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Create com munication skills and feelings

achieve objectives. If counsellors and helpers are to be good at listening deeply and accurately to clients, they have to make and implement effec­tive choices in this skills area.

In counselling and helping there are two main categories of skills: communication and action skills, or skills that entail external behav­iour; and mind skills, or skills that entail internal behaviour. Readers may wonder why feelings and physical reactions are not mentioned as skills. The reason for this is that feelings and physical reactions are essentially part of people's instinctual or animal nature so are not skills in them­selves. However, both students and clients can influence how they feel and physically react by how they communicate/act and by how they think.

Creating communication and action skills

There are five main ways counsellors, trainees and clients can send messages by creating communication and taking action. Verbal commu­nication consists of messages sent with words: for example saying 'I understand what you are saying' or 'I don't understand.' Vocal com­munication consists of messages sent through one's voice: for instance, using volume, articulation, pitch, emphasis and speech rate. Bodily com­munication consists of messages sent by the body: for instance through gaze, eye contact, facial expression, posture, gestures, physical proximity and clothes and grooming. Touch is a special category of bodily commu­nication. Messages sent by touch include: what part of the body one uses, what part of another's body gets touched, and how gentle or firm is the touching. Taking action communication consists of messages sent when not face to face with others: for example, sending a follow-up note to a client who has missed an appointment. Though not emphasized in the following discussion, it is extremely important to acknowledge cultural differences in communication.

Verbal communication skills

Let's look at some skills of verbal communication or talk.

• Language. Language consists of many elements other than whether people are English-speaking or not. For instance, there may be a for­mal language, words either BBC or ABC news readers might use, as well as an informal or colloquial language, words one might use with mates in the pub.

20 lntroducti,:' ­

• Content. Content may refer to topic area, problem area or the task being undertaken, such as learning counselling skills. In addition, content refers to the focus of talk, whether it is about oneself, others or the environment. Content can also refer to the evaluative dimen­sion of talk: for example, depressed clients may say many negative things about themselves, such as 'I'm worthless' and 'I just don't seem to care any more.'

• Amount of speech. 'Shy' is a common term attached to people who experience difficulty when it comes to their turn to talk. In some, but not all counselling approaches, clients talk more than counsellors. However, some clients may be talkative from the start, others warm up as helping progresses, and yet others talk haltingly throughout even though the counselling may be successful. Counselling trainees can also talk too much or too little.

• Ownership of speech. Thomas Gordon (1970), in his book Parent

Effectiveness Training, makes a useful distinction between 'You' mes­sages and 'I' messages. 'You' messages focus on the other person and can be judgemental: for example, 'You don't appreciate what I'm doing for you' or 'You're not listening to me properly.' 'I' mes­sages use the word 'I' and are centred in a person as the sender: for instance, 'I feel unappreciated' or 'I'm experiencing not being heard correctly.'

Activity 2.1 Creating verbal communication skills

Trainees and trainer(s) can partiCipate in one or more of the following activities where the object is to allow others to get to know you better. Observe how you create your verbal communication skillS by what you choose to reveal and conceal.

• Introduce yourself. Spend one or two minutes describing yourself as a person to the whole training group.

• Introduce a partner. Divide into pairs. Partner A discloses to partner B, who listens and may ask a few questions. After a set time period, say two or three minutes, the partners reverse roles. This pairs work is followed by partners introducing one another to the whole training group.

• Use triads or smali groups. Divide into threes or small groups and introduce yourselves to one another during a set time period.

• Circulate with personal information visible. Fill out either an index card or a Post-It sticker with information about yourself, and then pin or stick it on your front. Circulate and hold brief conversations with as many people in your training group as you can within a set time period.

Hold debriefing sessions at the end of getting acquainted activities. Explore skillS connected with creating, sharing, and withholding verbal information. '

21 Create communication skills and feeljngs

Vocal communication skills

A person's vocal messages can speak volumes about what they truly feel and how emotionally responsive they are to others' feelings . The follow­ing five dimensions of vocal messages form the acronym VAPER - volume, articulation, pitch, emphasis and rate.

• Volume. Volume refers to loudness or softness. Counselling trainees need to speak at a level of audibility that is comfortable and easy for clients to hear. Some trainees let their voices trail away at the end of sentences. Some unnecessarily soften their voice to match that of their client. Though a booming voice overwhelms, speaking too quietly may give the impression that one is a 'wimp'. A firm and confident voice is a good starting point from which to make variations as appropriate, for instance by speaking more gently or more loudly.

• Articulation. Articulation refers to the clarity of speech. Trainees and clients who enunciate words well are easier to understand.

• Pitch. Pitch refers to the height or depth of one's voice. An optimum pitch range includes all the levels at which a pleasing voice can be produced without strain. Errors of pitch include either being too high pitched or too low pitched.

• Emphasis. A trainee uses vocal emphasis when responding to clients' feelings and nuances and when sharing feelings. Trainees may use either too much emphasis and seem melodramatic or too little empha­sis and come across as wooden. In addition, they may use emphasis in the wrong places.

• Rate. Often speech rate is measured by words per minute. Speech rate depends not only on how quickly words are spoken, but on the fre­quency and duration of pauses between them. If speaking very quickly, trainees appear anxious and clients may have difficulty understanding them. On the other hand, too ponderous a speech rate can be boring or pompous. Pausing and being silent at the right times is another important aspect of speech rate.

Activity 2.2 · Creating vocal communication skills

Part .A: Assess your vocal communication skills

Self-assessment Assess yourself on each of the following 'creating vocal communication' skills you use when you either participate in your counselling skills group and/or help clients:

l

22 IntroduC':ic­

• volume • articulation • pitch • emphasis • speech rate • use of pauses and silences • other important areas not listed above

2 Obtain feedback Obtain feedback from the other trainees in your group and from your trainer(s) on your good and poor vocal communication skills.

Part B: Change a specific vocal communication skill

Pick a specific vocal communication ski" that you think you might improve: for instance you may have a tendency to talk too softly. Then hold a conversation with a partner in which you work on improving the skill you have targeted. Either during or at the end of your conversation ask for feedback on how you are dOing.

If appropriate, you and your partner then reverse roles.

Bodily communication skills

When both speaking and listening, counsellors, counselling trainees and clients disclose themselves through how they create their bodily com­munication. Following are some of the main kinds of bodily communi­cation skills.

Facial expressions

Facial expressions are perhaps the main vehicle for sending body messages. Ekman, Friesen and Ellsworth (1972) have found that there are seven main facial expressions of emotion: happiness, interest, surprise, fear, sadness, anger, and disgust or contempt. A person's mouth and eyebrows can convey much information: for instance, 'down in the mouth' and 'raised eyebrows'.

Gaze

Gaze, or looking at other people in the area of their faces, is both a way of showing interest and a way of collecting facial information. Speakers look at listeners about 40 per cent of the time and listeners look at speakers about 70-75 per cent of the time. Gaze is useful for coordinating speech: for example, speakers look just before the end of utterances to collect feedback about their listener's reactions. Women

are gene (Argyle,

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23 Create communication skills and fee lings

are generally more visually attentive than men in all measures of gaze (Argyle, 1999).

Eye contact

Eye contact is a more direct way than gaze of sending messages, whether of interest, anger or sexual attraction.

Gestures

Gestures are physical movements that can frame or illustrate words com­ing before, during or after what is being said. An example of using a ges­ture to display and emphasize an emotion is clenching one's fist to show aggression. Gestures may also illustrate shapes, sizes or movements, par­ticularly when these are difficult to describe in words. How people ges­ture can vary according to their sex. Sometimes men's gestures are larger, more sweeping and forceful, while women's gestures are smaller and more inhibited. Gestures can also take the place of words: for example, either nodding one's head up and down or moving it sideways for saying 'yes' or 'no', respectively.

Posture

A counselling trainee's posture may convey various messages. Turning one's body towards the client is more encouraging than turning away from them. In addition, whether the trainee leans forwards or backwards may indicate interest or uninterest. Height tends to be associated with status: for instance, one 'talks down to' or 'talks up to' someone. Small people may be at a disadvantage unless the other person's body posture is changed: for instance by sitting down.

Posture may also communicate how anxious a person is: for instance, sitting with arms and legs tightly crossed suggests being emotionally as well as literally uptight. However, for a woman, it is possible to appear too relaxed: some men may mistakenly perceive uncrossed and open legs as a sign of sexual availability whether a skirt, trousers or jeans are worn. Such perceptions manifest confused standards in how people decode body messages.

Physicat closeness

The degree of physical closeness that is comfortable for Britons and Antipodeans is generally the same (HaU, 1966). The zones vary accord­ing to the nature of the relationship. In the intimate zone (between 6 to 18 inches) it is easy to touch and be touched. This zone is reserved for spouses, lovers, close friends and relatives. The personal zone (between 18 and 48 inches) is appropriate for less close friends and for parties

24 lntro

and other social gatherings. The social zone (between 4 and 12 feet) is comfortable for people not known at all well. The public zone (over 12 feet) is the distance for addressing public gatherings.

Clothes

If clothes do not make the counsellor or helper, they certainly send many messages that can influence how much and in which areas clients reveal themselves. These messages include social and occupational standing, sex-role identity, ethnicity, conformity to peer group norms, rebelliousness and how outgoing they are. While maintaining their individuality, counselling trainees need to dress appropriately for their clientele: for example, delinquent teenagers probably respond better to informally dressed helpers than do stressed business executives.

Grooming

Personal grooming also provides important information about how well people take care of themselves; for instance, clean or dirty, neat or tidy. In addition, the length and styling of hair sends messages about what sort of person one is.

Activity 2.3 Creating bodily communication skills

Part A: Assess your bodily communication skills

1 Self-assessment Assess yourself on each of the following 'creating bodily communication' skills you use when either you participate in your counselling skills group and/or work with clients :

• facial expression • gaze • eye contact • gestures • posture • physical proximity • clothing • grooming • other important areas not listed above

2 Obtain feedback Obtain feedback from the other trainees in your group and from your trainer(s) on your good and poor bodily communication skills.

25 Create communication skiLls and feelings

Part B: Change a specific bodily communication skill

Pick a specific bodily communication skill that you think you might improve: for instance you may have a tendency to sit with too rigid a posture. Then hold a conversation with a partner in which you work on improving the skill you have targeted. Either during or at the erid of your conversation ask for feedback on how you are doing.

If appropriate, you and your partner then reverse roles.

Feelings and physical reactions

To a large extent, people are what they feel. Dictionary definitions of feelings tend to use words like 'physical sensation', 'emotions' and 'awareness'. All three of these illustrate a dimension of feelings. People are biological beings first, persons second. As such they need to learn to value and live with their underlying biological nature. The word emo­tions implies movement. Feelings are processes. People are subject to a con­tinuous flow of biological experiencing. Awareness implies that people can be conscious of their feelings. However, at varying levels and in different ways, they may also be out of touch with them.

Physical reactions both represent and accompany feelings and, in a sense, the two are indistinguishable. For example bodily changes associ­ated with anxiety include galvanic skin response - detectable electrical changes taking place in the skin, raised blood pressure, a pounding heart and a rapid pulse, shallow and rapid breathing, muscular tension, drying of the mouth, stomach problems such as ulcers, speech difficulties such as stammering, sleep difficulties, and sexual problems such as complete or partial loss of desire. Other physical reactions include a slowing down of body movements when depressed, and dilated eye pupils in moments of anger or sexual attraction. People are affected by their physical reac­tions. For example, in anxiety and panic attacks, they may first feel tense and anxious and then become even more tense and anxious because of this initial feeling. The subject of physical reactions is dealt with again in Chapter 10, where they are listed in Box 10.I.

Counselling trainees need to be able to experience and understand both their own and their clients' feelings. Even though feelings repre­sent people's biological nature, this does not mean that trainees and their clients can do nothing about them. In counselling and helping, three somewhat overlapping areas where feelings and accompanying phys­ical reactions are important include experiencing feelings, expressing feelings and managing feelings. In each of these areas, counselling skills

26 Introducri!'

students can work with clients' communications/actions and thoughts and mental processes to influence how they feel and physically react.

Activity 2.4 Feelings and physical reactions

What physical reactions might accompany the following feelings?

• anger • sadness • depression • joy • attraction • tiredness • any other feeling on which you wish to focus

2 To what extent do you consider that you are

- in touch with your feelings - able to express your feelings well?

3 How might your understanding of and ability to express your feelings influence how well you counselor help clients?

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