Question

1. What are the two types of internal interference? What are the two types of external interference? Can you think of an example of each in your own life?

Answer 1

Internal interference refers to one’s own inability to cope with the conversation or listening that’s in progress. One’s moods would play a major role in coping with the ongoing conversation or listening task. For example, if one is tired, bored, sad or even more happy, one wouldn’t be in a mood to listen. Secondly, one’s existing knowledge would prevent them from focusing on the listening, instead, one would process the thoughts in one’s own mind in a way to reply the speaker, thus, reducing the chances of listening actively.

External interference refers to the outside distractions that prevent one from focusing. The most important interference is noise because one would focus on the noise as soon as one hears it. Secondly, one would be distracted by the physical appearance of the speaker and would lose focus on the content that’s delivered. They would just get into day dreaming when the speaker is more attractive or when they refer an event which the listener could connect to.