Visual and Auditory Codes:

1. Visual and Auditory Codes: Kinesics, Physical Appearance and Vocalics

2. Nothing is more revealing than movement. --Martha Graham The eyes of men converse as much as their tongues, with the advantage that the ocular dialect needs no dictionary, but is understood the world over. --Ralph Waldo Emerson

3. Importance of Visual and Auditory Codes • Biological • survival value • reflexes and other sign behavior • predispositions to attend to auditory and visual social information, esp. from caregivers • Developmental • acquisition of speech and language • Social & interactional

4. Kinesic Code Classifications • Birdwhistell • kinemes • kines, allokines • kinemorphic constructions • parakinesics

5. Kinesic Code Classifications • Ekman and Friesen • affect displays • adaptors (object, self, alter) • e.g., Captain Queeg’s ball bearings • regulators • illustrators (batons, ideographs, kinetographs, pictographs, deictic movements, spatial movements, rhythmic movements, emblematic movements) • emblems (insults, greetings, departures, interpersonal directions, replies, physical states, emotions)

6. Kinesic Code Classifications • Bavelas • conversational gestures • topic gestures-- ones that relate to the content itself • interactive or social gestures--ones that function to distinguish true dyadic interaction from monologues and that are nonredundant with the information conveyed by words • delivery • citing • seeking • turn-taking

7. Kinesic Code Classifications • Chovil • speaker comments-- Nonrepresentational facial expressions or gestures that add in personal sentiments to neutral statements, allude to thoughts or memories, and interactive displays that recruit interlocutor’s attention • listener comments-- backchannel displays, personal reactions to what speaker is saying, motor mimicry • Von Cranach--gaze, mutual gaze, looks

8. Kinesic Code Classifications • McNeill & Duncan • iconics-- pictorial gestures that bear a close resemblance to a concrete object that is being depicted • same as pictographs and kinetigraphs • beats-- hand movements that follow the rhythmic pulsation of speech and use same form regardless of speech content • deictics-- pointing gestures • metaphorics--pictorial gestures that present an abstract concept or thought process • incorporates ideographs, spatial movements, rhythmic movements, and emblematic movements • cohesives-- repetitions of gestures, movements, and locations in gestural space to tie together related but separated discourse themes continuities across separated

9. Vocalic Code Classifications • Trager & Poyatos linguistic approaches • primary qualities • timbre, resonance, loudness, pitch, intonation range, syllabic duration, rhythm • voice qualifiers • e.g., breathing control, laryngeal control, articulatory control • voice differentiators • e.g., laughter, crying, shouting, sighing, belching • alternants (word-like constructions) • e.g., “pooh,” “brrr”

10. Vocalic Code Classifications • Rockwell acoustic versus perceptual classification • segmentals • nonsegmentals • suprasegmentals • Pittam functional taxonomy

11. Illustrators Emblems Eye contact Regulators Sitting & standing postures Attractiveness Clothing Hair Make-Up and Adornments Norms and Expectations • Voice tempo • Voice pitch • Voice quality

12. Comparing Codes on Communication Potential • Empirical evidence • invalid studies • valid studies • conclusions

13. Comparing Codes on Communication Potential • Encoding potential • number of channels available for transmission • number and range of cues transmitted • symbolic v. sign value • simultaneity of transmission • static or dynamic presentation • manipulability • number of functions

14. Comparing Codes on Communication Potential • Decoding potential • visual and auditory acuity • attention and arousal • multiplicity of meanings and cultural or contextual dependency • ambiguity or clarity of meanings, discernment of intent