The Three Basic Skills of Listening
Now that you have an understanding of what the three basic listening models are, it is time to learn about the three most important basic listening skills. These are things that are going to affect your listening ability and make a big difference in what you get out of and put into a conversation.
The three "As," which are attitude, attention, and adjustment, play a key role in listening skills. Once you understand how these impact your listening, they most likely will stay in your mind and keep you on your toes when it comes to the times you need them the most.
It Is All Attitude
According to the dictionary, attitude is a mental position or feeling of emotion in regard to a fact or state. This has a lot to do with how you listen to someone speaking. In order to listen well, we have to approach the situation with an open mind. It is important to realize that what the person is saying is important, even if you have prior feelings about the topic that you are bringing to the table.
If you have an attitude that everyone deserves respect when being listened to, you will be a better participant and get more out of what you are hearing. We usually can learn something from everyone. If you have an attitude that this is true, then you usually will be a better listener and provide the speaker with more respect and attention.
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Have you ever tried speaking to a child that had an attitude at the time? If so, you can easily picture why attitude matters so much when we are listening. If people have a poor attitude or are feeling angry, bitter, or combative, they will not be able to be effective listeners. To be an effective listener, keep an open and relaxed attitude and you will get more out of the exchange.
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At Attention
It only makes sense that to listen to what someone is saying you have to pay attention. But for many, that is easier said than done. Some people may have a short attention span and become easily distracted or bored, and others may have difficulty paying attention because they tend to daydream, have a hard time focusing, or even have difficulty hearing.
If you have a difficult time with paying attention, it will make effective listening that much more of a challenge. There are some things you can do in order to improve your attention skills, such as playing memory games, reading, and playing an observation game in which you look at a picture for a minute and then turn away and recall as much about the picture as you can. Even regularly doing meditation can help improve your ability to focus and pay attention.
Did you know?
There are eight or nine million adults in the United States alone that have attention deficit disorder (ADD). If you have trouble with your attention span and have difficulty being able to improve it, you may want to speak with a doctor to be tested for ADD, which is a condition where the person is often distracted and has difficulty maintaining an attention span.
Adjustment Ease
If you are familiar with the term "go with the flow," then you can easily gain an understanding of what adjustment means in terms of listening. Rather than assuming that the speaker should be saying something, steering the speech in one direction, or talking about a particular topic, adjustment allows you to adapt to what is happening. The more you can adapt to where the speaker is taking the conversation, the better a listener you will be.
If you are not able to adjust to where a speaker is going, you will not be able to have an open mind. This takes us back to the first of the three basic skills of listening: attitude. Having an open mind allows us to adjust to what is being said and, in the end, makes us better able to take in what we are hearing.
Putting It Together
When we apply the three basic skills of listening that we just learned about, we should find that we are right where we need to be in order to effectively listen. We should be at a point where we actively listen to and reflect on what we hear.
At this point, you may be thinking that you want to have a better attitude, pay more attention, and be more flexible and adjusting, but you are not sure how to do that. This is common, as there are many barriers to listening. In upcoming lessons, we will look at common barriers to listening, as well as examples of poor and good listening habits.
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