiasm, and similar interest between the
two, and she felt the butterflies.

SCENE FOUR: Cedric is calls Gail because he misses her. Gail
answers the phone and starts ambushing him. So it starts with an small
argument but Gail stops literal listening becomes mindful of what he's
saying. This scene shows investment. They have been in a relationship for
a long time, they have felt the passion and they decided to move in
together. Things have been rough, which is why Gail kicked Cedric out,
but they still love each other. They realized that all the time and energy
that they put into their relationship, shouldn't be wasted. After fighting for
a while, Cedric got tired of being alone and wanted to come home. Gail
said yes, so they both made the decision to stay committed to each other.
VI Conclusion
This movie has a lot of relationships but the analysis on the four scenes have
shown me multiple things. A relationship is not a relationship if there is not any kind of
passion, and it won't be anything if there isn't commitment. Communication in a
relationship is extremely important. They way you communicate can either start an
argument, or defuse one. The whole Jerry and Kristen scene shows me that when two
people are having a heart to heart about their feelings, it is important to pay attention to
EVERYTHING being stated. Yes, some things may be boring but pseudolistening does
nothing for you, neither does literal listening. Besides, your partner will know you
weren't listening if they told you to do something and you weren't really listening when
they told you, and you forgot to do it. It causes conflict. Defensive listening and
ambushing does nothing but light a fire, it starts an argument. I feel that if I'm going to be
in a relationship, me and my significant other should have an understanding of tone-ofvoice. Also, both of us should be mindful of how we're coming off to each other.
I've been in relationships before, but I've never thought about how
listening makes such a big difference. Most of us are conscious of the many kinds of
listening there is, but some of us don't pay attention to the actual effect. The fact that
most arguments can be avoided if we actually paid attention. The reason I enjoyed this
analysis is the scenes from Think Like a Man illustrates the aspects found in Julia T.
Wood's book very well, along with making me analyze how I hold conversations with
people in general. Communication is important! Once you understand it, it becomes easy
and interesting.