"I like to listen. I have learned a great deal from listening carefully. Most people never listen." Ernest Hemingway. Often when a misunderstanding occurs, it is attributed to a lack of communication, which most of the time implies that whoever was delivering the message did not do an effective job. But what about the other side, the listener?

Listening is important. It is the communication skill most often used in human interaction. Between 45 and 55 percent of people's communication time will be spent in listening to others (Curtis, Floyd and Winsor, p. 56). As our textbooks tell us, listening is not a skill that most people perform well.

It is difficult to define listening. We could say that it is a receiver orientation to the communication process, since communication involves both a source and a receiver, listening consists of roles receivers play in the communication process. "Listening is a process that includes attending, perceiving, interpreting, assessing, and responding" (Barker and Gaut, p. 47).

Our own listening habits have been developed since we were born. Such habits are so well established that we perform them without thinking. Unfortunately, suc

Filtering - we usually filter out messages and listen only to those topics and materials that we want to hear. We will stop paying attention to those topics that we do not want to hear, such as messages that criticize us. Then we cannot be corrected, and we cannot take suggestions to change.

Identifying - you take everything people tell you and refer it back to your own experience. They may want to tell you about a car's braking system, but that reminds you of your car accident. You launch into your story before they finish theirs.

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Approximate Word count = 1503
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)