Chapter 1
Speaking in Public
Similarities Between Public Speaking and Conversation
Organizing thoughts logically
Tailoring the message to the audience
Telling a story for maximum impact
Adapting to listener feedback
Differences Between Public Speaking and Conversation
Public speaking is more highly structured
Public speaking requires more
formal language
Public speaking requires a
different method of delivery
The Speech Communication Process
Speaker
Message
Channel
Listener
Feedback
Interference
Situation
Speaker
The person who is presenting an oral message to a listener.
Message
Whatever a speaker communicates to someone else.
Channel
The means by which a message is communicated.
Listener
The person who receives the speaker’s message.
Frame of Reference
The sum of a person’s knowledge, experience, goals, values, and attitudes.
Frame of Reference
Everything a speaker says is filtered through a listener’s frame of reference.
No two people can have exactly the same frame of reference.
Feedback
The messages, usually nonverbal, sent from a listener to a speaker.
Interference
Anything that impedes the communication of a message.
Situation
The time and place in which speech communication occurs.
Stage Fright
Anxiety over the prospect of giving a speech in front of an audience.
Nervousness Is Normal
Your body is responding by producing extra adrenaline, a hormone released into the bloodstream in response to physical or mental stress.
Reducing Speech Anxiety
Acquire speaking experience
Prepare, prepare, prepare
Think positively
Use the power of visualization
Know that most nervousness is not visible
Don’t expect perfection
Positive Nervousness
Controlled nervousness that helps energize a speaker for her or his presentation.
Visualization
Mental imaging in which a speaker vividly pictures himself or herself giving a successful presentation.
Critical Thinking
Focused, organized thinking about such things as the logical relationships among ideas, the soundness of evidence, and the differences between fact and opinion.
Ethnocentrism
The belief that one’s own group
or culture is superior to all other groups or cultures.