CADRE Resources

Barriers to Every Day Communication

One of the most common complaints from clients entering mediation is that they cannot communicate with each other. All of us have experienced, at one time or another, the frustration of feeling misunderstood and being unable to make ourselves understood by another person. In mediation, the first step toward resolving a conflict is for the mediator to understand the point of view of each person, and then to help the parties understand each other. The more people understand each other, the more likely they can resolve their conflict. However, this requires both listening and assertion skills which are different from our typical ways of communicating. Therefore, such skills must be learned. Here at the Northern California Mediation Center, we spend a good deal of time teaching these skills in our trainings and modeling such skills with our clients. The response has been so positive that we would like to share some of these basic communication skills with you in this series of articles.

This article introduces the concepts of good communication and discusses some of the common barriers to communication. Future articles will address what is good listening and constructive assertion, and how to do each effectively.

Good communication skills are mutual respect skills. Ideally, each person will show respect for the other as well as respect for self. You show respect for the other person by listening fully and demonstrating that you "get" what that person means; and you respect yourself when you assert or "give" your own legitimate self-interest without aggression. To have a complete communication, each person must both "get" and "give."

Let us look at some of the conversational bad habits which often interfere with full and complete communication. Anything which blocks the meaning of a communication is a barrier to communication. These usually fall into one of three categories: judging, sending solutions or avoiding the other person's concerns. Some common examples follow:

All of these responses judge the other person and therefore impose the speaker's point of view. The other person will often feel misunderstood and unsafe, and is more likely to react in a defensive or self-protective manner.