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This is a word copy of an article that was published in Etc: A Review of General Semantics 73, October 2016, pp. 314-320.  (The journal is a bit behind and this was actually published October 2018.) T he purpose of the article was not to propose new theories but just to put some of these cognitive biases together and apply them to choice-making. And, as usual, the insights of General Semantics make a lot of confusing things a lot clearer. Making choices is not an easy task. It regularly creates stress and regret. Everyone wants to make the right choices or at least what we imagine the right choice might be. The process is complicated and made less effective than might be because of a variety of cognitive biases that impair logical thinking and analysis and lead to errors of judgment, misevaluations, and bad choices. The trick is to identify the biases and to confront them with more logical, more mindful, analysis. Here we single out just five of the many biases (the ambiguity bias,...

After reading the varied posts, I’m convinced we (as an academic discipline) don’t have any evidence for the claims that a live audience is either effective or necessary in online public speaking courses.  Although instructors noted how they handled this issue of a live audience, no one produced any evidence. In fact, I don’t know of any research showing that assembling 6 or more people and presenting a speech to them will improve someone’s public speaking skills more than will delivering it to a camera. If there is evidence, beyond the anecdotal, I’d much appreciate learning about it. Some people report that there is inherent value in presenting a speech to a live audience. This may well be true (though I’m not sure) but perhaps an online public speaking course is not the place for it. We cannot provide students with experience in every type of public speaking situation. After all, the live audience that the speaker recruits is unlike any audience he or she will ever meet again. ...

The following post was sent to the basic course list (Basiccc@lists.udayton.edu) in response to a number of instructors explaining how they incorporated the live audience in an online public speaking course. But, I thought others might be interested in the issue. It's an important one and one that is sure to increase as online courses become more numerous. I’ve read with much interest how various basic course instructors deal with online public speaking assignments. Many (perhaps most), it seems, require the student to deliver the speech in front of a live audience which must be video scanned. This requirement is surely well-intentioned, designed to enable the student to experience presenting to a live audience in as realistic a setting as possible. However, I think there’s a downside to this practice and I’d like to argue that it isn’t necessary and in many ways is counterproductive. Public Speaking is a difficult course for many students, often because of their communication appr...

Here's a wonderful brief post on etiquette and communication. A neat summary of some essential rules.. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/5-timeless-rules-of-etiquette-to-live-by_us_5a81b99ee4b0c6726e15bff4

Here is a Word file of an article published in Etc: A Review of General Semantics , vol. 73, no 2, April 2016, pp. 173-179. The journal is a bit behind its normal publication schedule so this was just published. Making Choices* Living is a process of making choices. Much as you cannot not communicate, you cannot not make choices. Making choices is inevitable--even, as William James noted “When you have to make a choice and don’t make it that is in itself a choice.” You make choices constantly—you chose what to wear, where to shop, what to eat, whom to call, what to read, what websites to access. Some choices are easy to make and some are difficult. Selecting a shirt or the way you want your eggs is an easy decision, largely because your ultimate choice doesn’t make much difference. But, some choices are extremely significant—where to go to college, what person to marry, what type of medical treatment to undergo, or what profession to enter. And, of course, these are the choices that ar...

Tools to analyze and ultimately improve conversation and communication generally have traditionally come in the form of suggestions or guidelines written in a textbook or a how-to-do-it trade book. But, recently, software programs such as Cogito have been developed. These programs are based on an extremely thorough analysis of all sorts of communication signals, especially nonverbal signals, for example, varied or consistent emphasis, mimicking or mirroring, and vocal-cord tension. They read these signals as you are speaking and they offer guidance (don’t vary your emphasis too much, you’re not mirroring the other person’s nonverbals, the person is getting agitated). The target audience for such tools is vast and is currently being tested with and in use with some health care providers and call-in centers.  Here are a few references that might prove helpful. http://www.cogitocorp.com/ Bercovici, J. (2017, July/August). The machine that makes you human. Inc. 76-82. Zarya, V. (2017, ...