Emphatic or ‘active listening’ stresses putting one’s self in another’s place. The goal is to effectively understand and accurately interprets another’s meanings.

Stewart and Thomas identify 3 problems with this sort of approach:

1. We cannot actually get inside another’s mind or occupy their perspective. Nor can we actually set aside our own perspective.

1. Paraphrasing under this approach can become a mere parroting back of the other’s words, which tends to frustrate the other person.

1. These approaches focus each participant’s attention on the other’s internal psychological state, rather than focusing on the joint process and interaction of communication.

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Dialogical Listening

Stewart and Thomas contrast dialogic listening to actice or emphatic approaches.

The dialogic approach has four distinctive characteristics:

1. It emphasises conversation as a shared activity. Usually people focus their attention on their own views in conversation. Active listening overcompensates for this tendency by overemphasising the need to focus attention on the other’s views. In contrast, in dialogic listening the focus is on ‘our’ views and the emerging product of the conversation.

1. Dialogic listening stresses an open-ended, playful attitude toward conversation. Stewart and Thomas note that the modern Western culture values ‘hard’ thinking which produces certainty, closure, and control. Speculative, metaphoric, ambiguous thinking is generally devalued. Dialogic listening seeks to recover and tap into the productive creativity of this ‘softer’ style of thinking. In contrast to the ‘hard’ style of most conversations, the ‘soft’ style of dialogic listening requires modesty, humility, trust, and a robust recognition of the other party as a choice-maker.

1. In dialogic listening, the parties focus on what is happening between them, rather that each party focusing on what is going on within the mind of the other. Stewart and Thomas say, “instead of trying to infer internal ‘psychic’ states from the talk, when you are listening dialgocially you join with the other person in the processs of co-creating meaning between you” (p.162)

1. Dialogic listening focuses on the present (what we are doing now), rather than primarily on future goals (what we will do), or on past events (what we did then). Dialogic listening requires that one be fully present to the process and one’s conversation partner. This attitude of being-in-the-present helps each party to unify his or her actions, intentions, and speech. It can also ameliorate power differences.

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Applications

The most important element in applying dialogic listening is the participant’s attitude. The dialogic listener must stay focused on staying present, and on the open-ended process they are jointly creating. Dialogic listening occurs when these attitudes are coupled with the following techniques:

1. Dialogical listeners should encourage each other to say more, to further explore and explicate their views and questions. The authors find that requests to ‘say more’ seldom produce mere reputation, and generally produces greater clarity and detail.

1. Dialogic listeners should also use, extend, and share metaphors. Such use of metaphors is typical of the softer style of thinking, which this approach seeks to foster. Exploring metaphors can help to reveal new perspectives on an issue or situation.

1. Dialogic listening also makes use of paraphrasing. The authors recommend asking one’s conversation partner to paraphrase one’s comments. Dialogic listeners use paraphrasing not just to repeat what the other said but aslo to interpret and respond. Again, the goal here is to keep the conversation open and focused on the interaction.

1. The authors also encourage dialogic listeners to explore the context of each other’s claims. Explore the circumstances and desire which surround ideas, feelings and opinions. Filling out the context facilitates shared understanding.

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Disadvantages to dialogical listening

Stewart and Thomas conclude by responding to common objections to their dialogic approach. One objection is that dialogic listening is too time consuming. The authors point out that this approach can be pursued in only half-again the time that poorer communication takes. Moreover, dialogic listening can lead to more efficient communication in future interactions. Many people find that the increased quality in communication balances the additional time costs.

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Dialogic listening can seem awkward and possibly manipulative to those who are unfamiliar with the approach. If you encounter this resistance, the authors suggest first that you re-examine your own motivations to make sure you aren’t being manipulative or insincere. Otherwise, people can usually be put at ease with some brief explanation of your non-standard behaviour.

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Finally, dialogic listening is very demanding. It requires a lot of effort and attention. Sometimes people will resist these demands. One may encourage others to participate in the dialogic approach, but you must know when to stop pushing.

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Active listening
Quotes taken from here in the context of Conflict research studies

”Active listening is a way of listening and responding to another person that improves mutual understanding.

Often when people talk to each other, they dont listen attentively. They are often distracted, half listening, half thinking about something else.

When people are engaged in a conflict, they are often busy formulating a response to what is being said. They assume that they have heard what their opponent is saying many times before, so rather than paying attention, they focus on how they can respond to win the argument.

Active listening is a structured form of listening and responding that focuses the attention on the speaker.

The listener must take care to attend to the speaker fully, then repeats, in the listener’s own words, what he or she thinks the speaker has said.

The listener does not have to agree with the speaker – he or she must simply state what they think the speaker said. This enables the speaker to find out whether the listener really understood. If the listener did not, the speaker can explain some more.

Often, the listener is encouraged to interpret the speaker’s words in terms of feelings.

Thus, instead of just repeating what happened, the active listener might add “I gather that you felt angry or frustrated or confused when.. [a particular event happened]. Then the speaker can go beyond confirming that the listener understood what happened, but can indicate that he or she also understood the speaker’s psychological response to it.

Active listening has several benefits.

1. it forces people to listen attentively to others.

1. it avoids misunderstandings, as people have to confirm that they really do understand what another person has said.

1. it tends to open people up, to get them to say more.

When people are in conflict, they often contradict each other, denying the opponent’s description of a situation. This tends to make people defensive, and they will either lash out, or withdraw and say nothing more.

However, if they feel that their opponent is really attuned to their concerns and wants to listen, they are more likely to explain in detail what they feel and why. If both parties to a conflict do this, the chances of being able to develop a solution to their mutual problem becomes much greater.”

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(‘Dialogical listening text above is a transcribed summary by Tanya Glaser from here

in the context of Conflict research studies)

(Reference- John Stewart and Milt Thomas, “Dialogic Listening: Sculpting Mutual Meanings,” in Bridges Not Walls, ed. John Stewart, 6th edition, (New York: Mc Graw- Hill, 1995), pp. 184-201.)