When we speak, we communicate our point in more ways than one. Our words convey ideas and concepts, our tone, emotion and intent. Together these two basic but distinct channels give our speech meaning. Unfortunately, the two don’t always align when we speak.
What You Hear Strikes Emotionally Before the Words are Understood
Early in my career, I worked alongside a diverse team of scientists and laboratory technicians. Some, from around my home in Houston, Texas, whereas others hailed from a multitude of foreign countries.
One technician was a native Iranian, a United States citizen, and a long-time resident of Texas. He and I got along well, and I understood his accented English without difficulty. In my opinion, he was friendly, conscientious, and hard-working. However, as his supervisor, generational Houstonian technicians, complained to me that he was abrasive, aloof, and difficult to work with. I had trouble understanding the situation.
Yes, it is quite possible he might have behaved differently toward me than toward his peers. I was his supervisor, after all, and people adopt different personas in different situations. I watched from afar, as the technicians interacted. I asked questions to understand their perceptions and the circumstances. Yet, I could not identify the source of the problem.
I had to change my approach. I started listening more intently to my own conversations with the Iranian-born technician. After really listening to everything he was saying, I realized there were unusual intonations and lilts in his speech. If I focused just on those intonations, I perceived a very different message, ‘Do what I say.’
Words Have Their Own Meanings
Through familiar combinations of sounds that represent equally familiar words and sentences, we can use part of the sound to convey information. This verbal channel generally operates transparently: we typically intend to speak aloud and consciously use certain words to convey certain meanings.
The Meanings of Tones Can Be Completely Different
At the same time, we use another part of the sound to convey information about our emotions and attitudes. We associate certain traits of speech like pitch and modulation with behavior and attitudes such as friendliness, ambivalence, or scorn. This nonverbal channel generally operates covertly; we don’t analyze as much as react after the fact. If all we have is the sound, without a meeting of eyes and face, the subconscious conclusions are even more substantial.
Tone Strikes Powerfully Into Our Subconscious
In American English, a question is not a question unless the tone rises at the end of the sentence. Commands start with a high tone and end with a flat one. We perceive intent most passionately when we are not really paying attention to the words. We are fundamentally emotional creatures, and we process those feelings in the subconscious.
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The underlying tone of the native Iranian’s speech was the source of the problem: his verbal words did not match his nonverbal tone. Without saying as much, the native Houstonians thought he had been ordering them around. A thoroughly confusing situation for a native English speaker and listener; their response was equally baffling to the nonnative.
I highlighted the issue to the native Houstonians and their foreign-born colleague, helping all to realize impressions were inadvertent, not deliberate—a false perception created solely from tone.
Negotiators must recognize and assess the subtle as well as the obvious
To understand a speaker’s true message, a listener must separate the verbal information of the conscious from subconscious nonverbal. Unawareness of these allows confusion and misunderstanding to dominate in negotiations.
We all need to be careful about what we say!