Graham D. Bodie

Listening is Listening is Listening: Employees’ Perception of Listening as a Holistic Phenomenon

Interpersonal listening research is marked by a wealth of conceptual definitions and measurement instruments, with a consensus about neither. Therefore, we sought to discover how laypeople, rather than theoreticians, construe listening, and to construct a scale that reflects these perceptions. In Study 1, laypeople listed the features and characteristics of interpersonal listening in four different contexts (general, romantic, colleague-to-colleague, and manager–subordinate). In Study 2, a second sample of individuals rated the centrality of the features found in Study 1 for the definition of listening. These centrality ratings were similar to the frequency of good-listening features in Study 1. In Study 3, we used the features identified in Study 1 and 2 and asked a sample of employees to rate each one regarding their experience with their supervisor or one of their work colleagues listening to them. These ratings yielded a single factor. Thus, we conclude that, although people can describe the complexities of listening, they seem to perceive it as a holistic and unitary experience. Practically, a small set of good items pertaining to perceptions of listening may yield an acceptable, or even excellent, unidimensional reliability estimate.

Mapping the terrain of person-centered supportive conversations

ABSTRACT This study explores the conversational terrain of supportive conversations that vary in person centeredness (PC). Our team transcribed and unitized 223 conversations in which a discloser talked about an upsetting event to a listener trained to exhibit either low (LPC), moderate (MPC), or highly person-centered (HPC) comfort. Each utterance was coded for PC with a modified version of the traditional nine-level hierarchy. HPC-coded turns comprised 24% of HPC conversations, while LPC-coded turns comprised almost half of LPC conversations. Over 95% of turns in MPC conversations were classified as MPC. Additionally, turn-level coding and global ratings of PC differentially predicted outcomes. We discuss the implications of these conversational profiles in the context of how the PC content of conversations might aid in cognitive reappraisal.