You don’t really get what I’m saying (over text)
Communication in the modern world is broken. Misunderstanding is so widespread, and a lot of it is due to us having reduced the act of communication down to a text, or an email. We try to take very complex ideas and crunch them into a few words, hoping that the person we are talking to can not only accurately decode the words we’ve sent, but also understand the tone, emotion, and purpose behind it. This is absolutely absurd.
Language is inherently ambiguous and hard to decode, even when spoken. When we listen to someone speak, there is a lot more information that we take in to accurately interpret what is being vocalized. Body language, tone, volume, and cadence to name a few. This can communicate a number of things including urgency, emotion and feelings about the conversation, and the perceived importance of the conversation. We’ve reduced this complex system to it’s building blocks only, but still expect to get the full benefit of it.
Lets explore the ambiguity of the English language with a classic example of structural ambiguity — which is one of many.
Take the sentence — “I saw a man on the street with binoculars”.
Did I:
- see a man who was on the street (sitting? standing? walking?) looking through binoculars
- see a man, who had a pair of binoculars in his possession, on the street
- see a man on the street, and a pair of binoculars that were also on the street
We might be inclined to say its quite obvious, but is it? The sentence is grammatically sound. But it is ambiguous. Details can be added to make the sentence clearer, but that’s besides the point.
Back to the communication issue. When we are trying to convey something, especially in a high emotional state, we are not analyzing whether what we are typing could be interpreted differently. The only goal at that moment is to get our point across, which puts the receiver of this communication in a peculiar position. The receiver now has to take into account all of the context (if any) around the conversation going on, analyze what could be meant by it (meant by what?), what type of response the sender might be expecting, their mood and then craft a perfect response, taking all the factors into account.
This is an absurd task for anyone to be expected to complete with preciseness. There are so many factors, many which are not presented, to take into account.
If we take this same scenario and put it into a phone conversation, or an in-person conversation, a lot of these mis-understandings can be avoided. From the tone of the conversation, the reaction that is induced by something that is said, the way something is said can all contribute to a better understanding of what is being conveyed by the speaker. There are many cues we pick up on subconsciously that is not possible over text or email. We may take an interruption during a conversation to be rude, but even that adds a whole new element to it that cannot be replicated over text.
This is not a comprehensive guide on how to eliminate all miscommunications from our lives. There still exist many forms of ambiguity in our language and communication styles — general misunderstandings in our conversations, conversations that take a whole different path, sarcasm, implications, questions vs. requests, homonyms, idioms, and references to anecdotal experiences. This is also not a call for everyone to stop texting — it's a wildly useful tool and everyone should be utilizing it as they see fit.
However, taking the time to really understand what someone is trying to convey, and clarifying if one is not sure could prevent miscommunication in our daily lives. Let’s stop blaming the incompetence of people, and recognize the deficiencies in our modes of communication and adapt!
