Week 16 - Post 3

            One other concept that I think is important is in chapter 7, Group Communication. Group communication is such an important thing to learn about because there will always be certain people that you do not get along with. More likely than not, everyone will deal with group communication throughout the rest of there lives. Weather it’s between family, friends, or coworkers, the communication between a specific group of people is a difficult task. One important thing to do in teams is to delegate certain tasks for each person so that no one is confused about what they need to get done. The most important thing to remember in group communication is the steps in the standard agenda. These steps show us how to go about solving a problem in general. Since there will usually be one team member that doesn’t get along with another, everyone needs to know how to work together to solve issues and get through projects. 

Week 16 - Post 2

            The concept that I found most interesting in this class was in chapter 3, Decoding Messages: Listening and Perception, but more specifically, the listening part. I always strive to be a better listener because of the positions that I have held in my sorority. People will always have problems with the things that you do, but if you are willing to let them talk about the problem that they have, things will turn out fine. Improving listening skills can definitely make a difference in your credibility and trustworthiness. The first concept of listening that Trenholm discusses is the attention that you give the person speaking. Along with attention, you need to know how to interpret, evaluate, respond, and store and retrieve what they say to you. Even if a person is simply venting to you, those 5 steps to improve your listening are crucial to improving and maintaining the relationships you have. 

Week 16 - Post 1

            One research method listed in Table 13.3 of chapter 13 that I found interesting was ethnography. This method requires the researcher to practice exactly what he or she is studying and “may actually ‘go undercover’ as a participant” (354). I think this is an interesting research method because it forces the researcher to experience firsthand what he wants to know. It seems to me that it would be one of the most reliable forms of research because the researcher experiences the research. Another interesting method is survey research. I found this interesting because I have conducted surveys in other classes before and it is definitely a great way to get information, as well as the fact that it is a very organized research method. If I wanted to study some aspect of deception, my research question would be, “ How does deception affect interpersonal relationships through the Internet?” I would use the survey method, but I would make it anonymous since people who are deceiving probably will not admit to it. 

Week 14 - Post 3

            A concept that I found interesting in chapter 11 was about mobile telephony. Trenholm discussed that young people think that a cell phone is considered a necessity instead of a luxury. I know that I am apart of this generation that believes in that, though, I do think that cell phones can still be considered a luxury. Young people are starting to get cell phones at a younger and younger age, which promotes more communication with peers outside of school for them. Some parents are not able to afford the expensive and ongoing bill that cell phones require for their children. The new smart phones provide even more ways for communicating with people because they give us apps such as Facebook, Twitter, email, and Internet access that we can contact people with. My generation heavily relies on cell phones, but I definitely think it is possible to live without them, since past generations have proved that they were able to live without a cell phone when they were our age. 

Week 14 - Post 2

            I do agree with Marshall McLuhan’s idea that “the medium is the message”. For example, if you email a person that rarely checks their email and would prefer to discuss matters over the phone, you might not receive a reply for a while. The medium that the message was sent through might technologically be transmitted, but not personally to the person, because they have not checked their email yet. McLuhan describes television as a “cool medium” because it requires the viewers to fill in detail. Television provides us with the ability to see emotions and body language as well as everything else that we could experience while being face-to-face with a person. Viewers are able to see what is on TV as if they are physically watching what is going on. The viewers can fill in the details because they are able to piece different clues together in a conversation from nonverbal and verbal cues, just like face-to-face conversations. 

Week 14 - Post 1

            I have never made friendships that exist exclusively in cyberspace. I mainly use cyberspace, such as social networking sites and email, to stay in contact with people that I already know. For example, I do not accept people that I do not know as friends on Facebook. There are a lot of horror stories about stalkers and people who are not who they say they are online, which leads me to be distrusting of people in cyberspace. If you meet someone online, you might not ever truly know who he or she are unless a mutual friend can vouch for their credibility. It is such a dangerous world online so I always have my guard up and do not form new friendships through cyberspace. Although, I can say that I have maintained many of my friendships through cyberspace, and it is the most convenient and easy way to do so. I think that cyberspace is a great place to maintain friendships, but not smart to form them.