[Neurons] 2018 Neurons #32 EXPOSING AN NLP MYTH

[Michael Hall]

From: L. Michael Hall

2018 Neurons #32

July 30, 2018

 

EXPOSING AN NLP MYTH

 

I first read "Buzz" Johnson's article in 1994 when it was published in
Anchor Point.   Having worked in communications as a trainer and therapist I
knew that the idea that communication is 93% non-verbal is just wrong.  I
also knew that from having attempted to watch and understand airplane movies
without headphones.  Watching their faces wasn't enough.  Sights and sounds
of a foreign language movie would give me a sense of the actors' states
(angry, upset, in love, etc.),  but that was about it.  

 

In this article you will discover that most information comes not from
non-verbal channels- tones, facial expressions, or so-called "body
language."   No.  Most information comes from the meta-representational
system of language.  Try to communicate that "Supper will be ready at 5:45
p.m." with just tones and facial expressions.  This highlights the crucial
role that the higher linguistic systems play in our lives.  We need words to
convey higher level as beliefs, concepts, understandings, ideas, plans,
meanings, etc.  So while primary states are valuable and important,
meta-states are much more so.  They truly govern our experiences inasmuch as
they set the conceptual and semantic frames that we live in.  Because the
myth is everywhere, even among NLP trainers who should know better, we
publish it again to sharpen your critical thinking skills.

 

THE 7%, 38%, 55% MYTH

 
Dr. C. E. "Buzz" Johnson

 

In the remote sense that anyone in the NLP field needs their memories
refreshed concerning the numbers in the above title, let me briefly give my
recollection from numerous sessions.  The total message one receives in any
face to face communication is divided into three components.  The words
themselves, the tonality used in delivering those words, and the body
language accompanying the other two. 

 

The numbers indicate the relative weight or importance assigned to each of
these three areas with body language receiving the 55% figure, tonality the
38%, and the actual words themselves being tagged with a paltry 7%.  This
strangely skewed distribution has bothered me ever since my introduction
into this marvelous arena called NLP.

 

Out of the Mist

The first reason for my puzzlement was that none of my NLP instructors could
tell me where those figures came from.  Please do not interpret this to mean
that I had been cursed with unknown and unknowing fly-by-night mentors.
They are all very well known and active in the NLP community.  They are
also, in my opinion, excellent teachers.  However, when asked where I might
find further information about the research that produced those numbers, I
was vaguely referred to a variety of well known universities.  I later drew
a blank at each of these institutions.

 

Secondly, if these percentages are really valid it would mean that the
learning of foreign languages could be greatly abbreviated.  After all, if
the words only account for 7% of the meaning of communication, we should all
be able to go to any country in the world, and simply by listening to the
tone and carefully observing the body language, be able to accurately
interpret 93% of their communications!  And I'll bet you always thought that
learning Chinese or Russian would be a real stretch.  In fact, from these
percentages, it appears that you needn't even bother.  You may be better off
without being encumbered by all the intricacies of any language.  People
like Leo Buscaglia are looking forward to the time when words will no longer
be necessary as he states in his book Living, Loving & Learning.  Since a
word such as "love" has as many definitions as it has definers, he feels it
will be a happy day when the world of word hang-ups is replaced by
"vibrations."

 

Counting on What?

I wonder how many of you have a 93% rate of accuracy when it comes to
interpreting and understanding even your most intimate friends and family
members?  And that's with people speaking the same official language with
its 7% impact!

 

It is not only the NLP community that is espousing and apparently believing
the 7-38-55 myth.  I've heard therapists and counselors who were unfamiliar
with NLP allude to those same numbers.  There also seems to be a widespread
believe among the general population that words are relatively unimportant.
I'm sure most of us have heard people mid-read with statements such as, "She
didn't really mean what she said, she probably meant XXX instead."  Or, "He
may have said that but he didn't really mean it."  Or, "It's not what you
say, but how you say it."

 

In NLP change work, note how carefully we re-word statements in order to
reframe a client's personal perceptions.  And by very skillfully using just
the right hypnotic language patterns, we are able to rapidly enhance desired
shifts in our clients' understandings and attitudes and beliefs.  Would we
need to be this meticulous and conscientious if we were really dealing with
only 7% of a person's awareness and comprehension?

 

I was finally able to track down the source of this myth thanks to a
professional speaker who makes his living giving sales seminars and
workshops.  And yes, the 7-38-55 was an important part of his presentations.
He didn't know how to spell the name of the individual responsible for the
research that originated those numbers or which university was involved, but
he gave me a valuable starting point by offering me a couple of different
possible pronunciations.  I think you'll be interested in what I found.

 

The Study

Albert Mehrabrian, Ph.. Of UCLA was the originator of the 7-38-55 theory.
He speaks of it in two books, Silent Messages published in 1971, and
Nonverbal Communications published in 1972.  In these two books, he refers
to research projects which were published in various professional journals.
I will get to the journals in more detail later, but first let's look at
some of his statements from one of the books.

 

>From Chapter 3 of Silent Messages we find that the numbers 7-38-55 expressed
as percentages have to do only with what he calls the resolution of
inconsistent messages, or to put it in NLP terms, incongruencies.  He also
states that there are very few things that can be communicated non-verbally.
He initially was investigating liking/ disliking which he later generalized
into feelings.  In speaking with him by phone in March, 1994, he stated that
his findings and inferences were not meant to be applied to normal
communications.  They were of very limited application.

 

Let me paraphrase some of his thoughts from page 134 toward the end of that
book.  Clearly, it is not always possible to substitute actions for words
and therefore, what are the limitations of actions as instruments of
communication?  If you've ever played charades, you know that words and
language are by far the most effective way of expressing complex and
abstract ideas.  The ideas contained in Silent Messages, and most other
books for that matter, couldn't be done with actions.  A very important
thing to remember about the differences between words and actions is that
actions only permit the expression of a limited set of things; namely,
primary feelings and attitudes.

 

The Details

Now let's examine in more detail the specifics of a couple of his
experiments from which some people have made some rather sweeping and
inaccurate generalizations.  From the Journal of Consulting Psychology,
1967, Vol. 31. No. 3, pg. 248-252 is a report entitled Inference Of
Attitudes From Nonverbal Communication In Two Channels.  This study was
designed to investigate the decoding of inconsistent and consistent
communications of attitude in facial and vocal channels.  The experimental
team found that the facial component received approximately 3/2 the weight
received by the vocal component.  You can readily see that this roughly
corresponds to the 38% and 55% figures mentioned earlier.

 

You may be wondering how this study was conducted.  There was only one word
used.  That word was "maybe," selected for it's apparent neutrality.  Three
female speakers were tape recorded saying that word wile varying their tone
of voice so as to communicate three different attitudes (i.e., like,
neutral, and dislike) towards an imagined addressee.  Then the tapes were
listened to by 17 female subjects with instructions to imagine that the
speaker is saying this word to another person and judged by the tones what
the speaker's attitude is towards that imaginary addressee.  So there was no
direct feedback by anyone who was being addressed.  It was a number of
third-party listeners who were asked to mind-read, guess, interpret,
imagine, etc., how the speaker felt towards someone who wasn't even there
and, in fact, didn't even exist.  There was no way to see or hear the
reactions of this phantom individual, about whom someone was going to make
several long-lasting and powerful speculations.

 

Next, black and white photographs were taken of three female models as they
attempted to use facial expressions t communicate like, neutrality, and
dislike towards another person.  Then photos were shown to the same 17
subjects with the instructions that they would be shown the pictures and at
the same time hear a recording of the word "maybe" spoken in different tones
of voice.  "You are to imagine that the person you see and hear (A) is
looking at and talking to another person (B)."  For each presentation they
were to indicate on a rating scale what they thought A's attitude was toward
B.  Again, third-party mind-reading with no direct contact with the person
addressed, B, because that person was non-existent.  The conclusions from
this experiment were that the facial components were stronger than the vocal
by the ratio of 3/2 as referred to earlier.

 

An interesting comment that came out of the discussion section indicated
that the effect of redundancy (i.e., consistent attitude communication in
two or more channels) is to intensify the attitude communicated in any one
of the component channels.  Perhaps this is something that could be more
profitably pursued instead of the denigration of words.  Or as you can see
from this particular study, word, not words.  And that word was "maybe."  It
seems to play words under quite a handicap not much different from playing
charades. 

 

Two Studied Combined

They integrated this study with another one to come up with the .07, .38,
and .55 coefficients.  This second study was reported in the Journal of
personality and Social Psychology, 1967, Vol. 6, No. 1, pg. 109-114
entitled, Decoding Of Inconsistent Communications.  Here they dealt with
inconsistent communication of attitude in two components; tone of voice and
nine different words.  Three words were selected that seemed to indicate a
positive attitude, "honey," "thanks," and "dear."  Three were neutral,
"maybe," "really," and "oh," and three were negative, "don't," "brute," and
"terrible."

 

Two female speakers were employed to read each of the nine words with each
of the three tones, positive, neutral, or disliking of an imaginary
addressee.  These were recorded on tape which was then listened to by 30
University of California undergraduates. 

 

They were instructed to imagine that each word was being said by one person
to another and to judge what the speaker's attitude was towards the
imaginary recipient.  One-third were told to ignore the information conveyed
by the meaning of the words and to pay attention only to the tone.  Another
third were told to ignore the tone and pay attitude only to the meaning of
the words.  The last third were told to utilize both the tone and the
content.

 

The findings were that the independent effects of tone, overall, were
stronger than the independent effects of content.  I should think so!  After
all, the words allowed were very limited while the tones allowed were
unlimited as long as certain feelings were being demonstrated.  But, after
all, Mehrabian's main interest is in non-verbal types of communication.
However, in fairness, it was mentioned in the discussion that the
methodology used failed to solve the problem for which it was intended.  An
alternative methodology could have employed written communication for
assessing the independent effects of content and electronically filtered
speech (with the content rendered incomprehensible) for assessing the
independent effects of tone.  I don't know if an alternative experiment like
that was ever carried out. 

 

After commenting on some of the methodological problems, they do go on to
say that the results indicate that judgments of attitude from inconsistent
messages involving single words spoken with intonation are primarily based
on the attitude carried in the tonal component.  The use of single words is
a long way away from normal communications, don't you think?  In fact, they
admit that their findings can only be safely extended to situations in which
no additional information about the communicator-addressee relationship is
available.  This seems to relegate it to the realm of tightly controlled
laboratory-pure experimentation only.

 

I would invite all of you readers to examine not only Mehrabian's books, but
also his articles in the professional journals which go into more detail
concerning his experiments.  If enough of us carefully analyze the available
data, perhaps we can reinterpret the results in a more useful, meaningful,
and workable way than we have in the past.

    

Time For Accuracy

If we continue to disseminate erroneous information such as the 7-38-55
myth, I feel we are doing a grave disservice not only to the NLP community,
but to the public in general.  We could do a great service by helping the
public realize that the words they use on themselves as well a on others are
extremely important in determining the effectiveness and longevity of
relationships, the strength of personal self-esteem, and a whole host of
other psychological physiological phenomena.  

 

Words and language are probably the primary motivation factors for human
beings and they can be enhanced by proper congruent tonality and body
language.  They can also be somewhat diminished by incongruencies which then
often show up as confusion and bewilderment in relationship situations.  For
example, think how often some battered women have desperately believed the
words of their batterers despite overwhelming incongruent behavior.  "He
said he was really going to change this time." 

 

Think of your own personal experiences in close relationships that have gone
sour.  Haven't you also hoped and waited for change that would transform
incongruent communication signals into congruent ones?  Especially before
NLP training?  Haven't most of us, at some time, hopelessly clung to our own
inaccurate interpretation of another's actions hoping for a miracle that
would once again make everything whole and comfortable just like we thought
it used to be?  And what was the total affect of the spoken word at those
times?  Did the words really have only a 7% influence on our hopes and
desires?  Not likely.  Given the emotional impact of prior experience and
beliefs, our memories are not about to logically reduce the words of a loved
one, or former loved one, to such an insignificant role instantaneously. 

 

Such impersonal and coldly analytical reactions are probably destined to
remain in the safety aloof confines of the experimental laboratory with its
pretend situations and imaginary interactions.  Perhaps we could benefit
from a re-assessment of old acquired beliefs in the glaring light of real
life relationship reactions and perceptions.

 

References

Buscaqlia, Leo.  (1982).   Living, loving, & learning.  Charles B. Slack,
Inc.

Mehrabian, Albert.  (1972).  Nonverbal communication.  AldimeAtherton, Inc.

Mehrabian, Albert.  (1971).  Silent Messages.  Wadsworth Publishing Co.

Mehrabian, Albert; Ferris, Susan. (1967).  Journal of Consulting Psychology,
Vol. 31. No. 3. Pg. 248-252.

Mehrabian, Albert; Wiener, Morton. (1967).  Journal of Personality and
Social Psychology. Vol. 6, No. 1. Pg. 109-114.

 

Author

Dr. C. E. "Buzz" Johnson, retired Optometrist, has been through Master
Practitioner and Trainer's Training.  He has been researching the power of
words in a variety of different disciplines, medicine, education,
addictions, relationships, psycho-neuro-immunology, hypnosis, psychotherapy,
etc.

Quoted by Permission from Dr. Johnson, Published originally in Anchor Point,
July 1994.

 

 

 




 

 

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D., Executive Director 

Neuro-Semantics 

P.O. Box 8

Clifton, CO. 81520 USA                             

               1 970-523-7877 

                    Dr. Hall's email:
<mailto:meta at acsol.net\hich\af31506\dbch\af31505\loch\f31506> meta at acsol.net


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