Sunday, March 11, 2012
Misunderstandings Happen
I have recently been conducting research on nonverbal messages that occur during an interview interaction between the interviewer(s) and the interviewee. A statistic that I have repeatedly read (yet haven’t any definitive source to cite) is that only a small percentage of communication involves actual words, only 7% of communication involves words to be exact (at least from the statistics that I read). In fact 55% of communication is visual (body language, eye contact) and 38% is vocal (pitch, speed, volume, tone of voice). The most common body language attributes, mentioned in the research I found, that sway a person’s opinion of another are: eye contact, posture and hand gestures. Then there were several additional attributes mentioned at random. Some of these are more obscure, but a few I was surprised to find not mentioned with more regularity. They consist of: choice of positionality, smiling, fiddiling with props, bobbing your head, rocking or fidgeting, and mirroring your body language to match that of the interviwer’s. Alas, all communication, and that includes body language and other types of nonverbal messages, is ultimately left up to the perception or interpretation of its receiver. This is the epitome of how misunderstandings happen.
The Fur-Kid
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These are some really interesting statistics! Although you do not have a direct source, I definitely believe it. Given that interviews will always be a big part of our careers, whether we are the ones being interviewed or if we are the ones doing the interviewing, I think it’s really important for everyone to know how big of a role nonverbal communication plays in them. Confidence, usually shown through speech and body language, can make a big difference in the impression you make to the other person or people involved with the interview. If everyone knew how much of a differences these things made, maybe they would have better results from their interviews!
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