Touch: An Important Form Of Nonverbal Communication

Chapter Journal Communication is very important to our daily life, but sometimes people will not say what they mean, in stead, their body movements and gestures tell the truth. Nonverbal communication is the “study of communication systems that do not involve words” (Trenholm, 99). These nonverbal messages may be more important than verbal messages because what we do often conveys more meanings than what we say. Touch is “an important form of nonverbal communication, and its study is sometimes called haptics” (Trenholm, 120). Touch can conveys a lot of different meanings to the people around us and also each culture has their own regulation of “how and how often their members touch” (Trenholm, 120). I found a good example of this concept …show more content…
This kind of feeling may caused by the environment I lived in. In my family, touching is not used as common as most American families, and I can clearly count the number of times my mom and dad hug or touch me when I was still a children. When I was in China, my Elementary School teacher always tells us that there is a huge difference between male and female students, and it is very inappropriate when a male or female student touches each other. I am not sure if it is still the same in China, but in the textbook it stated, “people deprived of touch may develop physical, mental, and social disorders” (Trenholm, 120). This context is very important to communication because most of the time, the words we say may not express the correct feeling due to varieties of reason, but a simple touch can let others feel the same thing as you are feeling too. If the meaning of touch is understood correctly, then the message is correctly understand by the receiver. The message also achieves the intended effects physically, mentally, and emotionally. Lastly, if one party or another does not force the act of touch, the message is considered to be