User:Phlsph7/Intrapersonal communication

Definition and essential features
Intrapersonal communication is communication with oneself. It takes place within an individual and can be defined as "the creating, functioning, and evaluating of symbolic processes which operate primarily within oneself". Its most typical forms are self-talk and inner dialogue. For example, when an employee decides to leave work early, they may engage in an inner dialogue by mentally going through possible negative comments from their boss and potential responses. Other inner experiences are also commonly included, such as imagination, visualization, and memory. As a form of communication, it involves the sending and receiving of messages. It is a self-to-self communication, in the sense that the sender and the receiver is the same person. It contrasts with interpersonal communication, in which sender and receiver are distinct individuals. Intrapersonal communication is investigated by the discipline known as communication studies.

Some theorists restrict intrapersonal communication to inner experiences or "what goes on inside our heads", like talking to oneself within one's mind. But in a wider sense, it also includes external forms of self-to-self communication, such as speaking to oneself aloud during private speech or writing a diary or a shopping list. In this regard, it only matters that the sender and the receiver is the same person but it does not matter whether an external medium was used in the process. A slightly different conception is presented by Oleś et al. They reject the idea that sender and receiver have to be the same person. This is based on the idea that one can have imaginary dialogues with other people, such as a friend, a teacher, a lost relative, or a celebrity. Oleś et al. hold instead that the hallmark of intrapersonal communication is that it only happens in the mind of one person. Some theorists see the process of searching and interpreting information as a central aspect of intrapersonal communication, as is the case for inner monologues and reflections on oneself, other people, and the environment. Frank J. Macke and Dean Barnlund emphasize that the mechanical exchange of messages is not sufficient and that intrapersonal communication has to do with meaning and making sense of things.

Intrapersonal communication need not be cut off from outer influences and often happens as a reaction to them. For example, hearing a familiar piece of music may stir up memories that lead to an internal dialog with past selves. In a similar sense, intrapersonal communication is not restricted to situations in which a person is alone. Instead, it also happens in social circumstances and may occur simultaneously with interpersonal communication. This is the case, for example, when interpreting what another person has said and when formulating a response before enunciating it. Some theorists even hold that intrapersonal communication is an essential part of all communication and, therefore, always accompanies interpersonal communication.

Types
Various types of intrapersonal communication are distinguished in the academic literature. The term is often used in a very wide sense and includes many phenomena. An important distinction is based on whether the exchange happens purely internally or is mediated through external means. The internal type is the most discussed form. It plays out in the mind of one individual without externally expressing the message. It includes mental processes like thinking, meditating, and reflecting. However, there are also external forms of intrapersonal communication, like talking aloud to oneself in the form of private speech. Other examples are notetaking at school, writing a diary, preparing a shopping list, praying, or reciting a poem. External intrapersonal communication is also characterized by the fact that the sender and the receiver is the same person. The difference is that an external medium is used to express the message. Another distinction focuses on the role of language. Most discussions in the academic literature are concerned with verbal intrapersonal communication, like self-talk and inner dialogue. Its hallmark is that messages are expressed using a symbolic coding system in the form of a language. They contrast with non-verbal forms like certain forms of imagination, visualization, or memory. In this regard, intrapersonal communication can be used, for example, to explore how a piece of music would sound or how a painting should be continued.

Among the inner verbal forms of intrapersonal communication, an often-discussed distinction is between self-talk and inner dialogue. In the case of inner dialogue, two or more positions are considered and the exchange takes place by contrasting them. It usually happens in the form of different voices taking turns in arguing for their position. This can be conceptualized in analogy to interpersonal communication as an exchange of different subjects, selves, or I-positions within the same person. For example, when facing a difficult decision, one part of a person may argue in favor of one option while another part prefers a different option. Inner dialogue can also take the form of an exchange with an imagined partner. This is the case when anticipating a discussion with one's spouse or during imaginary conversations with celebrities or lost relatives. For self-talk or inner monologue, on the other hand, there is no split between different positions. It is speech directed at oneself, as when commenting on one's performance or telling oneself to "try again". Self-talk can be positive or negative depending on how the person evaluates themself. For example, after having failed an exam, a student may engage in negative self-talk by saying "I'm so stupid" or in positive self-talk, like "don't worry" or "I'll do better next time".

There are various important differences between self-talk and inner dialogue. Inner dialogue is usually more complex. It can be used to simulate social situations and investigate a topic from different angles. Its goal is frequently to explore the differences between conflicting points of view, to make sense of strange positions, and to integrate different perspectives. It also plays a central role in identity construction and self-organization. For self-talk, an important function is self-regulation. Other functions include self-distancing, motivation, self-evaluation, and reflection. Self-talk often happens in reaction to or anticipation of certain situations. It can help the agent prepare an appropriate response. It may also be used to regulate emotions and cope with unpleasant experiences as well as monitor oneself. Self-talk and inner dialogue are distinct phenomena but one can quickly turn into the other. For example, an intrapersonal communication may start as self-talk and then evolve into inner dialogue as more positions are considered.

Intrapersonal communication is associated with a great range of phenomena. They include planning, problem-solving, and internal conflict resolution, as well as judgments about oneself and other people. Other forms are perception, conceptualization and interpretation of environmental cues, data processing like drawing inferences, thinking, understanding, and self-persuasion as well as memory, introspection, dreaming, imagining, and feeling.

Models
Various models of communication have been proposed. They aim to provide a simplified overview of the process of communication by showing what its main components are and how they interact. Most of them focus primarily on interpersonal communication but some are specifically formulated with intrapersonal communication in mind.

According to the model proposed by Larry Barker and Gordon Wiseman, intrapersonal communication starts with the reception of external and internal stimuli carrying information. External stimuli belong to the senses and usually provide information about the environment. Internal stimuli include a wide range of impressions, both concerning the state of the body, like pain, but also encompassing feelings. An early step in intrapersonal communication focuses on classifying these stimuli. In this process, many of the weaker stimuli are filtered out before reaching a conscious level. But they may still affect communication despite this. A similar process groups the remaining stimuli according to their urgency. It runs in parallel with attempts to attach symbolic meaning to the stimuli as a form of decoding. How these processes take place is influenced by various factors, like the communicator's social background and current environment. After the symbolic decoding process, ideation occurs in the form of thinking, organizing information, planning, and proposing messages. As a last step, the thus conceived ideas are encoded into a symbolic form and expressed using words, gestures, or movements. This process can happen right after the ideation or with some delay. It results in the generation and transmission of more stimuli, either purely internal or also external. The generated stimuli work as a feedback loop leading back to their reception and interpretation. In this sense, the same individual is both the sender and the receiver of the messages. The feedback makes it possible for the communicator to monitor and correct messages.

Another model of communication is due to Dean Barnlund. He aims to give an account of communication that encompasses both its interpersonal and its intrapersonal side. He identifies communication not with the transmission of messages but with the production of meaning in response to internal and external cues. For him, intrapersonal communication is the simpler case since only one person is involved. This person perceives private cues, like internal thoughts and feelings, public cues originating from the environment, and behavioral cues in the form of their own behavior. One part of communication is the process of decoding and interpreting these cues. Its goal is to make sense of them and to reduce uncertainty. It is accompanied by the activity of encoding behavioral responses to the cues. These two processes happen simultaneously and influence each other.

Sheila Steinberg follows Graeme Burton and Richard Dimbleby by understanding intrapersonal communication as a process involving five elements: decoding, integration, memory, perceptual sets, and encoding. Decoding consists in making sense of messages. Integration puts the individual pieces of information extracted this way in relation to each other through processes like comparing and distinguishing. Memory stores previously received information. Especially relevant in regard to intrapersonal communication is the concept one has of oneself and how the newly received information relates to it. Perceptual sets are ingrained ways of organizing and evaluating this information, for example, how feminine and masculine traits are conceived. Encoding is the last step, in which the meaning processed in the previous steps is again expressed in symbolic form as a message sent to oneself.

Many theorists focus on the concept of the self in intrapersonal communication. There is a variety of definitions but many agree that the self is an entity that is unique to each individual, i.e. not shared between individuals. Some theorists understand intrapersonal communication as a relation of the self to the same self. Others see the self as a complex entity made up of different parts and analyze the exchange as an interaction between parts. A closely related approach is to talk not of distinct parts of a single self but of different selves in the same person, like an emotional self, an intellectual self, or a physical self. On these views, intrapersonal communication is understood in analogy to interpersonal communication as an exchange between different parts or selves. In either case, intrapersonal relationships play a central role. They concern how a person relates to themselves, for example, how they see themselves and who they wish to be. Intrapersonal relationships are not directly observable. Instead, they have to be inferred based on other changes that can be perceived. For example, inferences about a person's self-esteem can be drawn based on whether they respond to a compliment by bragging or by playing it down.

Relation to interpersonal communication
Both intrapersonal and interpersonal communication involve the exchange of messages. For interpersonal communication, the sender and the receiver are distinct persons, like when talking to a friend on the phone. For intrapersonal communication, one and the same person occupies both of these roles. Despite this difference, the two are closely related. For example, some theorists conceptualize inner dialogue in analogy to social interaction as an exchange between different parts of the self. The two phenomena also influence each other in various ways. For example, the positive and negative feedback a person receives from other people shapes their self-concept or how they see themselves. This in turn has important implications for how they talk to themselves in the form of positive or negative self-talk. But the converse is also true: how a person talks to themselves affects how they interact with other people. One reason for this is that some form of inner dialog is usually involved when talking to others to interpret what they say and to determine what one wants to communicate to them. For example, if a person's intrapersonal communication is characterized by self-criticism, this may make it hard for them to accept praise from other people. On a more basic level, it can even affect how messages from other people are interpreted. For example, an overly self-critical individual may interpret an honest compliment as a form of sarcasm.

However, self-talk may also interfere with the ability to listen. For example, when a person has an important meeting later today, their thoughts may be racing around this topic, making the person less responsive to interactions in the present. Or if a listener is very keen on making a response, their attention can be mainly focused on their self-talk formulating a message and not on listening to what the speaker is currently saying. Positive and effective self-talk, on the other hand, tends to make people better at communicating with others. One way to become better at interpersonal communication is to become aware of this self-talk and to be able to balance it with the need of listening.

Another important discussion in the academic literature is about the question of whether intrapersonal communication is in some sense more fundamental than interpersonal communication. This is based on the idea that some form of intrapersonal communication is necessary for and accompanies interpersonal communication. For example, when a person receives a message from a friend inviting them to their favorite restaurant, there can be various internal reactions to this message before sending an answer in return. These reactions include sights and scents, memories from previous visits, checking whether this would clash with other plans, and devising a route to get to the restaurant. These reactions are forms of intrapersonal communication. Other examples include self-talk in an attempt to evaluate the positions expressed by the speaker to assess whether one agrees or disagrees with them. But intrapersonal communication can also occur by itself without another party being involved. For these reasons, some theorists, like James Honeycutt and Sheila Steinberg, have claimed that intrapersonal communication is the foundation of all other forms of communication. Similar claims are that intrapersonal communication is omnipresent and that it is a requirement or preliminary of interpersonal communication. However, the claim of the primacy of intrapersonal communication is not generally accepted and many theorists hold that social interaction is more basic. They often see inner speech as an internalized or derivative version of social speech.

A closely related issue concerns the questions of how interpersonal and intrapersonal communication interact in the development of children. According to Jean Piaget, for example, intrapersonal communication develops first and manifests as a form of egocentric speech. This happens during play activities and may help the child learn to control their activities and plan ahead. Piaget holds that, at this early stage, children are not yet fully social beings and are more concerned with developing their individuality. On this view, interpersonal speech only arises later in the individual's development. This view is opposed by Lev Vygotsky, who argues that intrapersonal communication only happens as an internalization of interpersonal communication. According to him, children learn the tools for self-talk when their parents talk to them to regulate their behavior, for example, through suggestions, warnings, or commands. Intrapersonal communication may then be understood as an attempt by the child to regulate their behavior through similar means.

Function and importance
Intrapersonal communication serves a great variety of functions. They include internalization, self-regulation, processing information, and problem-solving. Because of this, some theorists understand intrapersonal communication as an "exceptionally powerful and pervasive tool for thinking". Various categorizations of these functions have been proposed. According to James P. Lantolf, two important functions are to internalize cultural norms or ways of thinking and to regulate one's own activity. The self-regulatory function of intrapersonal communication is sometimes understood in analogy to interpersonal communication. For example, parents may influence the behavior of their children by uttering phrases like "wait, think". Once the child has learned them, they can be employed to control behavior by uttering them internally. This way, people learn to modify, accept, or reject plans of action. According to Larry Ehrlich, intrapersonal communication has three main functions. One function is to monitor the environment and ensure that it is safe. In this regard, self-talk is used to analyze perceptions and to plan responses in case direct or indirect threats are detected. A closely related function is to bring harmony between the inner and outer world by making sense of oneself and one's environment. A third function is of a more existential nature and aims at dealing with loneliness. Many theorists also draw a close connection to the processes of searching and interpreting information.

Inner speech may be required for various higher psychological processes to work. It has a vital role in various mental functions, such as shaping and controlling one's thoughts, regulating one's behavior, reasoning, problem-solving, and planning as well as remembering. It often accompanies diverse communicative tasks, such as listening, speaking, reading, and writing, for example, to understand an expression or to formulate a new one. More specific applications are to calm oneself down in stressful situations and to internalize new knowledge when learning a second language, for example, when repeating new vocabulary to oneself in order to remember it. Intrapersonal communication can also be applied to a great variety of creative tasks, like using it to come up with musical compositions, paintings, or dance routines. Stanley B. Cunningham lists a total of 17 functions or characteristics commonly ascribed to intrapersonal communication. They include talking to oneself, dialogue between different parts of the self, perception, interpreting environmental cues and ascribing meaning to them, problem-solving, decision-making, introspection, reflection, dreaming, and self-persuasion. The goal of some external forms of intrapersonal communication, like taking notes at school or writing a shopping list, is to aid memory. In some cases, they can also help break down and address a complex problem in a series of smaller steps, as when solving a mathematical equation line by line.

The importance of intrapersonal communication is reflected by how it affects other phenomena. For example, it has been argued that people who engage in positive self-talk are usually better at problem-solving and communicating with others, including listening skills. Negative intrapersonal communication, on the other hand, is associated with insecurities and low self-esteem and may lead to negative interactions with others. For example, people suffering from the imposter syndrome are continuously affected by self-doubt and anxiety. Their negative intrapersonal communication tends to revolve around fears that their skills are inadequate and may be exposed. In this regard, intrapersonal communication affects a person's self-view, their emotions, and whether they see themself as capable or incompetent. It can help build and maintain self-confidence but may also create defense mechanisms. Additionally, it plays a central role in self-discovery and self-delusion.

Research and criticism
Intrapersonal communication has not been researched as thoroughly as other types of communication. One important reason is that there are additional problems concerning how to study it and how to conceptualize it. A difficulty in this regard is that it is not as easy to observe as interpersonal communication. This is due to the fact that it mostly occurs internally without an immediate external manifestation. Since it is not directly observable, it has to be inferred based on other changes that can be visible. For example, when seeing that a person dresses well and takes care of their health, one may infer that certain intrapersonal relationships are responsible for this behavior. A similar inference about a person's inner life could be drawn based on whether they respond to a compliment by bragging or by playing it down. A different approach is to use questionnaires to study intrapersonal communication. Questionnaires sometimes used in the process include the Self-Talk Scale, the Varieties of Inner Speech Questionnaire, and the Internal Dialogical Activity Scale. Among other things, they aim to measure what types of intrapersonal communication a person engages in and how frequently they do so.

Another difficulty concerns a more theoretical issue pertaining to the concept of intrapersonal communication. Intrapersonal communication is commonly accepted and discussed as a distinct type of communication. However, some theorists have criticized the claim that it is actually a form of communication rather than just a related phenomenon. A prominent defender of this position is Cunningham, who argues that many inner experiences discussed under this label may at times form part of communicative processes but are not themselves instances of communication. This pertains to various forms of cognitive, perceptual, and motivational episodes commonly categorized as intrapersonal communication. He sees such categorizations as an "uncritical extension of communication terminology and metaphors to the facts of our inner life space." This is closely connected to the problem that the expression "intrapersonal communication" is often used in a very wide and ambiguous sense. However, various theorists have objected to Cunningham's critique, for example, by pointing out that communication studies in general is a multiparadigmatic discipline that has not yet established definitions of its terms that are both precise and generally accepted. For them, the lack of precision does not mean that the concept is useless. A further problem in defining intrapersonal communication is that there are countless processes within the human body responsible for exchanging messages. So when understood in this very wide sense, even processes like breathing could be understood as intrapersonal communication. For this reason, the term is usually understood in a more restricted sense. Frank J. Macke approaches this problem by arguing that intrapersonal communication has to do with meaning and that some form of communicative experience is involved. On this view, the mechanical exchange of messages alone is not sufficient for communication.

Negative interpersonal communication and improving
Intrapersonal can be responsible both for positive mental health and mental illness.

Like other forms of communication, intrapersonal communication can be trained and improved to be more effective. This includes the ability to listen to oneself and to recognize general patterns in one's self-talk. If these patterns are negative or inefficient, the person may try to change them and thereby improve their intrapersonal relationships. For example, it has been suggested that intrapersonal communication and the associated self-esteem can be improved by practicing mindfulness. This practice consists in directing one's attention to experiences in the present moment, both external and internal while trying to abstain from evaluating these experiences. This can improve self-esteem by raising one's awareness of intrapersonal communication taking place. Abstaining from evaluations may help to avoid overly critical evaluations and instead foster an attitude of acceptance. This can also help people become more open-minded by temporarily letting go of one's tendency to evaluate according to one's own prejudices.

One way to avoid negative self-talk is to make a conscious effort to think more positively. For example, when the person becomes aware of a negative thinking process, they may try to stop it and direct their attention to more positive outcomes. An early step can be to become aware of and acknowledge negative thoughts and feelings.

The effects of positive and negative self-talk are often discussed in sport psychology. A common idea in this regard is that positive self-talk enhances performance while negative self-talk hinders it. There is some empirical evidence supporting this position but it has not yet been thoroughly researched.

One way to improve intrapersonal communication in the form of negative self-talk is through cognitive behavioral therapy. An important step in this regard is to raise the individual's awareness of negative thoughts as they are happening. A central idea of cognitive behavioral therapy is that a set of negative core beliefs is responsible for them. They can include beliefs like "I'm unlovable", "I'm unworthy", or "the world is threatening and I'm unable to face its challenges". A key therapeutic method for improving intrapersonal communication is to become aware of these beliefs and to question their truth.

Training intrapersonal communication can make the person more perceptive and improve their self-image.