Communication Styles
“They not like us, they not like us, they not like us…” Kendrick Lamar, Not Like Us
Last week we explored Conflict Resolutions Strategies, taking a few notes from J Cole’s involvement, and subsequent apology and disengagement from, the beef between Kendrick Lamar and Drake. This week, as Kendrick Lamar’s Not Like Us continues to break worldwide records, we‘re inspired by the beef between Kendrick and Drake to highlight different communication styles. Throughout their diss tracks, they each use different communications styles to escalate and provoke each other. As people who hopefully aren’t in the middle of a rap beef, we also use different communication styles in our day-to-day. After reading today’s blog, you’ll be able to recognize your own communication style as well each type represented in song lyrics.
Humans are built to be in community with other humans. Communication allows us to build intimacy and closeness, foster vulnerability and safety. Communication can help set goals within a relationship, resolve conflicts and celebrate achievements. Communication is essential! But communication is also often challenging.
Many clients make their way to Future Full of Hope to work on communication skills. Many clients that identify as male want to practice communication in dating, intimate partner relationships, friendships, or with their parents and children. Clients who are creatives want to perfect communicating through lyrics, performance, sound and art. These clients often want to develop communication skills to foster confidence in performance, advocating for their craft and connecting with their audiences. The professional clients tend to be interested in effective communication with managers, clients, colleagues and employees. They often want to practice empathetic communication during difficult professional situations such as performance evaluations or hiring/firing.
With all of these clients, we review 4 Common types of Communication Styles. These styles are: Assertive Communication, Passive Communication, Passive Aggressive Communication, and Aggressive Communication. They each highlight the power dynamics from which the communicator operates from in the relationship. Awareness of these styles helps to gain awareness of your default communication style and helps practice other styles.
Aggressive Communication: When you communicate aggressively, you’re communicating as if you have all of the power in the situation and the other person doesn't have any. This often sounds like disregard for the other person’s experience and is often accompanied with a raised voice, name calling, and profanity.
Examples of Aggressive Communication:
"You are a terrible friend, and you never respect our plans. Don’t you ever just change plans without telling me.”
"Your presentation today sucked! Did you even try? So pathetic.”
"You will not make decisions for both of us without my permission! I'm not going to put up with this anymore!"
Passive Communication: In this style, you communicate as if you have no power or agency, while assuming that the person you’re communicating with has all of the power in the situation.
Passive statements might sound like:
"I guess it’s okay if our plans change at the last minute, even though it does make me feel a bit down."
"It's probably nothing, but sometimes I feel like my concerns aren't really being taken seriously."
"I understand if you need to make decisions on your own, even though I sometimes wish we could discuss them together first."
Passive Aggressive Communication: When being passive aggressive, you’re using your power and agency in an indirect manner. You’re communicating unpreferred feelings in a passive manner, for example sarcastically, rather than being assertive with your experience.
Examples of Passive Aggressive Communication:
"It must be nice to make decisions without caring about anyone else."
"It's fine. Don’t listen to my concerns, I'm probably just overreacting anyway."
"Don't worry about changing plans at the last minute; I'll just figure out how to adjust on my own like always."
Assertive Communication: This is often the sweet spot for communication. When you communicate assertively, you’re speaking with the understanding that the person you’re talking to has power and choice and is worthy of dignity, honor and respect. You’re also recognizing your power and choice and expect respect. With assertive communication you’re standing up for your own needs and wants, and for those of others
Examples of Assertive Communication:
"I feel really sad and let down when our plans change without any notice. I need us to communicate better and respect the commitments we make to each other."
"When you dismiss my concerns, it makes me feel unimportant and unheard. I need us to work on truly listening to each other's feelings and perspectives."
"It hurts me when you make decisions that affect both of us without discussing them with me first. I need us to collaborate more and make decisions together as a team."
Your own communication style is indicative of the way you typically communicate to other people. Sometimes that style may vary from situation to situation; for example when standing up against injustice, aggressive communication might be important. Appropriateness of styles are context specific. They may also be culturally specific - for example, in a culture where indirect communication is preferred, passive communication may be valued over assertive or aggressive styles.
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AI Disclaimer: This post is original and written by Kevin Boyd of Future Full of Hope, PLLC. Chat GPT-4o was leveraged to generate examples of communication styles. On 5/17/2024, writer prompted Chat GPT-4o to generate 3 examples of each communication style type, based on a fictional scenario of two people in conflict.
