User:Unique-individual/Nonverbal communication

Nonverbal communication (NVC) is the transmission of messages or signals through a nonverbal platform such as eye contact, facial expressions, gestures, posture, and body language. It includes the use of social cues, kinesics, distance (proxemics) and physical environments/appearance, of voice (paralanguage), and touch (haptics). It can also include the use of time (chronemics) and eye contact and the actions of looking while talking and listening, frequency of glances, patterns of fixation, pupil dilation, and blink rate (oculesics).

The study of nonverbal communication started in 1872 with the publication of The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals by Charles Darwin. Darwin began to study nonverbal communication as he noticed the interactions between animals such as lions, tigers, dogs, etc., ad realized they also communicated by gestures and expressions. For the first time, nonverbal communication was studied and its relevance was questioned. Today, scholars argue that nonverbal communication can convey more meaning than verbal communication. Some scholars state that most people trust forms of nonverbal communication over verbal communication

First Impression:
In terms of culture, collectivists have a harder time changing their first impressions because they emphasize a lot more context and need additional time when faced with new clues as each view may be correct in some contexts. Moreover, Fang et al, acknowledged that first impression is less likely to change in Asian culture because they value cohesiveness and consensus, thus will not destroy their group cohesiveness at the expense of changing their first impression when they reached a consensus.

Symbolic:
Sign languages are highly developed systems of symbolic gestures. Some educators that work with deaf learners use a combination of cued speech and lip speaking and reading that helps deaf and hard hearing individuals (D/HH) to code and decode words based on their phonetics. In addition to the supplementary aspect of the cues like location and movement, every culture has its. own set of gestures, some of which are unique only to a specific culture. For example, the phonological and lexical repository of D/HH individuals is highly dependent on their social background and richness of language. Very similar gestures can have very different meanings across cultures. Symbolic gestures are usually used in the absence of speech but can also accompany speech.

Eye contact:
Eye contact is the instance when two people look at each other's eyes at the same time; it is the primary nonverbal way of indicating engagement, interest, attention, and involvement. Nonverbal communication involves the conscious and unconscious processes of encoding and decoding. Encoding is defined as our ability to express emotions in a way that the receiver(s). Decoding is called "nonverbal sensitivity", defined as the ability to take this encoded emotion and interpret its meanings accurately to what the sender intended. Encoding is the act of generating information such as facial expressions, gestures, and postures. Some studies have demonstrated that people use their eyes to indicate interest. This includes frequently recognized actions of winking and movements of the eyebrows.

The length of a gaze, the frequency of glances, patterns of fixation, pupil dilation, and blink rate are all important cues in nonverbal communication. Both gaze and blinking are para verbal cues that are dependent on the conversion, relationship, and proxemics between the emitter and receiver. According to Descroix et al, the context of conversations do not produce long blinks between the emitter and the recipient.

Haptics: Touching in communication
Touch is an extremely important sense for humans; as well as providing information about surfaces and textures it is a component of nonverbal communication in interpersonal relationships, and vital in conveying physical intimacy. It can be both sexual (such as kissing) and platonic (such as hugging or tickling).

Remland and Jones (1995) studied groups of people communicating and found that touching was rare among the English (8%), the French (5%), and the Dutch (4%) compared to Italians (14%) and Greeks (12.5%). In the Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, McDaniel et al assessed touch as a form of communication among people from different nations under the lens of culture, relationships, and a number of body areas touched. Latin Americans are known to have a high degree of tactile activity in contrast to Asians who are considered a no-contact culture as they often steer away from public display of affection (PDA).

Proxemics and Distance:
Proxemics is defined as the use of space as a form of communication, and includes how far or near you position yourself from others; it can be influenced by culture, race/ethnicity, gender, and age. Edward T. Hall invented the term when he realized that culture influences how people use space in communication while working with diplomats, and published his findings on proxemics in 1959 as The Silent Language. Proxemics also play a big role in business as research shows that gender and invasion of customers' privacy without previous ties negatively affect the outcome of deals. Besides, in high contact cultures, people are generally more comfortable in closer proximity, whereas individuals in low-contact cultures feel more comfortable with a greater amount of personal space.

According to Edward T. Hall, the amount of space we maintain between ourselves and the persons we communicate with shows the importance of the science of proxemics. In this process, it is seen how we feel towards others at that particular time. This resonates with proxemics and viewing it through the cultural lens, people use their space differently because of the meaning behind it as in a spectrum of cultures, ideologies differ. Within American culture, Hall defines four primary distance zones: (i) intimate (touching to eighteen inches) distance, (ii) personal (eighteen inches to four feet) distance, (iii) social (four to twelve feet) distance, and (iv) public (more than twelve feet) distance.

Public distance occurs in situations where two-way communication is not desirable or possible. When that space we maintain is invaded, Hasler et al state that we unconsciously turn on defense mechanisms that include changes in eye gaze or orientation as well as moving away to convey your discomfort to the other person especially when no primary interpersonal relationship exists.

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- The ideas in the encoding and decoding processes section aren't covered in the article as a whole. An alternative to completely deleting this would be to add some sentences in the content section. For example, the phrase 'Encoding information utilizes signals which we may think to be universal. ' can be removed and put in the gesture portion of the content.

Article body
- In the Display of emotions section: Nonverbal communication can also be explored in the context of illnesses. i.e. Doctor's interactions with depressed patients or also between family members during tragic intimate moments like the end of life.

- Infant's attitude towards non-linguistic vocal expressions.

- Comprehension of nonverbal facial clues can be reinforced by adding some recent real-life context studies in business within the pandemic era.

- Addition of sign language.