There is also a lack of immediate feedback. Things like facial expressions and tone of voice offer much insight into emotions that may not be expressed verbally. There are also disadvantages in that important context and nonverbal communication can’t be included. Communicating emotions through the written (or typed) word can have advantages such as time to compose your thoughts and convey the details of what you’re feeling. We may also still use pen and paper when sending someone a thank-you note, a birthday card, or a sympathy card. In a time when so much of our communication is electronically mediated, it is likely that we will communicate emotions through the written word in an e-mail, text, or instant message. For example, happy is mild, delighted is moderate, and ecstatic is intense ignored is mild, rejected is moderate, and abandoned is intense (Hargie, 2011). As we expand our emotional vocabulary, we are able to convey the intensity of the emotion we’re feeling whether it is mild, moderate, or intense. The more specific we can be when we are verbally communicating our emotions, the less ambiguous our emotions will be for the person decoding our message.
In order to verbally express our emotions, it is important that we develop an emotional vocabulary. Despite the fact that expressing feelings is more complicated than other forms of expression, emotion sharing is an important part of how we create social bonds and empathize with others, and it can be improved. Expressions of anger can be especially difficult to manage because they represent a threat to the face and self-esteem of others. Even those with good empathetic listening skills can be positively or negatively affected by others’ emotions. Some people are generally not good at or comfortable with receiving and processing other people’s feelings. For example, when people say, “I feel like you’re too strict with your attendance policy,” they aren’t really expressing a feeling they are expressing a judgment about the other person (a thought).Įxpressing feelings can be uncomfortable for those listening. And the defendant seemed to have a shady past-I think he’s trying to hide something.” Sometimes people intentionally or unintentionally express thoughts as if they were feelings.
A juror might express the following thought: “The neighbor who saw the car leaving the night of the crime seemed credible. Jury members are expected to express thoughts based on reported observations to help reach a conclusion about someone’s guilt or innocence. Whereas our observations are based on sensory information (what we saw, what we read, what we heard), thoughts are connected to our beliefs (what we think is true/false), attitudes (what we like and dislike), and values (what we think is right/wrong or good/bad). We take various observations and evaluate and interpret them to assign them meaning (a conclusion). In the perception process, this is similar to the interpretation step. When we express thoughts, we draw conclusions based on what we have experienced.