TRIANGLE OF MEANING HOW DO WE INTERPRET COMMUNICATIONS?

DEFINING “MEANING” DO YOU SAY WHAT YOU MEAN? DO YOU MEAN WHAT YOU SAY? DO YOU ASSUME THAT OTHERS INTERPRET THAT COMMUNICATION EXACTLY AS YOU MEANT IT? HOW DO WE TRULY “COMMUNICATE” WITH OTHERS?

AN EXAMPLE OF HOW THIS WORKS WHAT IS “FISH”? AN AQUATIC BEING A ROCK BAND A CHARACTER ON AN OLD TV SHOW AN ACTIVITY YOU ENJOY SOMETHING THAT YOU EAT A FOUR LETTER WORD

HOW DID YOU PROCESS “FISH”? DID YOU THINK ABOUT MULTIPLE MEANINGS OR DID YOU ASSUME THAT I MEANT WHAT YOU INTERPRETED IT TO MEAN? WITHOUT CONTEXT, NONVERBAL CUES, OR AN UNDERSTANDING OF THE RECEIVER – THE WORD BECOMES ONLY A SYMBOL WITH MULTIPLE POSSIBILITIES.

What does “fish” mean to the participants in this picture?

WHAT ABOUT “LOVE”? WHAT DOES IT MEAN? HOW DO YOU KNOW IT MEANS THE SAME THING TO YOU AS IT DOES TO THE PERSON WITH WHOM YOU ARE SPEAKING? IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE WE USE ONE WORD WHILE IN MANY OTHER LANGUAGES MULTIPLE WORDS ARE USED TO INDICATE DIFFERENT TYPES OF LOVE.

PLEASE REMEMBER Four letter words can get you in trouble. Even four letter words like “fish” and “love”.

symbol person object The area inside the triangle represents all the possible meanings of the word (symbol) for that individual.

symbol Person #1 object symbol object Person #2 REMEMBER that the symbol (word) is not the thing it represents.

object symbol Person 1 & 2 The overlapping area indicates the possible meanings for the symbol that the sender and receiver have in common.

COMMUNICATION IS A PROCESS SENDER RECEIVER MESSAGE MEDIUM INTERFERENCE FEEDBACK CONTEXT

“What do you think that meant?”