3 What is Communication?
For the telephone,
the channel is a wire, the signal is an electrical
current, and the transmitter and receiver are the handsets.
Noise
would include crackling from the wire.
Feedback would include
the dialling tone, which tells you that the line is ‘live’.
In a conversation, my brain is the source and your brain is the
receiver. The encoder might be the language I use to speak with
you; the decoder is the language you use to understand me. Noise
would include any distraction you might experience as I speak.
Feedback would include your responses to what I am saying:
gestures, facial expressions and any other signals I pick up that
give me some sense of how you are receiving my message.
We also apply the transmission metaphor to human
communication. We ‘have’ an idea (as if it were an object). We
‘put the idea into words’ (like putting it into a box); we try to ‘put
our idea across’ (by pushing it or ‘conveying’ it); and the ‘receiver’
– hopefully – ‘gets’ the idea. We may need to ‘unpack’
the idea
before the receiver can ‘grasp’ it. Of course, we need to be careful
to avoid ‘information overload’.
The transmission model is attractive.
It suggests that
Figure 1.1
The Shannon–Weaver transmission model of
communication
source
encoder
feedback
noise
decoder
receiver
channel
message
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