The Listening Styles Profile (Rubin, Rubin, Graham, Perse
& Seibold, 2009) is the one assessment that my results did not match how
the other two people responded. In fact the results from my assistant and
mother matched, but again, did not match mine.
My results showed that my listening style was in Group 3: content-oriented.
I do believe that when I listen to others, I am looking for details to make
sure I am making an accurate decision and in my professional life I need to
make sure I am listening for details to understand what might be going on in
the lives of my students and families. Like the profile stated, I do feel that when
there is a lot of information coming at me, I struggle with comprehending it
all. There are many times that I “zone” out when listening to a lot of
information because I can get overwhelmed by hearing all the information
presented at once. I try to take notes
as much as possible because of that. The results of my assistant and mother had
my listening style come out as Group 4: time-oriented. I can see why my
assistant’s results showed that because in a work setting I do have to be aware
of my schedule and have to carefully allocate when and how long I am going to be
able to listen. My mother also knows what I am like as a professional and said
the same thing, I have to be time-oriented during the work day. I did like that
my mother pointed out, that if she were to do this survey for my professional
and personal life, that the two results would be different. She believes if she
were to answer the questions solely on my personal life or even had a non-work
friend complete it, my results may have
been more in line with Group 1:
people-oriented. I agreed with her when
she brought this up, my listening style is very different in my personal life
than my professional life, and a lot of it has to do with time.
The
final communication assessment also surprised me a bit. In regards to the Verbal Aggressiveness Scale
(Rubin, Palmgreen & Sypher, 2009) I came out in the moderate range. I am
going to be honest, I was expecting to be in the significant range. I say this
because I can really call people out on things when warranted. When going over
the questions though, I did find myself saying, “No, I’m not that bad.” I don’t
attack people’s character or try to belittle them, so I can see why I am more
moderate. My mother and assistant’s
results also showed that I was in the moderate level. My mother frequently made
the comment while completing the assessment, “it depends on who it is.” This is
a statement I agree with. A perfect example was today. I attended an initial
intake meeting for one of my student’s at an outside agency for wrap-around
services. I literally walked into the evaluation room with the parent and
student and the agency worker started criticizing me regarding the incident
reports I provided to the agency to help them understand the aggressive and
unsafe behaviors this child is presenting. The agency worker didn’t even
introduce himself to me or the parent before his critique began. The agency worker told me that he did not
agree with what I was doing in my classroom and that it is no wonder I am
seeing these behaviors. Three different times throughout the 50 minute meeting
this person criticized what I was doing in my classroom, in front of the
parent. It took all I had to remain professional during this meeting and not
become argumentative or defensive. I was so upset when I left! Had I not had on
my “professional hat,” I would have become verbally aggressive toward this
individual.
References:
Rubin, R. B., Palmgreen, P., & Sypher, H. E.
(Eds.) (2009). Communication research measures: A sourcebook. New York: Routledge.
Rubin, R. B., Rubin, A. M., Graham, E. E., Perse, E.
M., & Seibold, D. R. (Eds.) (2009). Communication
research measures II: A sourcebook. New York: Routledge.
