Communication Research

Here's an interesting infographic: 9 Simple Conversation Hacks: How to Turn Any Interaction in Your Favor , sent to me by Sarah Johnson. Thank you, Sarah. It's sure to spark some interesting class discussion on the uses of communication skills or with the section on conversation or persuasion.

Here is an interesting case that would work well in any communication class dealing with ethics.  In Sunday's New York Times ,  Chuck Klosterman, the Ethicist, was asked if it was ethical for a beer company to bottle the exact same beer but package it in two different type bottles with different labels, one �regular� and one �premium.� The answer from the ethicist was that this was not unethical since the brewer didn�t say these beers were different; it was left it up to the customer to make the inference.  �It only becomes unethical,� says Klosterman, �if the brewer claimed the premium beverage was literally different.� This is nonsense, IMHO. The brewer did say, claim, communicate that the beers were different by the different bottles and the different labels. The label �premium� means that the product is different from one that is not labeled �premium.�  To limit communication to words seems a bit na�ve and leaves us with a conclusion that is intuitively incorrec...

Here's a wonderful  Infographic  on communication sent to me by Michael Yunat, coordinator/GetVolP. It should make a good discussion starter in interpersonal or fundamentals of communication courses.

Here is a New York Times  article on deception detection at airports or, rather, the lack of it. And after a $1 billion plus investment! There is also a great interactive link within the article that will prove interesting in a class discussion.

Here is a report on a study which provides some interesting evidence that although we are only able to detect lying at about 50 percent accuracy (consciously), we may do better relying on our unconscious mind. Briefly, the researchers found that subjects took longer to attach "truthful" labels such as truthful , honest , and valid to visuals of people (shown at speeds below the level of consciousness) who were identified as liars. They also took longer to attach "lie" labels such as dishonest, deceitful, and invalid to visuals of those identified as truth tellers. Conversely, truth labels were more quickly attached to truth-tellers and deception labels were more quickly attached to liars.