Non-Verbal Communication Assignment
Non-Verbal Communication Assignment
Documentation:
Time: Thursday, October 28, 1999, 10:30AM
Location: Silo dining area.
Background: Two girls, roughly twenty years old, sit down at a table after having apparently just purchased some food from Taco Bell. Our group spread itself out and watched them from different angles, remaining as inconspicuous as possible, to try and meet the objectives of this assignment.
We felt that we should break down our observations into the four main parts of Non-Verbal Communication discussed in section: Vocalics/Paralanguage, Proxemics, Kinesics, and Haptics.
- Vocalics/Paralanguage
For the most part, it seems as if the two girls (from her on known as "Yellow" and "Gray", after the colors of their shirts), had a low, flat tone through most of the conversation. It didn't seems like the tone changes much, although at one point one group member heard a change in tone that seemed to indicate a question was being asked by Gray. Another group member heard at one time one of the girls raise her voice, but only for a second.
- Proxemics
The two girls were sitting at opposite ends of the table, about three feet away from each other. A couple of times, the girls would lean towards each other, although it is hard to tell if it was simply to get closer because of the noise in the Silo.
- Kinesics
Gray had a lot of hand motion when she talked, and frequently used her hands as if she was describing something. Yellow, on the other hand, did not have much motion in her hands, except when she was playing with her nachos. Gray seemed interested in what Yellow had to say, as she seemed to be staring intently at Yellow. Yellow, on the other hand, did not reciprocate to appearance of interest, as she spend most of her time looking at her food and around the room. Gray also occasionally talked with her mouth full, and seemed to cover her mouth while doing so only about half of the time.
- Haptics
There was very little touching between the two girls. At one point, Yellow offered Gray some of her Nachos, which Gray accepted, and reached into the box while Yellow still had her hand there. Also, during an exchange of an item that appeared to be a picture, it appeared as if the girls hands did touch briefly.
Analysis:
It seemed as though the two girls had know each other for some time, and that this was not a chance meeting between the two. Given the sharing of the picture, the offering of food, and the fact that they came together and left together, it appeared that they were friends. It didn't appear that they were trying to impress each other, giving the talking with the mouth full. There was also the leaning towards each other that could be seen as two people trying to share a moment in a large public place, although some in the group simply thought it was them leaning closer to be able to hear each other.
Non-Verbal Communication did not appear to play a large roll in the conversation between the two girls. For the most part, there was a lack of facial expressions, especially given the amount of time the conversation went on. At appeared that most of the communication appeared to be verbal (based on the words themselves), even though it seemed that Yellow wasn't very interested in what Gray had to say. Yellow seemed much more passive, only offering responses when they seemed solicited.
While Non-Verbal communication didn't appear to have a large roll in the conversation, it definitely did exist. The large amounts of hand motion by Gray and the seemingly uncaring actions of Yellow seemed to define each persons role in the conversation, and also made it east to determine who was really leading the conversation (Gray). However, everyone in our group agreed that for the conversation we observed, Non-Verbal communication did not appear as much as discussed in class (55%).
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