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(
March 2023
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Communication
is when
information
is passed from a sender to a recipient using a
medium
. There are different media that can be used:
Communication can be
spoken
(a word) or non-spoken (a
smile
). Communication has many ways, and happens all the time. Not only humans communicate, most other
animal
s do too. Some communication is done without thinking, such as by changing in
posture
.
Communication that tries to change somebody's mind may be called
persuasion
or
propaganda
.
Communication works by exchanging information or messages. In very basic terms
- The sender makes a message, from an idea. This is usually called
encoding
- The sender transmits the message through the medium.
- The recipient receives the message and
decodes
it.
Besides the content of the message, there are other things that are important. These are not part of the message itself, but rather of its context
- Who is communicating, and what status does the communicator have?
- Communication messages usually do not come alone, but are accompanied by other messages. These are also interpreted.
For a message exchange to be successful, the sender and the recipient must have agreed on a
vocabulary
that avoids
ambiguity
. For example, the word
hedge
can mean completely different things based on the context. In
botany
a hedge is a row of shrubs or trees that make a barrier or form a border. In finance, a hedge is an investment made to reduce the risk of another investment. In linguistics a hedge is a word or set of words that make other words less important. Without information it is therefore very difficult to know which
hedge
is really meant by the speaker.